Digital publishing for Indian news media - Part III & last

Integrated Newsroom

The major problem is the integration of the print and online staff – the two poles in an organisation . We may have to take lessons from many organisations that have already done it. In India too, integrated and coordinated newsrooms have come about in the Hindi newspaper majors Dainik Bhaskar and Dainik Jagran respectively.

When professionalism was seriously talked about by the media and decisions taken in the 1990s in India, it usually related to the blue-eyed boys and girls, namely the reporters and correspondents. But the western experience of rotation of journalists on the desk and on the field was clearly ignored.

Now the integrated newsroom ought to encourage this in both versions. And only the term journalist would matter more if they are rolled into one and asked to do reporting and editing by turns. This would also the address the problem of lack of special stories and exclusives as all journalists will feel the need for breaking news of all hues.

What will differentiate one paper from another is the publishing of special stories with human interest and exclusive ones across the spectrum. Once this tribe of integrated journalists comes into being, there is nothing that is going to stop them from making their organisations the best ones.

Jakarta Globe

Take the Jakarta Globe online, for instance. The stories that come under the Editors Choice are very interesting and well-written. Recently, there was a story about their Homeless World Cup soccer team members – one of whom walked a long distance to raise funds to enable the team go to France for the cup. He was inspired by his mother’s words to keep promises, something that was ignored by a prominent public personality.

Compare this with some segments of the cricket-obsessed Indian media that chose to downplay the Indian hockey team’s protest over the paltry sum offered to them for their recent victory over Pakistan in the Asian Champions Trophy. All sports need to be encouraged and the media needs to play a larger role in this and derive all advantages that it can get from the youth in this respect.

The Globe also had a story about comics being used by Islamic schools to teach tolerance showed the transparency with which their system works. It received very sharp comments both from a person who opposed fundamentalism and another critical of Christians.

I wonder whether such feedback could be put on any website in India.
The challenge for the Indian media is to be glocal as well as local. Non-news sites are already tapping the citizen journalism front which quenches the thirst for news ignored or not covered by the mainstream media.

The Indian media needs to take all these factors into consideration and launch digital initiatives by playing to their strength and adding new readers through modern methods and devices.


(journo1958@gmail.com)

K.Kirubanidhi
Sr. Asst. Editor
The Hindu
Chennai