I grew up watching the local evening news. It’s when the family would gather for dinner and talk about the day. It’s how I learned about places and people in Newfoundland. It’s how I learned to obsess about the weather. In a strange way, it became part of my childhood and my culture.
Things have changed a bit since then.
No one has time to sit and eat anymore. We certainly don’t have time to actually sit for the news. Why would we when we can grab the latest breaking headlines right on our phones?
Recent studies show that about 38 percent of Canadians get their news primarily from social media. For Americans, a staggering 62 percent hop online to get theirs. (https://techcrunch.com/2016/05/26/most-people-get-their-news-from-social-media-says-report/)
Couple these statistics with the recent CRTC ruling that cable providers must offer an affordable $25 base package to consumers, and its not surprising that our trusted news anchors are probably updating their resumes as I type. (http://ottawacitizen.com/news/national/new-cable-unbundling-will-hurt-canadian-tv-production-predicts-new-report)
Millennials probably wont lose much sleep over this. After all, they are the ones consuming the most online news. But lets not forget those of us a bit more ‘seasoned’ that aren’t chained to our phones or tablets. Lest we forget those that still have no idea what a hashtag is.
If reports are true and Canadians lose a large number of local broadcasts, where do the less tech savvy citizens get their information? Sure, they could get with the times and hop online like everyone else. But what if they don’t have access to internet services? What if home is a remote community that receives little to no internet signal at all?
When considering those questions, the potential loss of the local news broadcast seems a bit more profound.
News providers are governed by metrics and revenues like any other business. If more and more people are tuning out its only a matter of time before advertisers do the same. It’s already happening as we see local news hours downsizing to just 30 minute broadcasts.
Now, this blog post is NOT a call to action. I’m not saying we should drop our phones and find the couch every evening. Let’s face it, that will never happen. However, as our aging Newfoundland population is replaced by younger generations raised online, it does leave the fate of the traditional evening news in peril. That’s a concern for me.
I watched the Berlin Wall fall with my family. I was riveted, along with my roommates, with the breaking news of the death of Princess Diana. We shared these moments in history and reacted to them together. We developed our opinions about these events and others around the world because of these interactions.
I just don’t know if that can happen to the same degree in a Facebook post or 140 character tweet.
What do you think? Lets talk.
No comments:
Post a Comment