29/09/16 - Leaks reveal Amber Rudd's involvement in Bahamas offshore firms (6)

29/09/16 - Leaks reveal Amber Rudd's involvement in Bahamas offshore firms

Amber Rudd, the current Home Secretary, was caught by a German newspaper partnered with BBC Panorama and The Guardian for being involved in a Bahamas offshore tax haven. While it remains unclear as to whether or not she actually invested in these firms, although she herself denies it, the story releases at a time when the government is seeking increased transparency of the practices taking place in these offshore companies and tax avoidance in general. This is evidenced through them planning to charge considerable fines to tax avoidance accountants associated with companies such as EY and KPMG as part of a crackdown on the issue.

• Her directorships were discovered among details of more than 176,000 companies set up in the Caribbean tax haven that have been leaked to the media.

I see this article as being representative of why exactly investigative journalism is needed in our current world - the story being a Guardian exclusive. People need to be aware of the practices that are being undertaken by the individuals governing over them, whether they're of a positive or more distasteful nature. In this case the latter is likely how it'll be perceived among most of the general public, however it's for a good purpose in that they can now scrutinise and hold their ministers to account things they've done.

26/09/16 - Publishers and journalists must work together to save journalism (5)

26/09/16 - Publishers and journalists must work together to save journalism (5)

Rather than focus alone on the fact that print is an increasingly dying media, this article details how the people behind it, journalists or reporters, are always at the losing end of the situation. While undoubtedly the digital revolution and adoption of e-media is discussed and cited as the main reason for journalists losing their jobs, publishers are also said to be the cause for this too. In saying that 'the crisis we journalists face at the hands of publishers is the destruction of our trade and therefore the annihilation of a public service,' the perception is got across that publishers are in fact a big reason as to why a number of jobs related to journalism have had to go. This tends to be due to the fact that (skilled, experienced) journalists have a reasonable amount of costs attached to them for publishers to pay with the research they make often taking considerable time to conduct, meaning from an economical standpoint 'desk-bound journalists' are ideal. With this the point is gotten across that both publishers and journalists will need to come together to work out how to solve the issue.

• Guardian News and Media, which owns The Guardian and The Observer newspapers, is to cut another 250 jobs in its latest effort to erase losses that came in at nearly £60m last year - 100 positions cut from editorial

This article furthers the discussion of the impact new digital media is having on the news industry, in specific to the jobs of journalists. What it does differently though, is approach it from a different perspective than is usually done in that publishers are also cited as a reason journalism has been falling in recent years. To combat against this as the rise of technology will not be looking to stop anytime soon, all that really can be done to prevent it having the damaging impacts that it has is for there to be closer work between them and journalists. Whether publishers will engage in this though is a whole different thing with economic benefits being the main thing in mind for them as oppose to improving the culture.   

How has news changed in the last 20 years?

How has news changed in the last 20 years?

Context:

During the last 20 years, the news industry has evolved in a way that many would say is quite unprecedented. With things such as the decline of actual newspapers and emergence of mobile devices including phones and tablets, the news has changed in a way that it's more accessible than we ever knew it to be. E-media sticks out here in particular with it not only allowing consumers to have another platform to access news on, but also to report their own on this same platform. It can be said that this was to the detriment of institutions but at the same time, others would suggest that their hold on the industry has merely remained the same.

Audience

• Citizen journalism sticks out as one of the main benefits for audiences of the changes that have occurred within news after the past 20 years. As put by journalism.about.com, 'citizen journalism is when private individuals do essentially what private reporters do - report information' which is 'usually found online.' Equipped with cameraphones, members of the general public can report random yet potentially notable things happening in front of them that perhaps couldn't have at all anticipated. Examples of this lie in the cases of police brutality that have occurred over the past few years including the death of Eric Garner and Alton Sterling. We see these deaths actually take place within videos shot by bystanders and with them we got a lot more of a inside look into some of the pure injustices going on, showing the significance that a feature like citizen journalism could have
• As a continuation of the point that citizen journalism has benefited audiences in that people can report on major ongoing issues, it's also granted them a platform for them to start their own publications whether it be through blogs or video-sharing as a way to spread news. We see this with YouTube channels such as DJ Akademiks for example. Providing commentary to the events that take place within the hip hop industry, the individual behind the channel has been referred to as being 'hip-hop's one man TMZ,' representative of the fact it can now take only a single individual to reach the feats of more major news publishers
• From an access point of view, news has changed in the sense that people are more likely than ever to access stories through social media rather than an actual newspaper. According to the Digital News Report 2016 carried out by Reuters, 51% of people with online access use social media as a news source. With the penetration the Internet has been making into homes across the world, this shows increasingly how access to the news through e-media is not coming to a stop anytime soon while more traditional platforms like print are on the decrease

