The Future of Journalism
A keynote conversation with
Josh Benton of Nieman Journalism Lab
The web has been a double-edged sword for journalism and the media — on the one hand, it has made it easier than it has ever been to create and distribute content of all kinds. As Clay Shirky has said: “Publishing used to be an industry — now it’s a button.” Social tools like blogs and Twitter and Facebook and the rise of smartphones have led to an explosion of content, including some powerful journalism from places like Egypt during the Arab Spring — much of it generated by non-journalists.
At the same time, however, the web has also broken the traditional business model that journalism used to rely on, both by increasing the amount of content available and by destabilizing the advertising industry — which traditional media outlets have always relied on to support their content. Now, media companies are trying to fill that gap by putting up paywalls or relying on subscription models, as well as experimenting with controversial new forms of advertising such as sponsored content and “brand journalism.”
Josh Benton, the director of the Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard University, is one of the most astute observers of these and other changes that are taking place in the world of media, and the Nieman Lab blog has become the go-to source for anyone who wants to find out what is going on in journalism online. In this keynote conversation we’ll be talking with Josh about what he sees when he looks into the future of digital media.
Learn more about our Media keynote, Josh Benton (Nieman Journalism Lab).
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