Promoting Online Journalism In Dev Countries

Mainstream media organisations in developed countries have success stories to tell about online journalism, a genre of journalism which enables the media outfits to supply multimedia reports to their audience with the aid of advanced technology.

Media watchers, however, say that developing countries are still grappling with how to adapt to the new media practice, leaving a wide vacuum in the quality of news and the medium of getting the news across to their audience.

Faced with this challenge, most media organisations in developing countries, which are still using the traditional means of news treatment and transmission, have started making efforts to transform their reportage and make it to conform to the emerging trends in the current multimedia age.

To build the capacity of journalists in developing countries in multimedia applications, the World Media Summit (WMS) Secretariat, hosted by Xinhua News Agency, recently organised a 10-day training programme in Beijing, China, for 11 journalists from African and Asian countries.

At the opening of the training workshop, Mr Zhou Zongmin, the Secretary-General of WMS, said that the training was aimed at helping the participants to understand the basics of online journalism.

Zhou, who is Director-General of Foreign Affairs Department in Xinhua News Agency, said that senior media professionals from developed countries were invited to share their experience in online journalism and multimedia work with the participants.

He said that senior media professionals from ITAR-TASS, BBC, Reuters, Associated Press, Al Jezeera, CNN and Xinhua News Agency would anchor the training in online journalism.

“This is because online journalism is the new trend now. Most media organisations have moved from the conventional way of news treatment to posting news contents online, supplying pictures, audio and visuals with the stories as well,” Zhou said.

One of the resource persons, Ms Yuan Li, the Managing Director ofWSJ.Com, an online publication, urged journalists from developing countries to acquire multimedia gadgets to enable them to practise online journalism.

Yuan, however, noted that journalists from Africa and Asia were particularly facing a lot of challenges in meeting their basic needs, adding that the constraints could somewhat make their efforts to acquire multimedia gadgets very difficult.

“It pricks my heart anytime 1 think about a situation where journalists don’t have enough money to feed themselves, not to talk of buying laptops, cameras and other gadgets. And without those gadgets, they cannot be multimedia journalists.

“However, I encourage them to save money and buy cell phones with Internet facilities or go for laptops that are not very expensive to enable them to master the skills of online journalism.

“All journalists are encouraged to be familiar with online journalism to enable them to brace to the challenges in the profession, as the media industry is rapidly changing due to recent advances in information technology,” Yuan said.

Mr Ahmad Shaikh, the Editor-in-Chief, Quatar-based satellite TV news channel AI­Jazeera, stressed that journalists needed proper training to get acquainted with the prerequisites of online journalism.

He said that the journalists could only attain proficiency in online journalism through purposeful and well-coordinated training programmes.

“Practical training is very important; they need to be trained by someone who has experience in online journalism. They cannot attain the know-how theoretically; they need a special training to master online journalism.

‘They need to know how to use the gadgets, download audiovisual contents, edit audiovisual contents and learn how to post stories on the Internet; as the publishing system on Internet itself has its constraints,” Shaikh said.

“For instance, one has to make the stories short and learn what relevant stories to choose. There is a need for a proper training in online journalism. Honestly, that is the only way out,” he added.

Sharing similar sentiments, Mr Yoichi Kosukegawa, Editor (World Services Department) of Kyodo News Agency, argued that it was only through well-structured training programmes that journalists from developing countries would be able to acquire the modem skills of the multimedia age.

He, however, urged the management of media organisations in developing countries to support their reporters by procuring the requisite gadgets for them.

Making reference to Kyodo, the Japanese news agency, Kosukegawa said that the agency had gone through some major reforms and had successfully adapted to the fundamental requirements of the multimedia age.

“When we introduced multimedia coverage to our reporters, they were initially confused and they often asked questions about the processes since they were used to the traditional means of reportage.

“They then asked questions about which content to bring first, text stories, picture, audio or visuals. We encouraged them to start with any content they considered convenient for them.

“It took about two years for us to get to where we are now but today we have a success story to tell. Apart from transmitting hard news, we now distribute photos, graphics, audio and video scripts to our subscribers,” Kosukegawa said.

Media experts, nonetheless, observe that countries and media organisations ought to fully take advantage of the applications of the Internet to enable them to smoothly adapt to online journalism.

They also note that Malaysia and Pakistan have invested substantially in modem media technologies, as more citizens are now buying laptops, cell phones with internet facilities and other gadgets, making the countries to progress rapidly in online journalism.

Yuan said that Malaysia was adjudged to be the most social network-friendly country in the world, urging other developing countries to emulate Malaysia.

However, some media organisations in Africa are currently undergoing some transformation to enable them to adopt online journalism and adapt to the emerging trends of the multimedia age.

This writer told the workshop participants that  News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) had moved beyond transmitting only texts and photos to sending audio and visual packages to its subscribers via the satellite.

She, however, said that the distribution of NAN’s visual reports to its television subscribers was still at the pilot stage, while the agency’s audio service was now full­fledged, as it currently supplied audio materials to over 40 radio stations across the country.

“NAN has a multimedia studio for recording and editing audio and visual media contents and it also provides a documentary package tagged ‘Business Nigeria’ for its radio clients,” she said.

However, the Ghana News Agency (GNA), which was established in 1957, is still in the process of embracing online journalism and the multimedia approach to news dissemination.

A GNA correspondent, Samuel Akapule, who participated in the training, said that the agency had yet to adopt online journalism, saying that the agency was still examining it to know how to embrace it in a pragmatic way.

“We supply only text stories and pictures to our subscribers. We have yet to go multimedia because our reporters still go out to file text stories, while our photo unit works on the pictures.

“Our management is planning to train us to be multimedia compliant, so as to enable us to provide multimedia materials to our subscribers as well,” Akapule says.

Kenya News Agency (KNA), which was established in 1963, is also caught in the web of emerging transformation of media practice, according to Hussein Hassan, an information officer working for KNA.

Hassan said that in 2009, KNA adopted the use of internet facilities for its news dissemination, conceding, however, that the agency’s reporters still carried out their reportage in the traditional way.

“But the management has promised to supply the reporters with laptops, digital recorders and cameras by January next year. When that is done, we will be able to further advance and provide multimedia contents for our subscribers,” he said.

Media analysts, however, note that online journalism has great potential in developing countries, depending on how fast they are able to adapt to it.

They, nonetheless, call on governments of the countries to make concerted efforts to revamp their communications infrastructure and promote wider use of the Internet, not only by the media but also by all the strata of their societies.

Ologunagba writes for NAN

Cecilia Ologunagba