Sustainable Media Business Models in the Digital Age Africa Media Leadership Conference 2010

September 26-29: Dar es SalaamGuy Berger, Rhodes University, South

Africa

Starting points

•Who cares about sustainable media business models in the digital age?•And why?

• Grocott’s Mail mobi site:

• Nîche is realtime content

Caring about content…

• And within the mix, let’s not forget about journalistic content!• Why?

A sustainable journalism story

‘Who are you outside the paper?’

Gwen Lister: “Well, press freedom, journalism in general, and The Namibian in particular are so integral to my life that it’s hard to think of myself with a separate identity, really! … Media and democracy have been my passion and probably always will be.

“I’m an idealist and always have been one. I’m also a strong individualist and I’ve never belonged to any group or political party…

So…

• It’s not only an issue about sustainable media as an end in itself… • But also about sustainability for

journalism … a special kind of content• Making money to publish, or

publishing to make money?

If journalism replied to questions…

1. Who are you? What do you do? Answer: “I am communication of content in

public interest”2. How old are you? When will you retire?3. Where do you come from?4. Who are your parents? Your siblings?5. Who are your friends? Your enemies?6. Describe your home – what kind of dwelling?7. How do you earn your daily bread?

The original journalism?

We don’t know

De-constructing the topic

1. Sustainable 2. Media 3. Business Models4. in the Digital Age

1. Sustainable?

• African media & journalism has always wrestled with this question… especially politically!

• But now there’s a new aspect.• 2006-10: 38->26% in USA read a paper

yesterday• Ask Seattle PI … & Encyclopedia Britannica• And Rocky Mountain News

No guarantees

• Dealing with death… we often dream of Life eternal!

• But: What if we’re entering times when media houses aren’t sustainable; i.e. there’s no Lazarus story?

• When journalism struggles to float in a thrashing sea full of other kinds of communications?

2. What’s media

Technical layer - vehicles:• Paper can transport messages = a medium• Even toilet paper may carry meanings – colours &

patterns! • Cellphones are mainly a vehicle for personal

comms• Meanings in clothes, buildings, voices and faces • BUT this doesn’t make them part of “the media”…

Platforms - genres

Content layer:• Internet as a vehicle has many uses – eg. e-

commerce• When internet is media, it can be used as a

platform for text, audio, video, pix, graphics. • These can be combined in different formats: –Online newspapers (news genres)– Portals (aggregations)– Blogs, Tweets (attitude, interaction genre)

• All of which can be journalistic in degrees …

What’s this mean then?

• Rename technical ‘medium’ as Vehicle• Don’t conflate Vehicle with “The Media”• Vehicle (eg. signals over airwaves) underpins a

Platform (eg. audio – or video – or data)• De-link Platform (eg. audio) from “The Media”

(“radio”).• See “The Media” as an institution – and from

both producer & consumer point of view. (So can cellphones really become media?)

Two more layers to “The media”Connections layer:• “The Media” has been 1:many: Mass media• Media is/was public, not private, news. • But these are dynamic categories!Journalistic layer:• Nowadays, journalism can de-link from “The

Media” qua institutions.• Many non-media entities/individuals do

journalism without being “journalists”

3. Biz models & media institutions

3 models to date, often in hybrid:– Audience pays; OR Advertisers pay to reach audiences;– State /donors pay for media content to reach audiences.

Nowadays, there are issues like:– Separating production, aggregation, curation, editing,

dissemination– UGC (cuttin costs of acquiring content);– Transactional revenues;– Selling services (like training, software, experiences);– Selling access to journalists (ouch, Washington Post!)– Freemium

Just what business are you in?• “The Media” (eg. radio) – or a specific platform

(audio) across several Media? • Content supply?• Paid praise-singing?• Community-building and citizenship?• Mediating buyers and sellers through

advertising?• Communications facilitation – like an ISP?• Global game?

Who are your competitors in these?

A thought about your biz

• Information, Education, Entertainment?• What about “the meanings

business”?

4. Digital age

• Revolutionises all aspects of the value chain:– Production (and re-production!)– Distribution/transmission of product– Consumption/use (comment, remix, recommend)

• Radically intensifies glocalisation• It changes the character of play: interaction is

the name of the game – sometimes.

