Changing Filters of Print Media?

Mary, I was leaving a comment for you on your print media post, but it became multi-paragraphed. Instead, here’s a post.

Your post is very appropriate for my current state of mind. Right now, as I work on my sociology assignment, the table that I use in the Woodward library is covered by piles of newspaper clippings, with topics ranging from gender to the mass media. These clippings include articles from the Globe and Mail, Vancouver Sun, New York Times, 24, Ubyssey, Metro, Vancouver Courier, Province, Georgia Strait, West Ender… you name it.

After reading your post, and with all these papers in front of me, I was suddenly reminded of Noam Chomsky’s propaganda model, which suggests that filters in the media include factors such as ownership and advertising. Evidently, with the current decline in the print media, traditional forms of media ownership and revenue sources are rapidly changing.

Particularly with respect to your illustrated examples on the visual layout of newspapers, I wonder the following: how would the placement of advertising be affected; how would the relationship change between newspapers and advertisers; will there be a shift in power (i.e., if newspapers become more dependent on advertisers for income); how would the quality and “neutrality” of print journalism be affected/maintained?

I guess a real-life example would be reputable local papers like the Vancouver Sun and Province, which are being handed out for free, nowadays, at certain Canada Line stations during the morning rush hour. An interesting thing about these complementary papers, and also what differentiates them with ones delivered to your door, is that they are sponsored, prominently, on the front page. My conservative guess is that the advertising takes up about 20% of the front page space.

For our example, let’s use a travel agency as the primary sponsor. Since the advertising placement and methods of revenue generation have be altered (imagine how much the sponsor had to pay to cover the hundreds, if not thousands, of free copies of the newspaper), we ought to consider how the power balance has shifted. Perhaps the paper would previously generate revenue from a greater and more diversified number of advertisers, not to mention the readers.  Would The Vancouver Sun be willing to publish an article that has negative connotations towards the travel industry?

Note that we have not even touched the topic of ownership. With a considerable number of newspapers facing bankruptcy (e.g., San Francisco Chronicle), we are also expecting changes in ownership of print media. There are many questions associated with this, as well.

Oops. This post went a little bit longer than expected — and on a tangent.

What are your thoughts?

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