Why you should assume responsibility over news media

Journalism in general, or at least some of its aspects, are often taken for granted and seen as some kind of a public good, like roads, electricity or transport. It’s a great analogy because news media have a lot in common with public goods:

• It seemingly costs nothing for the non-savvy information consumer and is very accessible
• It’s either provided by the government or regulated by one of its institutions
• Controlled by the government or media conglomerates and companies that are simply too large to not be affiliated with the government directly

This striking similarity is not bad in itself, the democratic importance of journalism is closely linked to public good aspects of media products, and can be viewed as a positive externality. Lack of investigative journalism may incur large social costs, because it’s an important element in the system of checks and balances that, in simple terms, keeps governments honest and ensures the rightful dominance of public interest as opposed to the interest of government officials or large capital.

The problem is that the availability, quality and the degree of independence of journalism, especially the investigative kind, is largely out of control of the population — it remains either at the mercy of government or media companies. In other words, it becomes increasingly difficult for journalism to perform its primary duty and provide a varied and independent news production, because every step of the way a news media outlet has to keep in mind the interest of its owner, and its owner’s interests rarely align with those of the public. The problem is much more severe in some countries, like the Russian Federation, for instance, which is a glaring example of abuse of media consolidation. It’s an example of media being a tool of propaganda and blatant brainwashing, rather than a public good.

There is logical explanation of why and how journalism and media in any country eventually risk reaching this point, but most people are oblivious to it. Independent journalism, historically, is difficult to fund on a commercial basis. Media companies are different, but those that focus on independent journalism simply wouldn’t be able to cover their own costs, because they produce something that people mostly take for granted, as mentioned above, something they see as a public good.

Media doesn’t exist in a vacuum, it has to be funded by advertising profits, government subsidies or through a combination of public and private support. Those who fund a media outlet gain control over it, it can be direct and obvious, or take indirect and less obvious forms such as censorship, but it’s a fundamental truth set in stone.

Does that mean that every single news media is taking advantage of its readers and the public in their country at large? That really depends on the country in question.

Let’s take Norway, what do the results of a quite recent survey show us?

The trust in journalists is quite high, and at the same time about 40% of people subscribe to an online media. The logic is simple — the media outlets get to remain trustworthy because they depend on their readers for their revenues quite directly. Betray their trust once or twice, and you lose your paid subscribers, then wave goodbye to your monetization model and a good chunk of revenue!