Take yourself back to the 1980s and imagine the media landscape of the time and how people accessed news. Initially, there were just four TV channels, with Channel 4 arriving in 1982 and breakfast TV only starting on the BBC a year later. Other than that, people relied more on radio and the printed word until the arrival of Sky in 1989.
The explosion of the digital media
Fast forward to 2025 and everything has changed, with print media struggling and growing concerns that people are no longer getting their news from trusted sources, following the explosion of digital media.
A recent report has suggested that digital-born news media in Europe are succeeding best in countries where traditional legacy media is weak. However, journalists have had to adapt to how the outlets for their work are changing.
Journalism has always been a changing industry but the arrival of the Internet in the 1990s has had a massive impact on how the industry works and how the profession is taught. If you are looking for journalism courses which have modules dedicated to journalism for a digital audience, you will find them at sites such as schoolofjournalism.co.uk.
How journalists deal with the digital age
Journalists have had to accept that whilst they are professionals and have training in the ethics relating to accuracy and fairness in their writing or broadcasting, nowadays anyone with a smartphone can be a citizen journalist, and instead of consuming the news, they can disseminate it. Although this has put intense pressure on traditional media, with more and more 18-30 year olds getting their news from social media, journalists are fighting back with their own digital content, such as podcasts.
This readiness to embrace change has always been an important part of journalism, and most journalists are now keen to exploit different aspects of digital media to enhance their own product. This can involve including videos or galleries of photos with their prose and engaging directly with the reader through posts and reactions to improve the story and make it more impactful.
