In 2010 Apple announced the iPad, a
powerful tablet PC that could replace regular laptops for those who just like
to use the internet and play a few games. At the time it was scathed as being a
larger version of it’s already overwhelmingly popular iPhone, a cash-cow that
Apple could milk with new version releases year after year. Not many outside of
Apple could foresee exactly how monumental the impact of this device would be. They
have transformed the way we communicate and take in media. If there’s one
industry that has never looked back since the introduction of this product (and
it’s many copycats) it’s journalism.
There are thousands of magazines on the
Apple App Store alone. When combined with the number on the Google Play Store
and other digital distribution outlets such as Amazon this number is far
greater. These digital copies of magazines offer far more than your regular
newsstand copy: you can watch videos, comment on articles, share them with
friends and interact with games and quizzes. There is no question that this is
a major advancement for the magazine and print journalism industry as a whole,
but what does it mean for the paper copies of magazines and newspapers?
Ian Murray, editor of the Southern Daily
Echo, sees tablets as being beneficial to the industry:
“What tablets are enabling us to do is
present the news back in a form, which is tried and tested over a couple of
hundred years, that people like to digest their news in.”
“What’s happening in the evolution of
tablets is that newspapers, after going through a rocky period with digital,
are now coming back into a form that we understand very well with headlines and
pictures drawing you into the story.”
He concedes that newer generations will
probably not use the paper edition of newspapers and that they would rather use
the digital editions, but they will probably still be reading magazines.
The figures suggest otherwise. A report by
Audited Media in 2013 on the 386 consumer magazines in the U.S. that have a
digital counterpart shows that sales of digital magazines have risen over 36%
since the same period in 2012. The important thing to note here is that
although this figure on its own is very impressive, digital sales only account
for 3.5% of the total circulation. The digital world is a growing market and it
still has a long way to go before it becomes the dominant force.
Ian Murray seems to sum up why this is
currently the case very well. When asked if the print journalism industry will
still exist in the next 25 years he simply says:
“I travel on the train quite often, I like
to have a newspaper, I don’t want to be looking at a screen all the time and
I’d lose the Wi-Fi link. As for taking my laptop, or even my iPad into the
bath, forget it.”
So it seems that technology itself is
holding back digital consumers. Although it is a growing market, until the
technology is there to thoroughly support it, customers are less willing to
migrate. Maybe when nationwide Wi-Fi links are put into place, or even when the
mobile technologies are made more rugged, practical and waterproof, people will
find themselves ditching the paper copies.
With that in mind there are many advantages
to using tablets as your primary source of news. Not only can you engage
yourself with the media with a higher level of technology (imagine watching The
Sun’s Dear Deirdre being conducted live on a Skype link), the technology makes
everything so much more convenient. If it’s raining outside you don’t have to
leave the house to find out what’s going on in the world; if 24 hour TV news
isn’t for you or you want something that is a bit more tailored towards your
way of thinking, you can simply download the latest edition of The New Statesmen
or The Spectator directly to what you are holding in your hands.
Tablets have opened up new ways of
advertising and generating revenue for the print media. Not only can publishers
offer subscription services at discount rates (they don’t have to print the
copies, simply upload them) they can also run tablet-specific adverts that
users can click on to find out more, opening an external app or website.
Companies pay more money to have their adverts appear in popular digital
publications.
It isn’t just traditional print media
that’s being affected by the tablet revolution; the TV news has also been
infected, along with a number of TV series’. Tablets have opened doors to new
ways of presenting the news and digesting our TV shows.
Sky’s coverage of news and sport is a prime
example of this – their use of tablets is innovative and mind-blowingly
effective. Take a look at the flagship football shows: the studio experts use
tablet technology to demonstrate where players should be on the pitch; they can
circle them, move them about, draw lines, slow down play and speed it up; this
technology has made football easy to understand even for those who are not
familiar with the rules. Gone are the days where presenters would use a white
board to show the possibilities of every move, now they have been replaced by
graphical demonstrations that are as easy on the eye as watching the game
itself.
The tablets have earned their place as an
on screen companion for newsreaders across Sky and other broadcasters and news
networks. They are given more control over the graphics that they use to
demonstrate news stories; they can manipulate objects on their tablets and
viewers can see the results on the green screen behind them. Has the FTSE
market seen a rise today? No problem, get the tablet out and use it to draw
some arrows so the graphics can help you tell the story.
TV news broadcasters have also expanded
into using applications to allow viewers greater access to their services. The
Sky News and BBC News apps allow you to watch reports as well as reading the
written version. You can also watch the news live so you never have to miss out
on following a breaking story. The portability that tablets have offered to
news organisations is remarkable. They can now target a whole new audience: the
commuters. These are the people who would have to wait until they got home to
catch the news at 10, now they have the option to watch the 6 o’clock news live
in their hands on the train from London to Birmingham.
Television shows have also been able to
take advantage of the greater levels of interactivity that tablets can offer,
with companion applications springing up left, right and centre, for
entertainment shows and documentaries. These offer viewers the chance to take
part in the show, maybe with exclusive polls and competitions, and find out
more information about the different subjects covered in the episode.
With all this in mind it is very easy to
get carried away when you consider the possibilities of tablet technologies,
but they do have their downsides.
The first is an obvious one: they are very
expensive. The latest iPad Air currently retails at £399, that’s more than some
laptops and even more than a daily newspaper costs over the course of the year.
On top of that price you have to purchase monthly subscriptions to have access
to each newspaper. The costs quickly add up. Talking of expense, if you want to
get a cover for your immaculate and shiny gadget you’re looking at another £20
for an unofficial one or a whopping £65 for an Apple one. The fact you can use
one on the Tube also makes you a target for potential thieves and muggers,
certainly far more so than reading a newspaper.
These technologies are also marketed as
being portable but there are some cases where being portable and being
practical are different entities. Ian Murray notes that you can screw up a
newspaper and put it in your pocket or bag, whereas a tablet gives you no
flexibility here, it is how it is.
Another disadvantage of a tablet is that
they are rather impersonal; where one might take notes on a newspaper I would
not scribble over my tablet screen. You also have to have the screen backlit so
you can read it. This cannot be good for your eyes in the long term and it
gives your face an inhumane glow.
So the tablets offer a whole range of
possibilities for the world of journalism and television, the problem is
getting people to adapt to them. Usage of tablets is on the rise so the
industry will have a lot of clout in the years to come. It is now down to the
news organisations and TV executives to make the most of the gold mine that is
developing under their noses.
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