News Corp

1) Research News Corporation’s response to the growth of new and digital media by listing each of the institution’s brands (Sky News, Times etc.) Have any closed, changed or been in the news in the last five years for any reason?

- Falling sales cut into profit of the Times and The Sun

- News Corp can save money on staff thanks to New and Digital media. News Corp can now use User Generated Content and citizen journalism instead of professional journalist. However the use of UGC leads to a loss of quality and that could tarnish the News Corp brand image as the professionalism is lost. The Sun on Sunday is also an example of how News Corp is saving money, they use the same journalist and resources as The Sun to cut costs.

- Rupert Murdoch felt that his company was at threat by New and Digital technology as it has allowed audiences a greater choice of variety of news and websites to obtain the news from for free. This therefore led to The Sun and The Times to put their content behind a pay-wall to ensure that their status remains high and that they can try and attract a loyal fan-base that receive perks of paying for the pay-wall e.g. The Sun giving people the opportunity to receive up-to-date goals on football sent to their phones.

- The use of New and Digital media has led to an opportunity to attract younger audiences. Due to many teenagers receiving their news online, News Corp can try and appeal to teenagers through the use of their websites and making their main page story being mainly about celebrities

- Sky Go is easy to watch on the go and is convenient for the majority of audiences which may affect other aspects of the business e.g. Sky News (TV) or The Sun (Online and Newspaper version)

- Price wars. Many newspapers are competing to be the cheapest or to have some major promotional offer to entice an audience in to pick up their newspaper and increase their readership and circulation

- Phone hacking scandal had led to the closure of News Of The World. Which later was replaced by The Sun on Sunday.

2) Develop examples of the impact that new and digital media has had on News Corp’s brands (paywalls, readership figures, audience share etc.) I think I already spoke about them in the above question

- Rupert Murdoch felt that his company was at threat by New and Digital technology as it has allowed audiences a greater choice of variety of news and websites to obtain the news from for free. This therefore led to The Sun and The Times to put their content behind a pay-wall to ensure that their status remains high and that they can try and attract a loyal fan-base that receive perks of paying for the pay-wall e.g. The Sun giving people the opportunity to receive up-to-date goals on football sent to their phones.

- Phone hacking scandal had led to the closure of News Of The World. Which later was replaced by The Sun on Sunday.

- Sky Go is easy to watch on the go and is convenient for the majority of audiences which may affect other aspects of the business e.g. Sky News (TV) or The Sun (Online and Newspaper version)

- Falling sales cut into profit of the Times and The Sun

- News Corp can save money on staff thanks to New and Digital media. News Corp can now use User Generated Content and citizen journalism instead of professional journalist. However the use of UGC leads to a loss of quality and that could tarnish the News Corp brand image as the professionalism is lost. The Sun on Sunday is also an example of how News Corp is saving money, they use the same journalist and resources as The Sun to cut costs.

3) Use what you have found out about News Corp to answer the following question:

Why and with what success are traditional media institutions adapting to the challenge posed by new/digital media?

I feel that News Corp has attempted to adapt and to some extent has done so with some success. News Corp felt threatened and therefore had placed a paywall up to make their news and up-to-the-second goal app. They had attempted to entice football fans to pay for the paywall just for the goal app, this therefore was a successful way of adapting. However, there are many other sites for just general news which the majority of users would go to. Sun readers online may just check twitter for news (especially if they are teenagers) as twitter has now become one of the fastest ways of communicating news to a mass audience, by the time newspapers print it or even post an article, millions of people would have read a brief summary of an event. The Sun being behind a paywall will therefore be at a disadvantage at this point as many of the people online would want a range of viewpoints and will most likely go to the free online sites such as The Guardian. This could have also been the cause of the fall in sales of The Sun and The Times.

The fall in sales could also have been due to the whole new/digital media as it provides much quicker and more convenient access than a newspaper. The internet also provides billions of online reviews, opinions, articles etc from professional journalist and also bloggers and this content tends to be free. Linking to the professional journalist, News Corp did lose News Of The World due to the phone hacking scandal but led to the creation of The Sun On Sunday which used some of the journalist from News Of The World. Some journalist may also not be needed as the internet and the creation of camera phones has allowed anyone and everyone to become citizen journalist recording events as they happen on their phones and then sending it in to a newspaper to print about and inform readers that the video is on their website. Sky Go was also created as a way to keep up with the changing world of today, we are able to view videos on our phones or tablets while going out, it allows more convince and is quite successful in the battle against digital media and institutions.

I believe that the creation of new and digital technology has led newspaper to a near end. Newspapers are becoming redundant and News Corp has decided to try and revive their news institution through the use of new and digital technology and have been successful to some extent.