‘Independent reporting is greatest challenge’
While some experts predict that newspapers in the Philippines will cease to exist in 30 to 35 years as readers turn to the Internet for information, the print media will not disappear, said Javier Vicente “JV” Rufino, director of Inquirer Mobile.
“Print media will not go away. It will transform. The audience is moving online,” he said in yesterday’s forum “Where is Journalism in a Digital World.”
He presented the mobile platform of the Inquirer Group, which has made all its 28 titles, including Cebu Daily News, available in digital editions whose entire pages can be read on iPhones, iPads, Android tablets, smartphones, Blackberries, Kindle and personal computers.
“The greatest challenge is to sustain independent journalism,” said Rufino.
“We don’t want to become dominated with people with an agenda.”
Rufino said media outlets are looking for a new revenue model in the fast-changing digital age because the cost of producing quality content makes it difficult to give it away for free on line.
The forum sponsored by CDN and Cebu Holdings Inc. was attended by mass communication students, bloggers, college professors and business executives.
Newspapers today are still valued for their “permanence” and being an authoritative source of information in he said, even though some international media experts hav drawn a scenario of extinction between 2040 and 2045, he said.
The digital age challenges journalists to be adept at multi-media, meet multiple deadlines and break news stories in 140 character-tweets, take photographs and video footage, Rufino said.
New skills are needed to reinforce traditional story telling by posting videos, audio interviews, and photos on line.
The Internet provides a flood of information for journalists to sift through but data still needs to pass editorial standards of verification, accuracy and fair ness, said Rufino.
CDN publisher Eileen Mangubat agreed, saying that future journalists still need to develop a good sense of news judgment, the ability to write, visual design and care to verify facts quickly.
Aside from releasing digital editions, the Inquirer Group has ventured into Internet radio and maximized SMS or text alerts.
“To be able to get maximum reach in you have to be in all these platforms,” Mangubat said.
Imee Alcantara, CDN vice president for operations, said, “There are more readers now, not less. We don’t see new media as a threat but a highway to reach our consumers anytime, anywhere.” /Marian Z. Codilla, Multi-media Coordinator
