Global newspaper chiefs are here in Bangkok to confer on the big challenges that face the industry, which include poor press freedom and financial struggles.
At the International roundtable entitled 'The New Media Landscape and its Press Freedom Challenges" yesterday, the audience was told that Southeast Asia is still filled with a lot of "sad story" when it comes to press freedom while a number of African countries pose serious challenges for working journalists.
Though Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia are regarded as more free when it comes to press freedom in the Southeast Asian region, these countries have their own challenges such as the lese majeste law in Thailand, the killings of journalists in Indonesia and the Philippines and the controlling of the Internet through laws such as Computer Crimes Act in Thailand and the Philippines, said Gayatri Venkitesuwaren, executive director of the Bangkok-based Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA).
From the African continent, Ferrial Haffajee, editor of City Press in South Africa, said problems ranged from jailing of journalists in Ethiopia to the state of emergency in Nigeria. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, said Haffajee, the country has become a no-go zone for journalists and other countries in the continent including North and South Sudan, Zimbabwe and Somalia are difficult for journalists to operate.
Kavi Chongkittavorn, columnist at The Nation and chairman of the roundtable, said press freedom in Southeast Asia still has a lot of problems, including the lese majeste law in Thailand. The region, he said, is like a Disneyland of political systems due to the wide range of governance methods. The event was part of the four-day 65th anniversary of the World Newspaper Congress. The annual summit meeting of the world's newspapers and news publishers, organised by the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA), ends on Wednesday.
The congress started with a roundtable discussion on digital media, where panellists agreed that newspapers across the world would need to go digital, encompassing websites, smart phones and tablets to meet the needs of the consumers. Through the digital platforms, they can seek revenue from online subscription and advertising.
Stig Nordqvist, an executive director for Publishing Digital, WAN-IFRA, said that the consumption of news will soon be as big on mobile as on laptop and PC, while print circulation and advertisement is rapidly decreasing in mature markets. Supporting this is a change in consumer behaviour as well as structural change in advertising strategy to cover new media.
Media publishers without healthy online business are extremely weak, and increasing the digital focus is key for building business. Nordqvist said that leading publishers are now heading to generate more than 50 per cent of revenue from digital platforms. For this, newspapers need a proper data management system to manage and balance their customers and advertisers.
Anders Berglund of Schibsted Media group Sweden urged news organisations to adopt the real-time bidding (RTB) model, as this will be the next big thing for online media. RTB is an automated process that allows online bids and purchases by media buyers.
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Article source: http://www.thethailandlinks.com/2013/06/03/newpaper-chiefs-confer-on-challenges-facing-industry/
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