Institution

• From an institutional standpoint, it could be said that firms in the news industry have suffered over the last 20 years due to to services like Google and Facebook. It has meant that billions in advertising revenue has went to the online services as oppose to the physical newspapers and has even resulted in journalists at these publications losing their jobs. Publications such as The Independent have even gone as far as completely shunning newspapers for a digital-only approach instead
• It could be said that news institutions haven't felt much of a change as a result of the emergence of the Internet and rather just have to adapt to the differences attached with. According to Herman and McChesney (1997) the market power of media giants won't be affected that much at all by the emergence of the Internet and perhaps this is true. Companies such as News Corp continue to have huge significance in the news industry, with or without the digital revolution so it could be said that news hasn't changed that much at all and things like citizen journalism don't have as much of an impact as we make it out to be - e.g. Daily Mail and General Trust earning a revenue of £1.86BN in 2014 alone

19/09/16 - Silicon Valley Brits: 'We had to leave the UK behind' (4)

This article has to do with a lot of new start-up technological companies from this country actually finding themselves being better off the States as oppose to the UK. With Silicon Valley renowned for being the headquarters for many high-tech firms including Apple, Google and Facebook, it's also the case now that UK find it a lot easier to succeed with their businesses there too. Things like growth tend to happen at a much slower rate in the UK, with an example being Robyn Exton who made $1 million in 8 months in Europe but earning the same amount in 6 days in the USA. Something that's also made note of is this whole idea of the cynicism towards failure that exists in the UK, rather than risk-taking.

• In 2015 US companies had access to $60bn, in the UK companies shared just $3.6bn

I think what this shows is that the UK will have to do quite a lot from now to encourage entrepreneurs from there to actually stay there. The success of technological companies in particular is almost an occurrence we're used to seeing in the USA with examples like Apple and Google named above. Particularly from an economic standpoint it'd be beneficial to the country if the businesses remained in the UK and as said before, do the wonders they've done in America.

19`/09/16 - Why Facebook is public enemy number one for newspapers, and journalism (3)

19/09/16 - Why Facebook is public enemy number one for newspapers, and journalism (3)

This article furthers this notion that the existence of social networks and other Internet services alike, are at nothing but a detriment to the newspaper industry. Looking at Facebook specifically, it's been made clear that the network has garnered a considerable amount of criticism in the last few weeks going from the censorship issue with the Phan Thi Kim Phuc napalm image, to whether their trending news topics present a bias to users to even their recently discovered reputation for tax avoidance. It's also referred to in the article that the social network has a strong hold in advertising revenue (on the Internet) due to the sophisticated targeting that can take place with the inputs of information users will enter about themselves on it. It's said that this in particular, is what is resulting in journalists for newspaper publications to lose their jobs, newspapers simply can't keep up with these advancements.

• 66% of Facebook users get news through the site.
• Facebook could be liable to pay between $3 to $5bn in extra US tax
• Facebook topped $2 billion in quarterly profit, six months after crossing the billion dollar mark for the first time
• Facebook added 220 million monthly active users in the past year, bringing the total audience to 1.71 billion users
• More than 90% of Facebook’s users are on mobile devices, where Facebook rakes in the bulk of its ad dollars

In my opinion, this article is only another confirmation that print is an increasingly dying media. As the use of online services/counterparts becomes more commonly used, the more it'll be in decline to the point where even more people (journalists) will lose their jobs if they haven't already. One thing to pick up on though is that although the network has attracted some bad press for the trending topics that they present due to its algorithmic nature, newspapers can be accused of also 'picking and choosing' what to publish, so perhaps a more objective viewpoint has to be picked up on here.

'Who are the major players in terms of news providers in the UK and what exactly do they own?'

'Who are the major players in terms of news providers in the UK and what exactly do they own?'

Quarterly reach of the leading 20 TV channels in the United Kingdom (UK) as of 1st quarter 2016

Monthly readership of UK newspapers and their websites from April 2015 to March 2016

(in terms of both print and online)

The Daily Mail newspaper is owned by the Daily Mail and General Trust who managed into 2014 to obtain revenue worth £1.86BN in 2014 alone.