Digital

• Fungible assets• Hard-to-protect assets• Speed and transience and re-use• Content as king, or is it now the carriage-

owning company? (cf. Net-neutrality debate). • Digital age expands who can play in the chain:

More media out there, and more non-media too!

Universities

NGOs

Parties

Not easy answers

1. Sustainable – a challenge for journalism2. Media – complexities of de-linking3. Business Models – operating so many!4. in the Digital Age – a new game

How to get a fix on changes and uncertainties?

Understanding the times

• The ‘value chain of meaning’ – John Hartley (2004).

Origination/ Production

Product and distribution

Consumer/ use

Understanding the times

• The ‘value chain of meaning’ – John Hartley (2004).

Origination/ Production

Product and distribution

Consumer/ use

Media house Outputs (“Texts”) disseminated

Audience

Teasing out the tangles

Three ways of making meaning valuable:

1.Pre-modern mode2.Modern mode3.Post-modern mode

1. Pre-modern mode

• Source of meaning comes from the author. Like truth from God in holy books.

• It only remains to be revealed.• Priests, spin-doctors or government media exist

to help audiences work out what was meant.• To make this meaning stick, you need monopoly.• With artificial media scarcity, authoritarian and

fundamentalist societies operate this way. • Power is held by state (or church) – or old media!

2. Modern mode

• Ultimate meanings come through pluralism and diversity of content – i.e. the truth comes through the multiplicity of texts.

• The breadth of the mix is sovereign arbiter of what is true meaning.

• The public reads and chooses rationally. • Power lies in the best texts and their

consumers ability to select rationally.• Many texts now hail from non-media sources.

3. Post-modern mode

• Meanings are decided by audiences.• Find out through pollings, ratings, surveys.• Expect the unexpected: contrary readings.• People do their own thing: eg. uptake of SMS;

prevalence of piracy; what becomes a hit. • Power lies with the active audience• Sovereignty is with their selves.• Truth is fragmented across publics.• Publics create. Not only read, but write.

Where power lies

Pre-modern Modern Post-modern

Origination/ Production

Product and distribution

Consumer/ use

Media house Outputs (“Text”) disseminated

Audience

Where power lies

Pre-modern Modern Post-modern

Origination/ Production

Product and distribution

Consumer/ use

Media house Outputs (“Text”) disseminated

Audience

Where power lies

Pre-modern Modern Post-modern

Origination/ Production

Product and distribution

Consumer/ use

Media house Outputs (“Text”) disseminated

Audience

Where power lies

Pre-modern Modern Post-modern

Origination/ Production

Product and distribution

Consumer/ use

Media house Outputs (“Text”) disseminated

Audience

Major mode of address

Pre-modern Modern Post-modern

Origination/ Production

Product and distribution

Consumer/ use

Media house Outputs (“Text”) disseminated

Audience

AuthorityAuthority ConvincingConvincing ConversationConversation

Making sense

• Our worlds combine all three modes:– Some media makes for authority modes of making

meaning. (Established organs)– Some plays in the social space of discourses

competing for priority and credibility (Providing a forum, versus providing attitude)

– Other facilitates interactive conversational process. (community radio, SMS comments)

• Much journalism merges all three aspects…

So what?

• Energy is in the places where the 3 intersect.• The contradictions between:• the pre-modern and the modern;• the modern and the post-modern;• the pre- and post modern.• “I tell you” vs “we tell you” vs “let’s talk”• Do you focus in on one, or a mix? What mix?

In summary

• Journalism – is that your point of reference?• Sustainable – art of the possible amidst change• Media – keep an open mind on its range• Business Models – which are you in?• in the Digital Age – new players/fields/games…• Pre-modern mode: one truth, monopoly power• Modern mode: convince people, pluralism• Post-modern mode: converse, media uncorked

Signing off

• Custodians of journalism need eyes open… in order to grow sustainability for journalism,

even if that journalism is re-invented.• In fact – it probably has to be reinvented:– Must be more than pre-modern mode;– Must really show stakeholders the value it adds;– Must operate with multiple biz models streams.– Must span a range of vehicles, platforms, media,

formats and genres

Take away

–Must still keep eye on the ball: making journalistic meanings!

Thank you

Presentation online at

http://mzan.si/1Wo7