On Monday's lecture we had the opportunity of listening to journalist
Skye Doherty. After telling us about her time spent working on Fleet Street in
London, it became clear that she is a very experienced journo. What stood out
to me wasn’t just her obvious knowledge on journalism as a trade, but also her
understanding of the politics behind it.
After covering many technical elements regarding factual storytelling,
Doherty answered some questions in relation to what was happing in the UK with
the News Ltd phone hacking scandal. She said that the scandal was ultimately
brought about through competition for sales. As it has been seen, some
journalists will do anything with their story, in order to sell newspapers. In
Australia, there is not nearly the same amount of business pressure on
newspaper companies. Doherty believes that this is the reason why Australia is
unlikely to see anything like what is happening in the UK to this degree of
controversy.
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| 'Uncle Rupert' understands Journalism as a business... but perhaps he went a little too far. Photograph: Eric Gaillard/Reuters |
She went on to link this to the recent Finkelstein inquiry,
saying that due to lack of newspaper competition, it is unnecessary to have a
higher level of media regulation.
This got me thinking... I posted on Monday about the Finkelstein
inquiry (read it if ya want), and posed the question of why there is such a
divide between academics teaching journalism and working journalists. After
re-reading Cameron Stewart’s article in The Weekend Australian, I feel that I
initially underestimated the significance of the business aspect of journalism.
“...few journalism teachers have recent experience in the profession. Some are
career academics who have never spent time in a working newsroom.”
My interpretation of what Stewart says is that academics
actually don’t understand the business aspect of a news publisher. This raises
some serious questions for journalism students. Are the people teaching
journalism in universities cut off from the real business of journalism? Are
they living in theoretical ‘ivory towers’? In the end, a newspaper or a radio
station has to sell product at prices that cover costs and make sort of profit.
Without neglecting the code of ethics, selling newspapers is important. How
else are journalists going to make a living?
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