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Australian media has entered a new phase in its painful transformation, yet so far it has been poorly reported and is only vaguely understood.
The evidence is everywhere. It’s in the poor commercial performance of all TV broadcasters, summed up in Bill Shorten’s recent claim on the ABC’s Q+A that free-to-air TV is in “diabolical trouble”.
It’s in Rupert Murdoch’s airy speculation that newspapers might only be around for another 15 years. It’s in the Reuters 2024 Digital News Report warning of growing news avoidance among the young.
It’s also in Meta’s withdrawal from funding media under the Australian government’s News Media Bargaining Code. Or the continuing job cuts across the media and the changing balance of power between media companies and tech platforms.
Even at public broadcasters such as the ABC, audiences are fragmenting and declining. There is an air of alarm in the morale-boosting efforts of its loquacious new chair, Kim Williams.
The fact the media itself has done a poor job joining all these dots is unlikely to surprise anyone familiar with US writer Upton Sinclair’s famous line that it’s hard to get someone to understand something when their salary depends on their not understanding it.
But the significance of the changes to the news media in Australia reach far beyond the vested interests of media moguls and journalists.
Williams correctly identified what’s at stake in the Sir John Monash Oration last week, when he warned of the implications of declining trust in media for social cohesion and the health of democracy.
He said “the very institutions of our society are losing the public’s trust, in large part because there is no longer a broad consensus about the facts”.
Today we are launching a new series on the future of Australian media, to better explain the powerful forces buffeting our media and how they will ultimately reshape society.
In our first piece, journalism academics Matthew Ricketson and Andrew Dodd examine the ways in which power has shifted from media barons to tech bros.
Ricketson and Dodd hold no illusions about the ruthless and hypocritical way traditional media owners wielded power, but they argue the tech bros are even worse because they don’t claim any fourth estate role: “If anything, they seem to hold journalism with tongs as far from their face as possible.”
In the coming days we’ll cover the commercial business models for radio and TV, rural and regional media, the future of printed newspapers, regulation of social media, and more.
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Misha Ketchell
Editor
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Matthew Ricketson, Deakin University; Andrew Dodd, The University of Melbourne
Old-school media moguls used their considerable influence covertly to get what they want. The big tech bros now in charge have no time for such niceties.
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Michelle Grattan, University of Canberra
National LGBTIQ+ group Equality Australia welcomed the government’s latest move, saying it was ‘sensible’ and ‘pragmatic’.
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Yeslam Al-Saggaf, Charles Sturt University; Julie Maclean, Charles Sturt University
In a new project, researchers looked at how to teach high school students to be safer with their phones.
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Emma Shortis, RMIT University
It’s a difficult question that has no easy answers, even if Kamala Harris wins in November.
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Michelle Grattan, University of Canberra
If the then-Labor leader had won the 2019 election, many things might have been different.
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Darius von Guttner Sporzynski, Australian Catholic University
Pope Francis’ longest overseas journey yet proves there is great power in papal travel – and that it’s changing to meet the demands of the modern world.
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Rob Stokes, Macquarie University
There are thousands of disused graveyards that could provide crowded cities with essential public green space.
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Joel Lexchin, York University, Canada; Brigitte Tenni, The University of Melbourne; Deborah Gleeson, La Trobe University; Ronald Labonte, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of Ottawa
We can’t rely on rich countries to donate mpox vaccines. Here’s what we need to do instead.
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Russell Blackford, University of Newcastle
The War Against the Past is sometimes convincing, but prompts larger questions about history, culture, education and morality.
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Deanne Fisher, Swinburne University of Technology
Today we’re able to finally reveal the first detailed picture of the gas shroud around a galaxy, extending 100,000 light years out into ‘empty’ space.
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Denis Tolkach, James Cook University; Stephen Pratt, University of Central Florida
Controversially, some airlines have already experimented with weighing passengers. We found travellers are mostly guided by self-interest in whether they accept such policies.
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Sara Walton, University of Otago; Andrea Foley, University of Otago
Large companies in New Zealand are increasingly being pushed to report their carbon emissions. But without a clear framework, businesses have been able to fudge (or hide) their results.
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Politics + Society
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Michelle Grattan, University of Canberra
Jim Chalmers also confirmed he will visit China later this month.
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Health + Medicine
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George Taleporos, La Trobe University
As a person with a severe physical disability, my life, like that of so many others in Australia, has been transformed by the NDIS.
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Connie Henson, UNSW Sydney; Katrina Ward, University of Newcastle; Kylie Gwynne, Macquarie University
One woman involved in our study realised her husband could be at risk of a heart condition. Her knowledge meant he got diagnosed – and had an urgent, life-saving quadruple bypass surgery soon after.
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Science + Technology
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Alan Collins, University of Adelaide
The first time Earth’s geologic record – information found inside rocks – has been used to create an animation of this kind.
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Erica Mealy, University of the Sunshine Coast
The federal government is encouraging more people to use artificial intelligence. But this blind hype dismisses the harms caused by the new technology.
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Environment + Energy
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Andres Felipe Suarez-Castro, Griffith University; Rachel Oh, The University of Queensland
Better urban planning can help stem the loss of birds by protecting and connecting the areas of habitat they need to survive.
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Laura Revell, University of Canterbury; Dan Smale, National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research; Richard McKenzie, National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research
More frequent wildfires, emissions from rocket launches and more satellite debris burning up in the atmosphere all contribute to ozone depletion and could slow the recovery of the ozone layer.
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Bradley J. Moggridge, University of Technology Sydney; Jessica K Weir, Western Sydney University; Katie Moon, UNSW Sydney; Rachel Morgain, The University of Melbourne
For the Kamilaroi of north-western New South Wales, the brolga and bittern are vital to culture. But conservation often doesn’t account for cultural knowledge or significance.
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Education
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Sarah Jefferson, Edith Cowan University
Parents offer rewards because they think it will help a child reach a desired goal. But it is more helpful to focus on effort than ‘success’.
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Arts + Culture
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Moya Costello, Southern Cross University
The new opera is a co-production by Opera Australia, Victorian Opera, and the Perth Festival and Brisbane Festival.
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Books + Ideas
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Luke Johnson, University of Wollongong
The First Friend is a double-speaking black comedy with an all-too-serious agenda for these partisan times.
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Business + Economy
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Stephen Bartos, University of Canberra
The economy hasn’t been this weak outside of a recession since the 1980s. GDP per capita has fallen for six consecutive quarters – the longest period in records going back to the 1970s.
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