THE JOURNALISM “CRISIS”

Abstract

Australia is facing many of the same trends in journalism that are occurring in other countries with mature media industries including declining numbers of journalists, fragmenting audiences, a loss of advertising revenue for media organisations and other challenges to their traditional business models including shifting patterns of news consumption, new competitors for old media and new technologies that demand more time from audiences. However, Australia is also in a unique position. It has a small population and unusually concentrated media ownership; recent newspaper circulation declines have not been as large as in the United States or United Kingdom; and Australia's major media organisations have “colonised the Web” to a larger degree than in many other countries. This has led to suggestions that Australian journalism will be immune from many of the most damaging international trends. Yet other evidence suggests Australia is already in the midst of an economic and professional crisis in newspaper journalism and that this is even more advanced than in other countries such as the United States and United Kingdom. This paper tests these competing propositions.

Keywords:

• Australia
• journalism
• media business models
• newspapers
• United States
• United Kingdom

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This research was supported by the Australian Research Council's Discovery funding scheme (project DP0663208) and the University of Melbourne Arts Faculty's Research Grant Scheme. The author wishes to thank Rodney Tiffen for providing access to resources and his forthcoming work, Stephanie Younane for her able research assistance and Michael Gawenda for his feedback. The usual disclaimer applies—any errors or omissions that remain are my responsibility.

Notes

1. There is some confusion on this point. The WAN report (2008a) states that “Year-on-year data of September 2007 show an overall circulation decline of just over one percent”. But a table in the report (Table 3.b) indicates a decline in total paid-for dailies between 2006 and 2007 of -5.35 per cent (more than for the United States (-3.03 per cent) and the United Kingdom (-3.46 per cent)). The report also states that “new circulation laws apply [in Australia] since 2007; figures cannot be accurately compared with previous years data” [sic].