Every year the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism runs an international study on the news and media usage across 46 countries, and delivers the findings in the annual Digital News Report. Because the same online survey is delivered in each country, it’s really helpful for understanding the state of the media across the world and how attitudes change over the years. The 2021 Digital News Report for Australia was released earlier in the month, and it painted a pretty grim and revealing picture of Aussie attitudes towards news (which we’re already seeing the effects of in COVID-19 coverage).
You can read the full 2021 Digital News Report here.
The TL;DR Takeaway: The only people actually paying for news in Australia, are those who want their own political beliefs to get more coverage and airtime.
That’s a big problem for media diversity and impacts the quality of Australia’s news outlets. Why is it the case? Buckle up, and read on.
Coverage of Political Beliefs
The key stats:
- “The news does not cover my political views enough”
25% of left-wing people think this, 22% of right-wing people think this (roughly equivalent) - “The news unfairly represents my political views”
35% of left-wing people think this, 34% of right-wing people think this (roughly equivalent) - There is a direct correlation between trusting the news and believing your political views are covered fairly
Unsurprisingly, there is a clear link between lack of trust in news media and the belief that your political views are being ignored or presented unfairly. And neither side is ‘worse’ than the other – people on the left and right sides of politics are equally as likely to say that their viewpoints are being misrepresented in the news.
For what it’s worth, the political beliefs of the respondents were pretty even: 31% left-leaning, 30% centrists, 22% right-leaning, and 18% unsure of their political orientation.
Overall, these aren’t notable findings until you start connecting some other dots…
Who’s Paying For Your News?
The key stats:
- Only 13% of people are paying for news content
- Only 12% of people are likely to pay for news in the next 12 months
- 66% don’t know or have incorrect beliefs about the financial state of the news media industry
- 67% don’t care or don’t know if they care about the financial state of the industry
Australia has less people paying or willing to pay for news content than the global average. This is despite the fact that more people were consuming news content than ever during 2020 (for reasons you already know!) By comparison, 45% of people in Norway, 30% in Sweden and 21% in the US are currently paying for news in some way, shape or form.
Perhaps part of the reason we’re so unlikely to pay is because Australians are generally unaware of the scary financial situation the news industry is in right now.
Only 34% of respondents were aware that news publishers (excluding the Government-funded ABC) are less profitable than 10 years ago. Almost half (49%) said they didn’t care about the financial state of the Australian news industry.
This is a problem, because news is mostly funded by either advertisers or subscribers. Advertising money is drying up, as Google and Facebook now take a whopping 80% of the ad spending that used to support the media industry. It leaves the fate of news publishers – across TV, print, audio and digital – in the hands of Australian subscribers… who have very little interest or intention in paying, according to the report.
Not only that, but 44% of respondents didn’t think the government should provide any assistance. That’s fair enough, but it raises the question – who ultimately pays for the news you consume? There’s one more finding from the 2021 Digital News Report to factor in…
Impartiality vs Reader Revenue
The key stats:
- 73% think news should reflect a range of views so the audience can “make up their own mind”
- 71% think all sides of an issue should be given equal ‘airtime’
- 57% say news should always be neutral
- But people who prefer that news outlets take a stance on issues are twice as likely to pay for news
This is where it comes full circle.
Again, it’s unsurprising that the vast majority of respondents believe that news organisations should present “all sides” of an issue and should maintain a neutral stance – regardless of the topic. The catch is that the people who are more likely to actually pay for news are those who want news organisations to take a stance and give less time to ‘weak’ arguments. And those who say they trust the news are also twice as likely to pay for news. Linking it back to the first point of this article, Australians trust the news when they feel like it represents their political beliefs – they’ll pay for news that supports what they already think.
Australian news organisations that rely on subscriptions or reader payments have to double-down on their audience’s political beliefs if they want to keep getting that money (and of course they do). The alternative is to fight for the 19c out of every $1 in advertising money spent in this country (the rest goes to Facebook and Google).
While there are other significant behind-the-scenes factors at play, this situation is one of the reasons why the news feels so politicised right now – it’s becoming a financial necessity, in part dictated by audiences.
