From hypertext pioneer Ted Nelson to 9/11 to paywalls. A look at technological and journalistic milestones in the history of online news. Undergraduate lecture by Tim Currie, Assistant Professor at the University of King's College School of Journalism in Halifax, Canada.

1. JOUR 5121: HISTORY & ETHICS OF JOURNALISM
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September 25, 2013
Tim Currie | @tscurrie
Download this presentation:
slideshare.net/tscurrie/history-of-online-journalism
Some themes borrowed
from David Carlson, University of Florida
History of Online Journalism

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1963
• Ted Nelson, Harvard
sociology student
• Formulates the
concept of hypertext
TED NELSON / HYPERLAND.COM

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1965
• Nelson, now a sociology prof at Vassar College in upstate
New York
• Gives a lecture which is covered in the student newspaper.
The first print reference of ―hypertext‖ appears, Feb.
3, 1965

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1969
• ARPANET computer network created
by the U.S. Defense Department
• Goal: Design a computer network to
withstand nuclear attack
• Decentralized system created under
the basic assumption that parts of
the network will fail
• Lays the foundation for the Internet
as a medium that is controlled by no
single entity

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1971
• A loop of ―pages‖
broadcast on TV
• Not interactive, slow
• Service is limited to
a few hundred
available pages
• Slow
BBC patents a new
technology… Teletext:

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1974
The British Post Office’s Research
Laboratory demonstrates the first
Videotext service
• It’s truly interactive, supporting
two-way communication
• You use your TV, hooked up to
cable and a phone line
• You make entries using a
keyboard, dedicated terminal or
computer
• Better graphics than teletext; even
photo display.

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1974
Snapshot: Three competing technologies …
• Not interactive
• Slow
• But all you
need is a TV
and a decoder
box
VideotextTeletext
• Interactive
• You need
cable TV and
an expensive
subscription
• Interactive
• Very
expensive
• Poorly
networked
• Almost no
one has one
Computers

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1975
Canada begins
developing Telidon, an
advanced videotext
system
By 1979 is considered a
world leader with
advanced graphics
technology
GOVERNMENT OF CANADA

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1975
GOVERNMENT OF CANADA GOVERNMENT OF CANADA

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1981-82
First computer-based
dial-up services
emerge Eg.:
• Compuserve
• The Source
• Prodigy
These are closed
systems — only
subscribers have
access
EVAN AMOS / WIKIPEDIA BILBY / WIKIPEDIA
COMPUSERVE

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1981
Video:
Internet News in 1981 (KRON TV report)

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1983-1988
• 1983: Time Magazine names the
computer ―Machine of the Year‖
• 1985: Worldwide 22 nations are said to
be involved in videotext and teletext
• 1986: Computers readily available in
university computer labs, offices
• 1988: DARPA makes the Internet public
TIME

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1990
• Tim Berners-Lee
creates Hypertext
Markup Language
CERN

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1993
• January: 26 ―reasonably
reliable‖ servers exist on
the World Wide
Web, according to CERN
• August: Mosaic, the first
graphical Web browser for
Windows, is released by
the University of Illinois.

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1993
• October: First journalism site on the Web is
launched at the University of Florida. There now
are about 200 web servers in the world
• Dec. 8: First article about the web appears in the
New York Times

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1994
• Jan. 19: The first newspaper
to regularly publish on the
Web, the Palo Alto Weekly in
California, begins twice-
weekly postings of its full
content
• April: The Yahoo ―Internet
index‖ is started by Stanford
PhD candidates David Filo
and Jerry Yang

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1994
• June:
the first
Canadian
newspaper, t
he Halifax
Daily News
goes online

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1995
April 19: Oklahoma
City Bombing
The first major event in
which people turn to
the Internet for current
information
PRESTON CHASTEEN / WIKIPEDIA

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1997
• March 26: Heaven’s
Gate suicides
The Internet becomes
part of a major news
story when members of
the Heaven’s Gate cult
create a website before
committing suicide KTTV LOS ANGELES

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1997
Video:
ABC News: March 26, 1997: Heaven's Gate
Cult Suicide
Journalists point readers to their source
material

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1997
• The Dallas Morning News
online edition gets an
exclusive that Timothy
McVeigh has claimed
responsibility for the
Oklahoma City Bombing
• First time a mainstream
news organization breaks
a major story on its
website -- not in its
newspaper

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1998
Jan. 19: Early reports of
U.S. President Clinton’s
involvement with White
House intern Monica
Lewinsky demonstrate how
a small independent news
site can seize a national
news agenda
DEFENSE DEPT. /
WIKIPEDIA
BOB MCNEELY /
WIKIPEDIA

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1998
A media frenzy
follows both
online and in
the traditional
press

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1998
September: Starr
Report
A new relationship
between politicians
and the public – Starr
bypasses the press
and distributes a
major political
document online first
Kenneth Starr
U.S. GOVERNMENT

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2000
Mainstream news
sites begin to involve
their audience
Death of Pierre Trudeau:
Canadians share their
stories on news websites
GOVERNMENT OF CANADA

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2001
Sept. 11:
Online news
operations
stumble …

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2001
… then recover …

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2003
Classified listings
flee print ... and
take money with
them

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2003
• Canada.com
moves to paid
subscription
model
• Breaking news
is free
• Other content
requires $$

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2003
• The dawn of
citizen media
• Blogging software
makes web
publishing easy
• The ―Baghdad
Blogger‖
captivates the
world

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2004
Bloggers
lead the way
in forcing
CBS to
retract its
story on
George W.
Bush’s
military
service

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Bloggers
beat the
mainstream
media to
tsunami-
ravaged
South-East
Asia …
2004

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2005
Mainstream
media starts
harnessing
user-generated
video

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News sites
rush to
establish
citizen
communities
2005

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2005
Major trend: ―A growing number of news
outlets are chasing relatively static or even
shrinking audiences for news. One result of
this is that most sectors of the news media
are losing audience.
The only sectors seeing general
audience growth today are online,
ethnic and alternative media.”

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Participatory
journalism advocate
Dan Gillmor tries
(and fails) to put
his emerging ideas
into practice
2006

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2006
Web 2.0: The
Collaborative Web
Time Magazine Person
of the Year

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2007
Bloggers face
greater legal
scrutiny

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2007
Citizen media grows in importance

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2007

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1. “Journalism is becoming a smaller part of
people’s information mix”
2. ―The signs are clearer that advertising works differently
online than in older media. The consequence is that
advertisers may not need journalism as they
once did, particularly online.”
2007

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2007
• September:
Journalism sites
move away from
subscription-based
news
• Advertising is seen
as the only
workable funding
model

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2009
Use of citizen
content is
commonplace

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2009
“Power is shifting to
the individual
journalist and away,
by degrees, from
journalistic
institutions."
MARK LUCKIE / GETLUCKIE.NET

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2010
Experiments with mobile

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2011

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2012
“A more fundamental challenge that we identified
last year has intensified — the extent to which
technology intermediaries
(Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple) now control the
future of news.”

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2012

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2013
Instagram
―arrives‖