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West ditching newspapers for Internet while we remain illiterate
2005-08-11 08:12:11
By Baragunzwa Niyungeko
Information is very important as human beings are what they are because of curiosity. One is every time in need of knowing whatever is taking place around the place. Without information, there will be so many inconveniences in the community.
For example a contagious sickness has broken out, and there is no means of enabling community to know of this in order to take some dispositions against it.
Not only is information needed in bad situations but also in good ones. If someone applied for Government sponsorship and the Government responded favorably to that application, the applicant must get information for further preparations.
The lack of information is a big problem for any organisation.
In Africa we face many problems including illiteracy and poverty. Since information plays a dominant role in human life we need newspapers, the cheapest of all media.
According to Rupert Murdoch, the international media magnate, the era of newspapers in the information age is almost over.
Data from the World Association of Newspapers show us that newspaper circulation is decreasing .For instance during 1995-2003 the circulation fell by 5% in America, 3% in Europe and 2% in Japan.
Murdoch adds that in the 1960s four out of five Americans used to read a newspaper everyday. The diminishing of newspaper readers is caused by the rise of new media like TV, FM radio, and recently, internet.
Philip Meyer, author of The Vanishing Newspaper: Saving Journalism in the Information Age (University of Missouri Press) says that if the trend continues, the last newspaper reader will recycle his final paper copy in April 2040.
Even though newspapers disappear irreversibly in America, there is no problem because everything is prepared in advance. But that does not apply to us while we are not at the same stage of development as the US.
Advances in science and technology in developed countries led to the invention of various types of media. There is use the of Internet. Digital natives get their news from web portals such as Yahoo, Goggle and from newer web media such as blogs.
Scientific advance also led to the online encyclopedia that is growing dramatically by the day; through exactly this spontaneous collaboration among strangers Photoblogs are becoming common.
Video blogs are just starting. Pod casting (conjunction of I pod Apple’s iconic audio player broadcasting) let both professionals and amateurs produce audio files that people can download and listen to.
In developed countries the need of newspapers is not of great magnitude because each person is able to reach any media preferred.
A person can be in his own house and be aware of things that happen throughout the world by only opening some sites on Internet. These sites will provide him all information needed.
Globalization has transformed the whole world in a global village. Things that happen in Tanzania are seen in a very short time by persons who are in Europe.
Noting that a computer is not costly to people in developed countries, everything that happens in the whole world is taken as if it was in their village. The rate of literacy in developed countries is very high and electricity is fully available.
Scientific advance is a reality in developed countries. Many people know how to manipulate computers when they are looking for news.
As said by Rupert Murdoch, developed countries’ settlers do not want news presented as gospel. For them it is possible to get information before it is written and published on newspapers.
There is no hence no need to bend themselves on newspapers, which will cost them time while there is a possibility to download and get news immediately.
A portion of the news is shifted from internet to newspapers. It isn’t helpful to write it again in the newspapers while most of the international audience can download information easily and rapidly.
Some international media stations such as CNN, RFI, BBC and Reuters are the first to get information all over the world These same media stations are located in industrialized countries. The audience there doesn’t need to write news from Internet to newspapers because it will be a waste of time.
Newspapers are not of great significance in developed countries where every type of media exists, but the era of newspapers is not over particularly in Third world countries, where buying newspapers has to be budgeted for, among other needs.
Newspapers compete with basic necessities of the life such as food and clothing. Purchasing television or computers while not being able to buy newspapers is a misnomer.
In developing countries the news comes sparingly, with newspapers, radio and television the main sources of information, even if not everyone affords these media.
People in developing countries have little interest in reading, in which case newspapers are not reaching their end of usefulness, as in a way we are in a pre-newspaper period.
Newspapers do not reach every citizen in Third World countries due to problems of income in urban areas and transportation in rural areas.
There is thereofre a double problem, one being the lack of interest in reading and the other is newspaper circulation, before one adds the big problem of illiteracy.
Electricity that is used to empower other sources of information such as computer is a very big problem in developing countries especially in rural areas where the great majority of people live.
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