Journalism Quality Management - a trouble, a pipe dream or a necessity?

Newspapers and journalism are experiencing a serious crisis, primarily economic, but also a crisis of their social role and credibility. It is visible in the decline in expenditure and revenue, including advertising, in the decreasing number of journalists and loss of public confidence. This pushes the further tabloidization of journalism, by which I mean using all means, themes, and forms that could attract readers. The result is a simplification of the content, a neglect of journalistic ethics, and – worst of all – numerous errors, from spelling mistakes to false information. This further decreases the credibility of the press. To brake this vicious circle a renewed appreciation of the importance of confidence in journalism is needed. This article describes the Total Quality Management project which was prepared by The Media and Society Foundation.

Defining the terms " radio and television broadcasting" in the digital age

Defining the terms „radio and „television broadcasting” in the digital age, can be problematic. Digitization , convergence and divergence of media, creates the need to revise the concepts of „broadcasting”, „radio” and „television”. All of these concerns stem from the fact that the concepts referred to above were created in other technological reality. However, these terms still exist in the legal language (especially in the Polish Constitution), but they seem somewhat anachronistic against the new media technology. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the concepts of radio and television in the digital age and to propose a change in this matter.

New media users and their strategies towards global media companies

Technological change in the form of convergence and digitization of media has fundamentally affected the relationships between all communication participants, leading to the design and implementation of new strategies in global media markets. The change applies to broadcasters, network operators, content producers, media products and service distributors, global and local actors in the audiovisual market. However, the key players of the change are the media users. From passive recipients of the mass media, they have become active consumers of media products and services, creators of network messages, and architects of new forms of communication. Media users gained influence over the decisions about the content, technology and distribution platforms. Thus, users have been converted into an important entity of the media market which strong corporate players have to deal with, and its potential and needs have to be taken into account in their business strategies. Thanks to networks, users produce and spread their own content and increasingly determine the shape of mass media content; they have their own strategies, and become significant players in the market. Their market strategies are variable and diverse, conditioned culturally, socially and economically. The change of the position of mass and network media receivers/users has an impact on the functioning of global and national media industries, corporate strategies and government policies. Corporate media have largely lost control over the dominant stream of audiovisual content and quotes, as well as other subjects. Along the development of a global information society there will evolve a strategic game between the media users aiming at the decentralization of media communication processes, freedom of choice, and creativity, and corporations seeking to dominate the market.

The consequences of co-creation of the value in media by the users

The usage of activities and emotions in the so-called background, the renaissance of pictography, crowdsourcing, gamification, geolocation, life-streaming and evolution of contactless technology – all of these terms are connected with the mass mobility of the media users and bring about the decline of the world of traditional mass media. Such are the consequences of progress in convergence and advancement of computing and telecommunication technologies. They may also be seen as signs of users’ activity, the result of co-creation of value for stakeholders and by stakeholders of media companies. Co-creation, which not only could, but should be administered.

Typologies of media innovation

The contemporary processes of media changes are occurring extremely fast. New technologies, business models, cultural patterns, social processes, regulatory changes necessitate modifications in the management of the media. Media innovation management is a key issue emerging particularly in the case of new media. The aim of the article is to present a typology of media innovations and to identify examples of each type. The analysis leads to the conclusion that innovation is now the biggest challenge to media producers and managers of media organizations. The study includes both old and new media, in particular the converging media. The article initiates the application of the innovation theory to media studies.

The business strategy of local public radio based on examples from Radio Koszalin

The publication presents the business strategy of a local public radio station based on the example of Radio Koszalin. As far as media management in an unstable situation is concerned, the efficient execution of the strategy is the key factor. Radio Koszalin is the only local public institution that is not supported by the voivodeship. The management board in cooperation with the employees have developed a corporate strategy for years 2012–2014 in order to increase the influence of the local media and improve the company value in the long term. The main purpose of Radio Koszalin is to gain the leading position on the media market within the Central Pomerania region. The new strategy provides an effective realization of the defined objectives.

In humanities and natural sciences, the media sphere is treated as a complex, abstract object used for describing the processes of media-based social communication. The concept is objectified and can be encountered in terminology employed in such fields as sociology, psychology, information technologies, cybernetics, the Internet, study of information society, as well as sciences of market economy, study of law and even organizational learning. Generally speaking the media sphere is a social sub-sphere and comprises the following sets of elements: media, information items, associations, senders and recipients. Each of these groups is time-dependent and changes significantly in a fractal-like manner. In this sense, we can talk about kinematics of this sphere and compare it to methodology issues connected with the area of physics. What is more, elements of the media sphere are affected by external factors. Therefore, it is possible to investigate the dynamics of the media sphere.

Media management in a formalized multi-dimensional media sphere

The article proposes new options for media management based on a model approach to the concept of a media sphere. The multidimensional model of a media sphere is envisaged as a place where all media entities (the media and all users of the sphere), which create networks of relations and dependencies, meet with information projected from the sphere of events into the information sphere. For the purposes of the final message, many information items projected in this manner are dropped by the media for various reasons, e.g. because they are too complex, insignificant or incomprehensible. Yet, they may be important for and highly valued by members of the audience. Mass media prefer not to come into conflict with the realities of the public, its needs and expectations; rather than discuss difficult social issues, they prefer to focus on sensational news and entertainment. Management and selection of topics to be covered are frequently the result of coincidences, or intuitions of the editors in charge, which leads to information chaos concealed by pseudo-events and other forms of journalism. Apart from that, media commonly use manipulation. Therefore, it is important to develop new concepts for media management so that they can be liberated from the direct impact exerted by the market, owners, corporations, as well as politics, and to ensure they are firmly rooted in the civic sphere. This is a kind of  de-commercialization which may only be achieved through an adequately formalized media sphere and by creating new sub-spheres of management taking into account the needs of all media entities participating in the information transfer. Sub-spheres of management are an instrument supporting institutional and legal, organizational and strategic operations performed by the body monitoring and supervising the media sphere. They allow for more effective and valuable communications addressed to specific groups of the audience. This, however, requires adequate formalization of the media sphere where its internal dynamics is taken into account; such options are available when methods of artificial intelligence are employed for examining the media sphere and predicting media events. The study is the first attempt to clarify this issue, and is the result of a discussion conducted during a seminar on modeling the media sphere at the University of Rzeszów.

Dyskusja odbyła się podczas konferencji naukowej poświęconej tematowi: „Kulturotwórcza rola mediów. Rola i znaczenie rozgłośni regionalnych Polskiego Radia”. Konferencja została zorganizowana w ramach obchodów 60-lecia Spółki Polskie Radio Regionalna Rozgłośnia w Opolu „Radio Opole” SA w dniu 24 listopada 2012 roku w siedzibie rozgłośni przy ul. Strzelców Bytomskich 8. Została zorganizowana przez: Instytut Kultury UJ, Instytut Politologii Uniwersytetu Opolskiego, Radio Opole SA.

W dyskusji udział wzięli: prof. Bogusław Nierenberg, prof. Stanisław Nicieja, prof. Emil Orzechowski, Sławomir Rogowski, Marcin Pulit, Henryk Pietrzak, Marek Składowski, Janusz Andrzejowski, Paweł Frącz

Wśród zaproszonych gości obecni byli przedstawiciele zarządów rozgłośni regionalnych Polskiego Radia, członkowie Krajowej Rady Radiofonii i Telewizji, członkowie Rady Nadzorczej Radia Opole SA, przedstawiciele opolskiego środowiska nauki i kultury.