*The Integrated Newsroom - Literature Review*

2.7 AUDIENCE

Just as the role of the journalist has changed in the online era, the target audience has evolved as well. In Russell Neuman's paper, "Is the public ready for news on computers?" in the Nieman Reports (1995 p.63) he describes this new audience as neither dissatisfied with the current news media nor particularly enamoured by the prospect of reading news stories on computer screens. Neuman said,

People don't receive news passively, they actively scan and filter it. For print media, news is organized in space and readers scan illustrations, sidebars, headings and headlines for cues on what to read more fully. In the computer world it is a bit of both. The computer can act as an intelligent agent, seeking out, filtering and formatting news stories in response to the readers' tastes, prejudices and mood.

(ibid p.63)

He adds that most people do not want to do the work of the editor and appreciate the benefit of journalists' professional judgment. But they do know what they like, and as before, will continue to actively scan, ignore and seek out subtle clues of what in the flow of news really interests them (ibid p.63). Recent studies indicate that as many as 90 per cent of web users go online for news and information and that TV viewing has declined as Internet use has increased. (Maddox & Hu cited in Aikat 1998, p.95). Neuman said that generally traditional print newspapers are losing their younger audience. At the moment, even among the early adopters, online news in not a news habit. Among home computer modem users only 28 percent often or sometimes seek out news, weather or sports information. The number of American adults who report reading a newspaper regularly is 71 percent (Neuman 1995 p.63).

The past two decades have documented a decline in the newspaper reading habit among teenagers and young adults, the most significant element in overall newspaper circulation decline. Furthermore, there is little evidence that these young people are picking up

newspapers in their 30s or even in their 40s as they tend to rely on electronic media. Although it is not yet evident in the survey numbers, this cohort may rediscover "print" in a newly electronic form (Neuman 1995, p.63).

In terms of WWW usage the Greenfield Online Netstyles study of 1,000 American households gives some indication of future trends. An estimated 97 million Americans have access to the WWW. Seventy four percent of online households allow children in the home to surf the Web. Fourteen percent of children online are aged five years or younger (Business Wire 1999). A January 2000, Nielsen-NetRatings (NetRatings Inc Online 2000) study revealed an Internet universe of 120 million users with 52 million being active users. They spent an average of two hours 49 minutes surfing the WWW in six sessions per week viewing each page for an average of 53 seconds.

Sulzberger (Webb, 1995 p.28) predicts that the nature of the WWW will change as a second wave of commercial shopkeepers replace the technically-oriented frontierspeople. Future Internet users won't be the Web surfers of today. "People are going to want to go to places that help them, and then they're going to stop.Online users need branded information like The Times because people are creatures of habit and will want to go somewhere to serves their news needs daily (ibid).

This branding of information ties in with Shenk's (1997, p.102 - 108) pre-empt that publishers should find a receptive audience for the masses of information being transmitted. He describes the 'information overload' side-effect. Publishers are trying hard to attract and entice online readers and currently information providers are resorting to 'shock value' to garner attention. He says it would be wise for online news publishers to understand this and position their products carefully adding that in a glutted environment, it is simple to send out messages but publishers have to be aware of the "two-by-four-effect".

The two-by-four-effect provides humanity with a way to keep communication alive in a glutted environmentÉ . We are witnessing the new reign of trash TV, hate radio, shock jocks, tort litigations, publicity stunts, excessive violent and sarcastic rhetoric.

(Shenk 1997, p.103)