Sabir Alam : Kolkata : One of the speakers who raised some very pertinent points on the first day of #MediaNext 2020 that focused on Digital Journalism was Anto T Joseph, the former Managing Editor of DNA.
Mumbai based Senior Journalist Anto T Joseph is a writer and columnist. He has also worked with The Economic Times, The Guardian and Deccan Chronicle Group.
#MediaNext 2020 is being organized by the Kolkata-based Adamas University in association with Sharda University, Birla Global University, DME, AIMEC, Lok Samvad Sansthan, exchange4media, ABP Education and IndiaReal. The mega conclave is being organized over a period of 10 days from June 1, 2020 to June 10, 2020. Each day of the conclave focuses on one specialized domain of the Media and Entertainment (M&E) industry and the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on that specific domain.
Anto T Joseph shared his opinions on newspapers in the post-Covid era, falling newspaper readership and circulation. He said that many newspapers’ delivery rates were declining earlier. Due to the pandemic, a much bigger mess has been created resulting in the fall of newspapers.
He also added that the top 10 newspapers in India have experienced fall in numbers. Dainik Jagran and Dainik Bhaskar, known to be the largest circulating newspapers in the world, have also witnessed a fall in circulation.
He added that it’s a tough time to garner advertising revenues subject to the decline in GDP. Thus, people are not buying what they used to buy. Due to the emergence of digital media, the traditional print media is declining. Therefore, the advertising campaigns are not being run on traditional media as the audience density on the given platform has decreased over time.
The INS (Indian Newspaper Society) said that e-papers in portable document formats (pdf) are not going to be free. So, INS plans to make changes in their business model to generate revenues by annual or monthly subscriptions. There is a huge growth of digital media.
Can print Journalists transform into digital journalists and will they be suitable and what are the new skills that are required?, asked a student. Joseph responded by saying, “Newspaper is dead. Many media firms and journalists have already turned to the digital platform.”
He added, “If you are a reporter, then you have to do the same thing even in digital media because fundamentals never change.” He also added that for the sub-editors, who are new to the digital world, have to know the audience and create effective and powerful headlines. What will be the future of freelance writers?, was another question to which he said, “The writing habits are declining due to the addictive impact of digital electronics. Earlier, the freelance writers and independent journalists used to get paid well, though in recent years, the pay has also dropped drastically. The emergence of digital media has also created a huge opportunity for content writers. So, is digital is the way forward? To understand this, it is important to understand as to what is digital?
Joseph said that many digital platforms are also facing the same problem – The Quint, ET Now and many other online media platforms facing problems in terms of generating revenues because in online platforms, generating revenues is a long process.
So, to understand the future of Digital Media, he used a SWOT analysis. It created strengths and opportunities for new and old firms going digital. There are many benefits of the digital platform – it is available in different formats for different devices. The target audience is known and revenues models are followed i.e. by rising subscription and premium package, additional benefits are given to the readers. For weaknesses and threats, he said that being at the developing stage it will take time, and some are doing very well. The competition has also increased due to high traffic of the audience in the digital platform.
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