Digital Journalism is the Wave of the Future

One hundred years ago, when automobiles were becoming a common sight on roads in the West, owners of horses didn’t decide that driving was too difficult, and so they would stick with their horses.

The benefits accruing from owning a motor car eclipsed those received from owning a horse, and the new transportation technology quickly made horses obsolescent as a means of conveyance.

Printed newspapers face the same fate as horses. Their epitaph has been written in the West, and it won’t be too long before Indians get most of their news in digital form.

Though print media makes money in this country, Indian news organizations are investing in online technology to satisfy consumers sold on the key benefits that online media offer: searchability and shareability.

All major newspapers and TV stations in India have websites that are as important a means of news delivery as the original platforms of paper and television, and are adapting their content for mobile consumption.

In a sign of things to come, newspaper readership among young Indians fell from 37 percent in 2010 to 23 percent in 2011, according to the 2012 click4college Youth Survey. Digital media, meanwhile, showed a CAGR of almost 35 percent from 2011 Q4 to 2012 Q2, according to the latest Indian Readership Survey. Print media grew just 0.9 percent in that period.

In this digital media environment, journalism students will benefit most from a practical, hands-on curriculum designed to familiarize them with each and every aspect—theoretical and technical—of digital reporting.

The Indian Institute of Journalism & New Media, based in Bangalore, is a pioneer in the field of digital journalism education in this country. Our trainee journalists may opt to study in the Print, Broadcast or Multimedia streams. Those who study Print or Broadcast must produce multimedia work as part of their major project, the summation of their learning in the 10-month master’s-level course.

Trainee journalists in the Multimedia stream learn how to report news using the most effective combination of text, still photography, video, audio and graphics. They publish an online newspaper, The SoftCopy, whose design and content is entirely their own work.

Our Multimedia graduates are now applying their in-demand skills in major news organizations across the country. Why not follow in their path?

By Mark Austin

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