Commentary: Life in the Mainstream- latest report on future of journalism

The RNZ boardroom, the last bastion of public broadcasting in the land, was the site today of the launch of the latest trans-Tasman report on the future of journalism and the practice of mainstream journalists.

A follow-up to 2008’s “Life In The Clickstream”, the report was published by Australia’s Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance (MEAA) and supported by New Zealand’s EPMU,

In presenting the report MEAA head Chris Warren stated that all individual journalists owe it to themselves and their craft to equip themselves with the “necessary building blocks to master the new architecture of news and information”. (For the full report see: www.thefutureofjournalism.org.au )

Peter Cavanagh, RNZ’s longstanding chief executive, commended the MEAA’s report card on the health and wellbeing of journalism.

While Warren acknowledged the broad gamut of crafts that make up journalism, Cavanagh was more precious about what true journalism is and the need to provide a re-definition or defence of “true journalism” – namely public good journalism, or journalism for the purposes of producing public good outcomes.

Any definition of independent, impartial journalism would automatically exclude, he considers, the pursuit of public relations, the exercise of blogging, the existence of funded research by vested interests, the dripfed nature of a Wikileaks, and “no matter how worthy” any agency of a non-government organisation.

ENDS

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