1. By Terry Flew, Christina Spurgeon, Anna Daniel
and Adam Swift
2. • Huge growth in online news and information
services.
• The 5 most popular Australian news sites were:
• News.com.au
• Ninemsn
• The Sydney Morning Herald
• The Age
• The ABC
3. Shift away from mass communications and
movement towards networked social media
A crisis in professional journalism caused by:
◦ Declining newspaper circulation numbers and
advertising revenues
◦ High levels of debt in commercial media business
◦ A shift in attention of media users
◦ A crisis of authority for professional journalism
◦ A growing public distrust of journalists
4. Audiences are becoming increasingly fragmented
According to John Hartley one way mass
communication is being replaced by two way
networked communication
Younger media users refer to blogs and citizen
journalists for their news
Mainstream news is of little interest to younger
media users
5. Online media makes it easier to monitor and
track patterns of usage
Researchers partnered up with Fairfax to conduct
an online survey to better understand younger
audiences
Three broad but distinctive types of users:
◦ Convenience users
◦ Loyal users
◦ Customisers
6. Arrive at sites through forward linking options
presented to them via social network sites or email
Account for 60% of those surveyed
Predominantly aged between 18-24 years
Prefer news items that were short, concise and
“glossy”
Most found mainstream news irrelevant to them
Preferred news that suited their current interests
7. Account for 31% of those surveyed
This group is the most intentional of news users
Often remain loyal to a particular news brand
Most likely to read physical newspapers
Normally aged over 24
Value the quality and reputation of news
organisations
Often do not interact with news items
Most likely to pay for certain types of news
8. Account for 9% of those surveyed
Normally professionals aged over 24
Highly active users of online news
Not loyal to one news brand
Value accuracy, reliability and timeliness
Most critical of the news they perceive
Actively blog, comment, link and re-publish news
Only willing to pay for news in niche markets
9. There is no single set of attitudes among young
people towards online news, or news generally
The strategies of newspapers organisations need to
change to target each market
Loyal users would be the best group for media
companies to target for further information as they
are the most likely to pay for online news
The use of mobile devices for accessing news was low
Reasons for this may be slow download speeds and
costly mobile data plans
10. Online news is the preferred method of access for young
users. Reasons included:
◦ The speed of updating information
◦ Real-time live feed delivery
◦ Convenience
◦ Links to other news and information sites
◦ Ability to search across multiple sources
◦ Multimedia capabilities
37% of respondents between 18-24 years nominated
Facebook as their favourite news and information website
11. While the three groups presented are generalisations,
they help us to better understand the segmentation
of the online news and information market with
regard to young users in Australia
As online news grows, increased pressures will arise
for new content to be tailored to particular
demographics
This is a distinct change from 20th century mass
market/mass communication models
12. Has online news brought an end to the mass market/mass
communication model of the 20th century?
How important are young news consumers in relation to
media production and target audiences?
Would you identify with or consider yourself a part of one
of the three distinct user groups identified by the study?
(Convenience users, loyal users or customisers).
How much would you consider Facebook to be a news
website?
