Trends In Newsroom 2010

Newspaper newsrooms worldwide have had to drastically restructure their staffs, organization and workflows, whether it was because they integrated their print and online operations, to cut costs as they were pressured by the economic crisis, or because they wished to transform their print-centric news operation into a 24/7 multimedia organization. The current downsizing in many newsrooms leads to some obvious concerns about newspapers’ editorial quality in the future, while forcing editors to make difficult decisions on the newsroom jobs and roles that need to be safeguarded, sometimes at the expense of others.

The new demands of multi-platform journalism
It’s no surprise that the role of the journalist in the multimedia newsroom has significantly changed: in the US, the 2008 PRWeek/PR Newswire Media Survey found that the journalists’ skills were shifting shifted towards digital journalism, as well as an increased awareness of their newspapers’ financial issues. Of the 1,231 journalists from various media who were polled:

-    57% believe they are being asked to work more today than in the past.
-    56% say they are contributing to several platforms, including 39% of newspaper journalists who have to work on the online version of their publication.
-    38% of newspaper reporters expect to see "reductions in staff" over the next three years. Only 63% of print journalists believe their publication will survive considering the current state of the print industry.
-    91% consider the most important aspect of their work is to "make my publication successful by creating appealing content for its audiences", while to "break news" and "chronicle events as they happen" came as lower priority. The survey says that this "suggests a significant level of commercial awareness on the part of journalists."

COMMUNITY EDITORS REPLACE THE OMBUDSMAN?
As newsrooms reorganize for a digital future, many newspapers have created new positions to reflect the increasing importance of user interaction in the news process. The Telegraph in the UK is one among many newsrooms to have created the position of “Head of Comment and Community”, appointing Iain Martin in April. Martin’s role was to oversee all comment pages and community areas for the Telegraph's three main platforms (print, Web, Sunday edition), as well as be responsible for all platforms that host user input.

THE END OF SUBEDITORS?

In recent years, as more newsrooms have integrated their print and online operations and cut costs, it has become increasingly clear that the role of the subeditor and adjunct production tasks were being radically changed. Add to that that most recent content management systems have made the bulk of traditional subediting tasks accessible to journalists, and the fate of subeditors looks grim.

TRINITY MIRROR: THREE NEWSROOMS MERGE IN BIRMINGHAM

UK publisher Trinity Mirror has been leading a company-wide effort to integrate the operations of its newsrooms in order to turn all of its regional newspapers into multimedia news outlets and creating – successful – Web-based reader communities.

Neil Benson, Editorial Director of Regionals at Trinity Mirror, headed the integration process at three of the publisher’s Birmingham titles, The Birmingham Post, The Sunday Mercury and The Birmingham Mail.

In August, Trinity announced that the staffs of all three papers would be moving to new premises to form a single integrated news gathering team. Benson described how he and the editors have rewritten the rulebook of traditional workflows and newsroom management in the process.

JOURNALISTS OF THE DIGITAL AGE: THE NEWSROOM'S NEW POSITIONS