Journalism jobs and technology

The ethics of new journalism

Good news about the changing journalism job market.

By Josselin Basaldu

New digital technology and certainly the Internet, has transformed journalism and how people get their news. But have you thought about how new technology has affected those who work in journalism?

Technology allows journalists room for more creativity and accuracy, but the give and take of technology seems to have
changed the job market.

Journalists must write well, be a Web “guru,” and understand the importance of digital design.

The 2006 annual graduate survey from the University of Georgia found that:

• 4 in 10 of the 2006 journalism and mass communication graduates with a job in communication reported that at least part of their assignments involved writing and editing for the Web, designing and building Web pages.
  
  
• Only half of the journalism and mass communication graduates with a job in communication were working a 40-hour week.
  
• The percentage of bachelor’s degree recipients who reported reading or viewing online news “yesterday” increased in 2006 compared with a year earlier, and 7 in 10 now report getting news online.

You’d think an industry that suddenly requires stellar writing, audio/visual and Web skills, as well as attention to diversity, accuracy and ethics, might be making employment difficult.

A 2007 article published in the Guardian Unlimited, entitled, “Tom Coates on why bloggers aren’t prostitutes,” asked the question: “Where are all the journalism jobs?”

Well, the founder of mediabistro.com, a media job database, said the number of new media jobs has kept up with the digitalization of journalism and the “dot com boom,” but only for those with Web and design skills.

"Most people sit there and bemoan the sorry state of traditional media companies and notice how positions are being cut,” Laurel Touby said. “But there's another side of the trend. They might be cutting print jobs, but they're also adding digital positions, and they're having a hard time finding those people because - guess what? - no one has those skills."

However, the 2006 annual journalism graduate survey from the University of Georgia found that those in the journalism field don’t seem to have problems finding jobs:

• Only about 3 percent of the journalism and mass communication graduates in 2006 had no job interviews as they entered the market.
  
  
• About 76 percent of graduating 2006 journalism and mass communication students hadat least one job offer upon receiving their degrees.
  
• About 64 percent of journalism and mass communication graduates held full-time jobs six months after graduating.

Where do your ethics lie?

By Mackenzie Seaman

Journalism ethics comprise the performance of ethics and of good practice as applicable to the specific challenges faced by professional journalists.  Currently, the split of media ethics is widely known to journalists as their professional “code of ethics.”

While most codes differ pertaining to the journalist and the event being covered, most share common elements including the principles of-truthfulness, objectivity, accuracy, fairness, impartiality and accountability to the public.

Where does one journalist begin to discuss the important issues of ethics and journalism?

Aaron Quinn, a Chico State journalism professor whose forte is ethics, thinks students should ideally focus on a variety of things.
           
“Do I cover Britney Spears or something important?” Quinn asked. “Or not even just Britney, do I cover how the trend of entertainment and the things we want to know are only being covered compared to what we should know?”

Quinn offered a list of points that he thinks students should consider:

1. Is good reporting possible when news staffs are being cut?
   
   
2. Is there too much of an emphasis on new technology and not enough on tried and true practices like investigative reporting?
   
   
3. Is media ownership too concentrated to offer a reasonable diversity of views?
   
   
4. Is opinion sufficiently separated from news reporting?
   
   
5. Are journalists independent enough from publishers and owners to avoid political pressure from the top?

In the vast world of journalism, reporters are agreeing to cover stories that are cheaper to cover, which may give them less reason to do their job thoroughly. Traditional news reporters have taken on multiple roles that involve photography, filming video and collecting audio, but may lack the knowledge to do these jobs properly.