Highs and lows at the WAN Congress
The WAN Congress in Seoul May 29 – June 1 projected an upbeat mood. Timothy Balding, Director General of WAN, summed up the year 2004 in a torrent of global statistics: circulation is up (2 percent), newspaper titles are up (2 percent), advertising revenue is up (5 percent), readers on the web is up (32 percent).
However, a closer look at the numbers reveals that much of the expansion take place in Asia and former Eastern Europe. The rest of Europe and the US show less cause for optimism. And although the ad revenue increased, the newspaper’s market share continued to decline.
The WAN Congress mostly confirmed trends that are already known:
• Free-of-charge daily newspapers are here to stay – only in Seoul there are five of them: Metro, Zoom, Focus, AM7 and Good Morning Seoul. In Spain the free dailies have 40 percent of the newspaper market.
• Papers are shrinking. After Scandinavia’s almost completed change from broadsheet to tabloid, the rest of Europe follows suit. USA is next.
• Readers are spending less time with their newspaper.
• The web attracts readers, but doesn’t generate much revenue.
But as with any big conference, it was the people that attended that made the difference. From the stage came a mix of high and low:
• Most superficial presentation: Innovation International’s ”World Report 2005”. Time for something more in-depht in Moscow 2006, maybe?
• Most interesting panel: Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, New York Times, Ryoki Sugita, Nikkei (Japan), Ricardo Gandour, Diario (Brazil) and Trevor Ncube, The Independent, The Standard (Zimbabwe) and The Mail & Guardian (South Africa). Our ”global media world” still has very different local marketplaces, with very different challenges!
• Most disturbing event: when the security people, having failed to silence a protester from the media workers union, turned up the music so that the we couldn’t hear what the guy had to say. Freedom of expression, right?
• Most alarming quote: ”Nikkei will still exist, but maybe half of our readership will get their paper electronically, not on paper” said Ryoki Sugita.
That means 1.500.000 copies less per day.
• Most repeated statement: ”We don’t live in the digital era, we live in the empowerment era” said Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, and proceeded to outline the newspaper industry’s only defence against 10 million blogs and media fragmentation: our credibility. Well, New York Times should know how important that is.
• Most belligerent speech: the new WAN Chairman, Gavin K. O’Reilly, doesn’t like bloggers at all: ”Participatory journalism is very dangerous”, he said. ”It is our job to lead, not to pander to the latest weblog”.
• Most unaswered question: why did they serve the same meat and overboiled vegetables three days in a row? And why no Korean food at all? Next time – add chopsticks!
Finally, Timothy Balding reported that the governement of Uzbekistan has made an innovation: the newspaper without news. Privately owned newspapers ar only allowed to publish adverts, crossword puzzles, horoscopes and features – no news.
However, a closer look at the numbers reveals that much of the expansion take place in Asia and former Eastern Europe. The rest of Europe and the US show less cause for optimism. And although the ad revenue increased, the newspaper’s market share continued to decline.
The WAN Congress mostly confirmed trends that are already known:
• Free-of-charge daily newspapers are here to stay – only in Seoul there are five of them: Metro, Zoom, Focus, AM7 and Good Morning Seoul. In Spain the free dailies have 40 percent of the newspaper market.
• Papers are shrinking. After Scandinavia’s almost completed change from broadsheet to tabloid, the rest of Europe follows suit. USA is next.
• Readers are spending less time with their newspaper.
• The web attracts readers, but doesn’t generate much revenue.
But as with any big conference, it was the people that attended that made the difference. From the stage came a mix of high and low:
• Most superficial presentation: Innovation International’s ”World Report 2005”. Time for something more in-depht in Moscow 2006, maybe?
• Most interesting panel: Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, New York Times, Ryoki Sugita, Nikkei (Japan), Ricardo Gandour, Diario (Brazil) and Trevor Ncube, The Independent, The Standard (Zimbabwe) and The Mail & Guardian (South Africa). Our ”global media world” still has very different local marketplaces, with very different challenges!
• Most disturbing event: when the security people, having failed to silence a protester from the media workers union, turned up the music so that the we couldn’t hear what the guy had to say. Freedom of expression, right?
• Most alarming quote: ”Nikkei will still exist, but maybe half of our readership will get their paper electronically, not on paper” said Ryoki Sugita.
That means 1.500.000 copies less per day.
• Most repeated statement: ”We don’t live in the digital era, we live in the empowerment era” said Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, and proceeded to outline the newspaper industry’s only defence against 10 million blogs and media fragmentation: our credibility. Well, New York Times should know how important that is.
• Most belligerent speech: the new WAN Chairman, Gavin K. O’Reilly, doesn’t like bloggers at all: ”Participatory journalism is very dangerous”, he said. ”It is our job to lead, not to pander to the latest weblog”.
• Most unaswered question: why did they serve the same meat and overboiled vegetables three days in a row? And why no Korean food at all? Next time – add chopsticks!
Finally, Timothy Balding reported that the governement of Uzbekistan has made an innovation: the newspaper without news. Privately owned newspapers ar only allowed to publish adverts, crossword puzzles, horoscopes and features – no news.
posted by Pelle at Thursday, June 02, 2005
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