George Brock is optimistic about the future of journalism despite current challenges. He argues that pessimists make three mistakes: (1) ignoring history shows journalism has overcome volatility before through experimentation, (2) forgetting that innovation requires failure and adaptation, and (3) confusing journalism institutions with the underlying ideas of verification and fact-finding. While new technologies have disrupted traditional business models, trained journalists still provide essential functions like verification, eyewitness reporting, sense-making, and investigative work. If journalism focuses on these core tasks using new technologies, and on serving democratic purposes rather than institutions, it can thrive in the digital age through continued experimentation.

1. The changing role of
journalism in the digital age:
an optimistic look
George Brock
City, University of London
Media Forum, Lviv, May 2017

2. How can I possibly be optimistic?
• Newspapers close; online startups struggle
• Online news publishing revenue elusive
• Authoritarian mistreatment of journalists
spreading (as populism spreads)
• Social networks are eating the advertising
income

3. Pessimists are making 3 mistakes
1. They ignore history
2. They forget that adaptation and
innovation require experiment…and
therefore involve frequent failure
3. They confuse institutions with ideas

4. (1) History
• For journalism, the 20th century was an
unusual time:
– Print, radio and TV all had relatively secure
incomes
– Entry costs high
• When transformative change (aka the
internet) struck in 1990s, many comfortable
assumptions were upset

5. But…
• Journalism sits at the junction between the
economic market and democratic/moral
purpose
• Market is least bad way to ensure journalism’s
independence
• Democratic purpose: like it or not, society must know
this
• This is an inherently unstable place to be
• Most of journalism’s history is volatile,
improvised and experimental

6. Charles Dickens: great novelist,
mostly useless editor/publisher

7. Whatever ground journalism is
standing on, it is usually moving

8. (2) Innovation/regeneration
• Names on an upward path: The Atlantic (US),
Financial Times (UK), 140journos (Turkey),
Rappler (Philippines), Le Monde (France),
OCCRP (Bosnia), Jota (Brazil), Schibsted Group
(Scandinavia), The Conversation (Australia, UK,
US, France, India) and…Reuters
• Investigative journalism, once pronounced
dead, has revived

9. More reasons to be cheerful
• Pressure returns people to first principles –
how do we concentrate on value?
• Legacy media adapting strip out low-grade
material
• Improved grasp stress on experiment (not just
‘innovation’)
• Agile response to change: Bellingcat, First
Draft and factcheckers everywhere

10. (3) Institutions vs ideas
• Faced with disruption, journalists made
mistakes:
– They assumed that mainstream media were
journalism
– They thought change was adaptive, not
transformative
– Reckoned that people valued their work more
highly than they do

11. It’s tough, no question
• Journalists are losing their jobs
• Social media have decoupled reporting from
the distribution of news
• External threats have multiplied
• Technology is rewriting the way we we know
what we cannot see and hear for ourselves
• Power to publish has been redistributed

12. It’s not just about journalism
• How information functions in society (to tell
us what we cannot see or hear for ourselves)
is changing profoundly.
• The quality of information is not just about
the higher speed or lower price of
information.
• Technology has removed editors and filters –
is now wondering what to do. Truth is
undermined.

13. In that new context…
• Journalism must be exact about its value
• Even if ‘everyone’s a journalist now’, trained
and experienced journalists are useful at 4
things:
– Verification
– Eye-witness
– Sense-making
– Investigative reporting

14. Use the best of the past in the future
• Those 4 ‘core’ tasks can be done with artificial
intelligence, big data, virtual reality, reporting
networks – and anything else that may come
along
• Because the journalist’s business is the systematic
effort to establish the facts of what matters to
society in real time.
• Old-fashioned things will come back into fashion:
editing, ethical rules…words (and not video)

15. Things that go right
• Fake news and Trump (underlines
journalism’s value)
• News organisations which create &
sustain cultures of high-quality
experiment
• Focus on value
• Focus on values in strategy and flexibility
in tactics

16. Questions?
• @georgeprof
• Blog: www.georgebrock.net
• george.brock.1@city.ac.uk
• Talking later today about the INJECT project to
superpower journalism: