路透社新闻研究所：2018地方新闻的数字化转型(英文版).pdf

DIGITAL NEWS PROJECT2018The Digital Transition of Local News Joy Jenkins,Rasmus Kleis NielsenContents About the Authors 4Acknowledgements 4 Executive Summary 5Introduction 7 1.Local News and Digital Media 10 2.Streamlining Digital Editorial and Commercial Efforts 15 3.Creating a Digital-First Culture 21 4.New Business Model Approaches 32 5.The Changing Functions of Local Media 38Conclusion 42References 44Appendix:List of Interviewees 46THE REUTERS INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF JOURNALISM4About the Authors Joy Jenkins is a postdoctoral research fellow at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.Her research focuses on the sociology of news,particularly changing organisational structures and roles in newsrooms,the potential for news organisations to spur public engagement,and gender representations in media.She earned her doctorate in journalism from the University of Missouri in 2017,where she taught courses in news writing and reporting,magazine reporting,news and media literacy,and qualitative research methods.Her work has been published in multiple academic journals.She previously worked as a copy editor and reporter at an alternative newsweekly in Oklahoma City and as senior editor at a city magazine in Tulsa,Oklahoma.Rasmus Kleis Nielsen is director of research at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism,professor of political communication at the University of Oxford,and editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Press/Politics.His work focuses on changes in the news media,political communication,and the role of digital technologies in both.He has done extensive research on journalism,American politics,and various forms of activism,and a significant amount of comparative work in western Europe and beyond.Recent books include The Changing Business of Journalism and its Implications for Democracy(2010,edited with David A.L.Levy),Ground Wars:Personalized Communication in Political Campaigns(2012),and Political Journalism in Transition:Western Europe in a Comparative Perspective(2014,edited with Raymond Kuhn).Acknowledgements First,we would like to thank the 48 interviewees for taking the time to share their perspectives on navigating the local media environment in the digital age.We appreciate the time they took to welcome us to their newsrooms and speak openly with us about their experiences,challenges,and successes.We would also like to thank the academic and Reuters Institute colleagues who provided insights into the local news environments in their countries.Special thanks for their help connecting with interviewees to Pauline Amiel,temporary lecturer and research assistant at Aix-Marseille Universit;Nathalie Pignard-Cheynel,assistant professor at the Universit de Neuchtel;Atte Jskelinen,Reuters Institute visiting fellow;Emma-Leena Ovaskainen,Reuters Institute journalist fellow;Alexandra Borchardt,Reuters Institute director of strategic development;Caroline Lees,head of communication;Kate Hanneford-Smith,Reuters Institute administrator;and David Levy,Reuters Institute director.We also appreciate the French interpreting services provided by Julien Coquelle-Rohm and Clay Suddath.Finally,we are grateful for the feedback and support from the research team at the Reuters Institute,including Alessio Cornia,Richard Fletcher,Lucas Graves,Antonis Kalogeropoulos,Timothy Libert,Slvia Maj-Vzquez,Nic Newman,Tom Nicholls,and Annika Sehl,as well as Rebecca Edwards,Christina Koster,and Louise Allcock.Published by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism with the support of Google and the Digital News Initiative.5THE DIGITAL TRANSITION OF LOCAL NEWSExecutive SummaryIn this report,we analyse how local and regional newspapers in Europe are adapting to an increasingly digital,mobile,and platform-dominated media environment.Local news organisations play a particularly important role in terms of serving their communities.The challenges and opportunities they face are partly similar to those of national news organisations(declining legacy reach and revenues,shrinking newsrooms,new chances to connect with audiences online)but also partly distinct(most have fewer opportunities to pursue scale and more limited resources to invest in digital media but also less direct competition in their local markets).We focus here on the digital transition of local and regional newspapers and how they define and navigate the challenges and opportunities they face,including creating digital-first newsrooms,understanding and adapting to audience needs,and diversifying their business models.A key theme is how the approaches of local newspapers parent companies shape the ways they adapt to digital media.The report is based on 48 interviews with editors,reporters,and commercial directors at newspapers and editorial and commercial executives at their parent companies in the UK,France,Germany,and Finland.Our case newspapers represent both independent and group-owned ownership models.In particular,we suggest that parent companies are pursuing different overall strategies for producing and monetising local news in the digital age.We identify three approaches:the search for national scale,regional breadth,or local depth.These strategies influence not only how local newsrooms make decisions about editorial content but also how they differentiate their online and print products,discuss their audiences,cultivate social media tactics,focus their business models,and develop plans for the future.National scaleRegional breadthLocal depth Emphasis on scale Company-wide digital philosophy Centralized online content creation Traffic focus Online ads model Offers access to large network Emphasis on regional growth Solutions-focused digital experts Distinct newsroom cultures Access to centralized national content to allow for focus on local reporting Paid content models Continued emphasis on potential of print Editorial and advertising strategies driven by local community/region Distinct newsroom cultures Smaller online teams Paid content models,often based on premium content(1)National scale:This strategy emphasises economies of scale,pursued through the acquisition of a portfolio of different titles that,in aggregate,can draw the largest possible audience,which is in turn primarily monetised through advertising.This approach was most evident among the national parent companies in the sample,particularly in the UK.These companies tend to feature centralised newsrooms producing online content that can then be shared across multiple newspapers and adapted to local markets.They also seek to minimise costs through shared digital advertising sales,human resources,etc.These companies pursue a common digital culture across their holdings through in-newsroom training,conference calls,and company-wide editorial initiatives.Interviewees discussed both the benefits of this structure(access to digital experts and tools,a large network of local newspapers,robust web content)and challenges(what some saw as difficult-to-meet traffic targets).THE REUTERS INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF JOURNALISM6(2)Regional breadth:This approach also emphasises economies of scale but focuses on developing a more focused portfolio of editorial and other offers for a particular,often contiguous,region.The aim is to achieve a strong and distinct market position in that specific area,a position that local publishers increasingly seek to monetise through paid content models and the pursuit of auxiliary forms of revenue from events,services,e-commerce,and the like to supplement advertising.This approach is evident in large regional companies in France,Germany,and Finland,countries that have long sustained a robust local and regional press.As in the national-scale approach,these organisations often feature centralised newsrooms for national content while emphasising regionalism in editorial content and considerable centralisation of back-end functions,such as ad sales and human resources.However,companies focused on building a broad range of offers tailored to the different communities in the region they serve often give local titles autonomy to address specific needs,and affiliated newspapers maintain distinct cultures.(3)Local depth:This approach is pursued by individual local titles and groups and by those owned by smaller parent companies.Examples include Finlands Kaleva,Frances Nice-Matin,Germanys Main-Post,and the UKs Kent Messenger.These organisations remain editorially and financially powered by their communities and regions reporting on smaller geographic areas and in many cases relying on local advertising and print subscriptions.Like larger groups pursuing regional breadth,they increasingly look beyond display advertising and seek to sustain themselves through premium content and subscription models as well as auxiliary revenue sources.These organisations are often highly tailored to the specific areas they serve but tend to have fewer resources and hence less complex infrastructures for digital production than other companies in the sample.Their emphasis on a more targeted geographic area and audience also make them less able to realise economies of scale and more dependent on local support in the long run.All of these approaches are distinct from a more resigned strategy that is seen in some parts of the local and regional news industry,where companies focus on cutting costs to remain profitable even as legacy revenues decline.All of the approaches discussed here involve investment in developing new digital offerings and ways of engaging local communities that are not solely focused on extracting short-term operating profits from a declining print business.This orientation toward the future is critically important for the future of local news,both as a business and as a part of local communities.Most of the local news organisations we cover here still generate 8090%of their revenues and sometimes more from legacy print operations that are in clear structural decline.Although many of them are building impressive new digital offerings,across their websites,social media accounts,and other channels,they have significantly lower reach among younger people in their communities than they have had historically among their older print readers.Like many other news organisations,they find themselves in a position where some of the companies with whom they compete for advertising revenues large platform companies like Facebook and Google are also central to how they reach their online audiences through search engines and social media.The traditional bundle of local news combined with other information about the weather,movie listings,sports results,and various forms of advertising is less attractive to younger users,and many interviewees believe that the classic combination of a traditional package overwhelmingly funded through advertising will not remain the mainstay of local journalism.Their commitment to continued experimentation is based on their recognition of the pressing need to continue to evolve the ways they serve their local communities through their journalism,as well as the digital business models that enable this aim.For all the impressive work already done,the digital transition of local news is still clearly at an early stage.7THE DIGITAL TRANSITION OF LOCAL NEWSIntroductionLocal news plays a vital role in democratic societies.Local news organisations,from legacy players such as newspapers and TV and radio stations to emerging actors such as hyperlocal news websites,have a distinctive ability to connect and empower their audiences through informing them about their communities and equipping them with the information they need to become active participants(Harte et al.2017;Nygren et al.2017).Local newspapers,in particular,have long occupied dominant positions in their media environments,facing little competition for readers or advertisers and in many cases offering information not available anywhere else(Nielsen 2015b).The future of local media,however,has become increasingly uncertain,with the shift to a digital-,mobile-,and platform-dominated media environment and the resulting changes in audience behaviour affecting this sector perhaps even more acutely than national and international media(Ali and Radcliffe 2017;Cornia et al.2016,2017;Newman et al.2017;Sehl et al.2016,2017).Historically,advertising was the most important source of revenue for many local newspapers,and because they were the main publication available in their communities,they had considerable market power and could operate sometimes very profitable businesses.The move to digital media has changed this status profoundly.Advertisers increasingly invest in online advertising,which is dominated by large US-based platform companies that offer low prices,precise targeting,and unduplicated reach.Local newspapers cannot compete directly,and online,their traditional business model,advertising,is thus existentially challenged.As one advertising executive put it:Local isnt valuable anymore.Anyone can sell local(quoted in Nielsen 2015a).The need for local news organisations,particularly newspapers,to adapt to these trends and demonstrate their relevance while facing declining advertising revenues,circulation rates,and staff sizes has resulted in a perfect storm for layoffs,buyouts,and even closures.In this report,we look at how eight European local and regional newspapers operating in different countries are adapting to these shifts and evolving both their editorial offerings and the business that underpins it.Despite their shared emphasis on uniting diverse audiences in specific geographic areas(Powers et al.2015)and generally strong sense of democratic purpose to provide analysis and accountability(Coleman et al.2016),local media should not be regarded as monolithic.Understanding the outlook for local news requires considering both variations among and within countries,such as assessing differences in media systems and between rural and urban news organisations(Nielsen 2015a).Across Europe,local media environments feature significant differences,with strong public-and private-sector national news but a heavily consolidated local press in the UK,market-dominant regional newspaper companies in France,and robust local and regional newspapers in Germany and the Nordic countries.Therefore,comparatively evaluating local media is vital.This report examines challenges and opportunities facing European local newspapers and how they have responded to shifts in audience preferences,revenue opportunities,and ownership requirements.In particular,the report addresses three components of local news:editorial strategies,including the routines and processes through which journalists at local newspapers produce news;distribution strategies,specifically how expectations have changed in response to the need to deliver news on digital platforms and via mobile in particular;and business strategies,including both existing and e