New technologies and the ABC

Two years ago, Murdoch told the American Society of Newspaper Editors that 44 per cent of news consumers aged between 18 and 34 used the Internet once a day for news, compared to 19 per cent who used newspapers. Thirty-nine per cent expected to use the Internet more, compared to 8 per cent who expected to use newspapers more. He said mainstream media had to adapt or become "also rans".

Murdoch responded by converging his music, movie, sports and news business to attract younger consumers to websites. He created Fox News, a cross promotion of entertainment, celebrities, self serving politics, and theatrical hectoring - tricked out in a news format.

In Murdoch's view it seemed while the digital natives were definitely restless, they still might be rounded up for a profit!

So what about the alternatives offered by the ABC?

The ABC restructured in February to place its online convergence at the centre of its operations.

The ABC, Australia's most complex media organisation, launched its national radio network in 1932. Its organisation reflected the telephone network, which carried its information; centred in Sydney and radiating out to state capitals and eventually regional centres.

While the ABC's executive offices remain at the old analogue hub in Sydney, its News production has been dispersed to the ABC's 64 newsrooms around Australia and converged on the online newsroom near my office on the QUT campus.

The restructuring measures included:

• the creation of a new Innovation Division as an incubator for digital development across the ABC, and reporting directly to the managing director;
• the integration of the ABC News Online unit with the news and current affairs team into a rebadged ABC News Division to further develop a content rich news site;
• integrating ABC TV and ABC2 in the Television Division to improve the synergies between the two channels and creating a structure that can sustain additional digital television channels in the years ahead;
• the Radio Division to become the Radio and Regional Content Division, accelerating the process of turning each of the ABC's 60 local radio stations across Australia into hubs for digital content generation - providing both audio and video content for radio broadcasts, local ABC websites and television programming; and
• combining international operations into one division to promote and grow audiences for Australia Network and Radio Australia.

The ABC re-organisation recognised that radio, television and text were no longer separate products, couched in discrete production cultures. Rather these ABC divisions were content producers serving digital delivery systems, which might include radio, television and websites. It was a belated admission that multimedia production was a core practice rather than an experiment.

"It is not an add-on, it is not a novelty, it is the present reality as well as the future,” Mr Scott said.

So what of the future?

Private media's financial base, which underpins quality newspaper derived journalism will continue to shift ground towards the Internet. The advertising revenue which supports quality newspapers may be be diminshed, undermining the journalism which supports newspaper websites. Some industry commentators claim that revenues will cross over within two decades. This process has already begun, as corporations investing in newspapers cut costs or slim their publications.

Commercial network free to air television revenues can also be expected to reduced as broadband expands and portals such as Joost offer high quality digital video downloads. Why wait for the local free to air station to broadcast the latest US sitcom, crime drama or reality show, when the material can be accessed at source?