One of the more notable players in terms of UK newspapers though is Rupert Murdoch who owns The Sun, The Times, Sunday Times and previously News of the World. Owning News (Corp) UK, in 2014 it was reported that he owned a third of the UK market share for newspapers.

The impact of Google

1)

Google has led to the decline of the newspaper industry in that they as the article put it, are 'siphoning off billions in advertising revenue.' With them doing this over the last decade or so, it's definitely evident with the company hitting $19 billion in ad revenue in the second quarter of this year, up 19% since 2015.

2)

'Google critics note how much advertising money has disappeared from the newspaper business over the past decade or so — more than $40 billion, or about 60 percent of the ad revenue the industry generated at its peak in 2000, according to figures from the Newspaper Association of America — and they draw a direct line connecting that with the in advertising revenue that Google brings in every year from AdWords.'

3)

The steepest decline in the graph is shown between 2005-2013. This is likely due to the increased prominence that mobile devices gained during this time, boosting the use of 'newspaper industry killers' like Google.

4)

Personally, I believe that Google is in part to blame for the closing down of newspapers and job losses resulting from that. However it can't be said that the sole responsibility lies with them as they are not the only search engine using ad revenue that exist e.g. Yahoo. Not only this but the shift people made from newspaper to online can also be cited as a contributor here as without them/us in the first place choosing to make the jump, perhaps the newspaper industry wouldn't be at the disadvantage that it currently is now.

5)

After having read this comment, you realise that it is true that Google has in fact benefitted many people whether it be journalists, writers or artists to be discovered who perhaps may never have been without it. So while it can't be said to have been entirely beneficial since it has undoubtedly 'killed' some outlets such as The Independent, it has given rise to a new wave of innovators.

12/09/16 - YouTube is still 'not paying enough' to British musicians (2)

YouTube is still 'not paying enough' to British musicians (2)

The organisation that works to represent the interests of musicians, artists and songwriters from a commercial side, UK Music, has claimed that YouTube are not paying a fair share for the music that comes from the UK industry. Acting as more of an umbrella organisation for the industry, artists from it including Jack Garatt and group, Two Door Cinema Club, agree in the sense that they view what YouTube is doing as unfair. Having been pitted against other competitors such as Spotify though, YouTube maintains that it ensures that artists are receiving the 'advertising dollars' that they should be, explaining that payment doesn't work per-stream akin to Spotify.

• The service has paid over £2.3bn to the music industry
• Per-stream rates fell in 2015 from $0.0020 to $0.0010
• Music made £4.1 billion contribution to UK economy in 2015

I view this article as being just another part in this ongoing battle between artists and streaming services which I began to see bubbling up in 2014. It was towards the end of this year when Taylor Swift pulled her music altogether from Spotify with her receiving $280K - 390K for her single 'Shake It Off' after 46.3M streams which she perceived as being unfair. Since then it has constantly been brought to question whether the services use fair methods to determine the payment that artists using it receive. In saying this I think it is fair that the UK industry should also inquire whether they're receiving a just amount from their productions, and if they aren't then YouTube should revise their system and ensure they are.

12/09/16 - The online Independent: there’s good news and bad news (1)

The online Independent: there’s good news and bad news (1)

Having ceased being a print publication on March 26th 2016, The Independent has since been a digital-only newspaper being accessible via either a mobile application available on iOS, Android and Windows to name a few platforms and a website. As the first national newspaper to embrace the approach, the publication has seen both positives and negatives, first and foremost in the sense that it's readership has risen by 42%. While this is the case though, the paper is also wary of the increase in costs that they may go on to witness as their reach globally goes up.

• Readership up by 42%
• As of April the app received twice as subscribers as the print publication did
• The monthly audience of independent.co.uk has risen by 33.3% in the last 12 months to 70m users

To me personally, this article is representative of the transition that a lot of newspaper publications will make from print to e-media. Having already established that print is a continually dying media in Year 12 while e-media is only continuing to grow and become more lucrative, it's inevitable that we'll see more publications make this switch. Eventually I'm sure we'll be seeing a lot more cases of this with The Independent leading the way as being the first to do it. At the same time though, it'll be interesting to see how the publications approach the transition in the way that they'll handle their costs because as said before audiences are only continuing to grow, so where will be the cut-off point where they decide that they're not going to expand their reach anymore?