News is a niche until it's not

Above: Image by Photografier/123rf.com

All my writing in BitDepth about journalism is a kind of advocacy, but they are screeds that target a small sector of the business community, the media managers who oversee the contracting presence of independent news in Trinidad and Tobago and the wider Caribbean.

I’ve not had much success in that mission, as the failure of NewsdayTT, the newspaper of first publication for the column and my other technology writing for the last eight years attests.

But there is a larger issue at stake here, the fragility of primary source reporting and the skillset that makes it happen.
If there was ever an example of a well that won’t be missed until it runs dry, independent news gathering is that resource.

Let’s not underestimate how much verified, edited news is produced. I found this observation from the Next-Gen News report compelling.
“The volume of content far exceeds that of traditional news producers. A 2016 article in The Atlantic reported that The New York Times produced approximately 230 pieces of content per day on average; The Washington Post, more than 500 per day. Although updated statistics are difficult to ascertain, the quantity produced from even one news outlet far outpaces a single reader’s capacity.”

A vast cross-section of the news that citizens of the Caribbean consume is not found first hand, at its origin, but through reshares, reinterpretations and straight-up plagiarising of reporting done on the ground by first person witnesses of incidents and statements and commentary by informed subject matter experts.

If it isn’t made up wholesale (and misinformation and disinformation is a large portion of the average newsfeed), then it came from somewhere and that primary, identifiable source is increasingly endangered.

In surviving newsrooms, the capacity to report is being curtailed. Through voluntary separations, through the attrition of personnel who aren’t replaced, through workloads that limit available reporting teams to a depressingly narrow slice of the news menu.

I write about journalism from the perspective of an active practitioner. Since December 29, BitDepth has been returned to its roots after 30 years, written pro bono, because there is either no capacity to or interest in paying for it.

In the face of larger closures and the remarkable decision by the Washington Post to shutter its book reviews and a popular podcast while shrinking its international, metro and sports coverage, continuing BitDepth on my own dollar is a much easier play.

I’ve spent 11 years building TechNewsTT to ensure that the column and its wider reporting has a reliable, accessible home, but to do that, I’ve traded the security of a regular job with its work for hire rights restrictions for the fragility of freelance engagement, but it’s allowed me to unequivocally own my intellectual property.

Much of what I write about journalism’s future gets tested right here. Some solutions don’t scale down to this super-niche audience. Some are simply too expensive to consider, others require digital teams and expertise that are not available to me.

The problem with being chief cook and bottle washer is that the food and the bottles never get done any better than I can handle on my own.
If you’ve read the column about the expectations of next generation news consumers and felt a chill of confusion and unfamiliarity with a fundamentally different approach to news production, well, you’re not alone.

As with other developments, I plan to implement some of these strategies, but others will remain on a wish list. But a robust start on a few things is way better than grand plans that sputter in execution or worse, doing nothing and waiting for the good old days of media supremacy to return.