Tom Rosenstiel discusses where news audiences are taking journalism, the myths, mission and what people almost always get wrong.

1. Where is the new news audience
taking journalism?
Tom Rosenstiel
Executive Director
The American Press Institute

2. 5 Common Mistakes and 5 Ideas

3. What everyone knows….

5. But the story is more nuanced…

6. Mistake #1
…platforms are not sources

7. Look at the chart again…

8. Mistake # 2
With Choices the Young Don’t Get News

9. By various measures, people are
getting more news than they used to
Total +15
Net change
Increased No Change Decreased
25% 65% 10%
Source: New York Times

10. Especially Mobile users…
Mobile +24
Net change
Increased No Change Decreased
32% 60% 8%
Non-
mobile
+8 Net change
Increased No Change Decreased
20% 68% 12%
Source: New York Times

11. …And mobile news consumers are younger

12. • 75% under age 50 are mobile
online
• vs. 30% over age 50
Source: Pew Research Center

13. Mistake #3
Mobile will further hurt attention spans
and familiar news sources

14. …Mobile is driving people to familiar
brands
(touchscreen)
…tablets are getting people to read
long form on digital…for the first time.
(lean back)

15. Mobile is the true 2.0 moment for
news
 54% own a smart phone, up more than 60%
since 2011
 31% own a tablet in January, up 24% in 6 mos.
 Youth means it only grows
 Will soon surpass computer connection (its flat at
70%)

16. Mistake #4
Everyone, especially the young, now
get their news from social media
(the filter bubble)

17. Social news consumption is growing
but is still limited

18. And remember platform vs. source

19. Mistake #5
New platforms are cannibalizing and
destroying old

20. It’s not that simple:
New and old platforms are
interdependent …
in a “cycle of news discovery”

21. Half of people first hear about breaking
news from television
How first heard about a breaking news story
Television 50%
Computer (net) 17
Someone I know 11
Radio 11
Smartphone 5
Newspaper 2
Tablet 1
Source: New York Times

22. More than 8 in 10 then follow the story
using a second source
Among those who used a second source, half of respondents switched
platforms
83%
went to another …of those,
source…
51%
went to different
platform
Source: New York Times

23. Online, 6 out of 10 went to an legacy news
site as their second source
Second source if online
Established News
(e.g. NYT, CNN, Fox News) 60%
Web Native News
(e.g. HuffPo, Yahoo News, 13
Drudge)
Search Engine 12
(e.g. Google, Bing)
Social Media
(e.g. Facebook, Google+, 6
Twitter)
Source: New York Times

24. News consumers are loyal
across platforms
Use the same
67% brands across
platforms
Source: New York Times

25. So how will you invent the next
journalism to meet this new
audience?

26. Five Ideas to Guide You

27. 1. The Medium is Not the
Message

28. The Story Is The Message
• Watch TV to see the towers are
on fire
• Instagram pictures the snowstorm
• The hurricane is breaking on
Twitter
• I finally “got Mitt” after that profile
in the New Yorker
• I didn’t get the NRA until I talked
to my uncle who loves guns

29. Remember the Cycle of
Discovery
It depends on what people want to
know and where an event is in the
arc of the story

30. 2. So each platform is a different
tool more than a competing one
With its own strengths and
weaknesses
We have more tools
We can make a vastly superior
journalism

31. Learn their strengths and weaknesses
Instagram v. Twitter, etc.
Tablet v. web v. phone
Video v. audio
Data visualization v. interactive
Etc.

32. Let the story and its arc drive the
tools you use
How is this story best told?
What do people need to know
know about it?

33. Your journalism should use them all
Long form, short, visual, iterative, etc.

34. 3. The Next Journalism is a service
…not a product
• It answers citizen questions when
it’s convenient for them

35. It’s function is social connection
and community knowledge….
• It’s more than stories
and advertising

36. It always has been…
• 19th C. --
Classifieds, Comics, Letters to
the Editor
• 21st C. --
Yelp, AutoTrader, RealEstate.com
, Open Table, Angie’s List

37. So invent new ways to connect
• Storify, instagram, new apps, new
ways to tell narrative
• New ways to tell stories better
• New more convenient ways to
reach citizens
• But YOU MUST KNOW HOW TO
WRITE AND THINK

38. 4. Technology is Opportunity
Not a threat….those who see it that
way are doomed to lose those who
see its value
The future belongs to those who
believe in the future

39. 5. News must adapt to people’s
behavior, not the other way
around
People consume news differently on computers
than tablets
They consume differently during the workday
(computers) vs. night (tablets) or on the go
(phones).
Your journalism must match it (iterative vs. long

40. There is no better time
You Will Invent the Next Journalism
It will be better, richer, wider than
what your professors ever dreamed.
But it will be more like a big dinner
party… than this talk has been.

41. Questions?