How blogging is changing media reporting

Not all that long ago all of our news would come from the media. Whether it was the morning newspaper, radio or television, accessing the latest stories was pretty much a standardised formality. However, the rise of the Internet and, more particularly, the blogging community has all but put paid to traditional media sources.

Internet bloggers have a number of advantages over their offline counterparts. First and foremost is the immediacy of the online platform. As soon as a blogger receives a lead they can get started on a post and have it live within seconds. There’s no red tape, no editorial to pass through and no restrictions on content. Almost anything goes on the Internet, something the media can and probably never will be able to replicate.

A bloggers style is often far removed from that of the conventional journalist. However, this is one area, arguably at least, where the differences have become slightly blurred. To remain relevant to the tech savvy generation of media consumers, written and spoken styles have changed. The buttoned up conventions of Received Pronunciation that were extolled on the BBC for decades have been replaced by colloquialisms, regional dialects and celebrity news.

The transition towards a more relaxed and informal media started some time ago; however, in recent years the shift has gathered pace. Blogs have almost as much power as traditional outlets. Each sector has its powerhouse, whether it’s Perez Hilton (celebrity gossip), The Huffington Post (breaking news) or TechCrunch (technology) there’s a dominant blogger in every sphere.

But with the rise of social media, there has come a similarly substantial proliferation of blogs; some in brand new niches, others challenging the established top order. With the Internet now also going mobile, being made available on phones, PDAs and laptops, much of the appeal of media has dipped. Newspaper sales continue to suffer and doubtless in time television may suffer the same fate.

As revealed earlier in the month in our post ‘Classic Media Beating blogs to the Punch’, official news outlets are still getting stories out there first. With the wealth of resources they have available this is only to be expected, and this is one thing that Internet-based reporters may never be able to counteract.

Media reporting has had to remain focussed on the conventions of the past, whilst also incorporating the trends of today. The enforced modernisation of media will doubtlessly split opinion. There are those who welcome the reform and believe that now news is being forced to become more relevant and quicker with it too. Whilst others will always prefer a well-constructed and in-depth analysis, something only the old media can truly provide.

But the world is invariably being drawn online. Almost anything can now be accessed straight through your computer. From live sports to complete television series’, everything that was once the domain of established media has now been transferred over to the medium of the future, the Internet.

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