Closures ramp up as JobKeeper ends
PIJI’s Australian Newsroom Mapping Project has recorded some concerning early indications of a closure trend in its March data report, which appears to be continuing into April’s emerging data.
Our March Report logged 12 new entries in the mapping data, but only four of them occurred during March; two were closures and two were openings. Eight were backdated.
Local Ipswich News launched as a free community newspaper on 24 March in Queensland, while 2099, a new hyperlocal news magazine is now published in Dee Why, NSW, by Neighbourhood Media.
BuzzFeed finalised a deal to buy HuffPost from Verizon Media in February and then announced it would close the Australian and Canadian editions, affecting two local Australian staff. The other closure during March was View News, which had covered Maleny and the Sunshine Coast since 2008.
The other eight backdated entries in the March report were expansions, most of which were from Neighbourhood Media, which is in the process of opening a raft of local printed, quarterly, news magazines.
PIJI is closely monitoring a seemingly growing number of closures timed around the end of the federal government’s JobKeeper initiative, continuing into April. If you know of any closures or contractions in journalism in your local area, please let us know.
March’s data takes the total number of logged media landscape changes to 293, of which 94 are expansions and 199 are closures.
The Australian Newsroom Mapping Project is rapidly gaining both international and domestic interest. A recent article in the Columbia Journalism Review examines our mapping work, along with the work of our global peers, as the broad scale health of public interest news remains brittle in many jurisdictions.
PIJI is looking to expand our media diversity mapping with with more data sets that will increase the depth and understanding of the Australian context. This data is critical to informing inquiries, including the current Australian Media Reform Green Paper and the senate inquiry into media diversity, both of which report back to the federal government in coming months.
If you would like to learn more about funding opportunities to support PIJI’s work, please email us here.
Broadcast Media
PIJI is ramping up engagement with broadcast media, in the context of the Media Reform Green Paper.
The paper was released in November 2020 by the federal government and proposed that free-to-air commercial broadcasters should have the option of swapping their existing licences for a new type of broadcasting licence.
The new licence would impose fewer regulatory obligations on commercial broadcasters, but would entitle them to use less spectrum.
If at least two commercial broadcasters surrender their existing licences, the government will also reduce the amount of spectrum allocated to the ABC and SBS.
Returned spectrum would be auctioned by the Australian Communications and Media Authority and it is proposed a percentage of proceeds could be put into two trusts: a Create Australian Screen Trust and a Public Interest News Gathering (PING) Trust.
PIJI is advocating for the PING Trust to receive revenue from multiple income streams, including the option of deductible gifts and distribute to a range of public interest journalism operators.
PIJI is meeting with all broadcasters to explore the feasibility of the government’s proposal.
For more information, email PIJI here.
Board Appointment
PIJI is pleased to announce that Mette Schepers, Chair of our Finance and Risk Committee, has joined our Board.
Mette is an experienced international financial and professional services executive, with extensive experience of working in, and with, highly regulated companies across Australia, the Netherlands and the US.
Mette has held senior executive, board and advisory positions in large, small and global financial institutions and non-financial entities. Her previous positions include leadership of client and consumer businesses in the private sector, strategy development and risk management for community organisations and for universities and government in strategy and policy with the Nous Group and PwC.
She has worked with and for the boards of 3MBS, 3PBS and in a voluntary capacity with the Modern and Contemporary Arts department of The Arts Institute of Chicago. She was a panel member of the Monash University Commission into Post Compulsory Education. The first of the university’s commissions into Designing for the Future.
She is a Chartered Accountant and holds a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Melbourne, Associate Degree in Design (Furniture) from RMIT and a Graduate Diploma in Applied Finance and Investment from FINSIA. Mette is a graduate of the AICD.
Recent Media Coverage
Australia
- Nine programs to return to WIN in new affiliate deal. The Age/SMH, March 12
- Former AAP and News Corp execs launch regional media business, NewsFarm. Mumbrella, March 18
- New report targets 12 ‘super spreaders’ of COVID-19 misinformation. Croakey, April 6
International
USA
- The journalism crisis across the world. Columbia Journalism Review, March 31
United Kingdom
- Pandemic opened newsrooms to journalists with disabilities. Journalism.co.uk, April 8
- ‘Science journalism Christmas’: UK newspapers praised for AstraZeneca jab coverage, Press Gazette, April 8
New Zealand
- ‘Three pillar’ approach for new $55 million public interest journalism fund revealed. The Age, August 7
News
A monthly selection of new research from academic and industry groups, relevant to the future of public interest journalism.
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Richard Jones, University of Hudderfield, Journalism Practice - Media ownership transparency in Europe: closing the gap between European aspiration and domestic reality
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Philipp Bachmann, Universitat Zurich; Mark Eisenegger, Universitat Zurich and Diana Ingenhoff, University of Fribourg, The International Journal of Press/Politics - Collaborating in a pandemic: adapting local news infrastructure to meet information needs
Andrea D Wenzel, Temple University and Letrell Crittenden, Thomas Jefferson University, Journalism Practice