Jobs in journalism: The bad news…and the worse news

By Germain Ma

(Source: Seneca College)

With recent layoffs during the pandemic, changes are coming to Canada’s journalism industry which has been bleeding for years.  

In February, at least 210 jobs were cut by Bell Media, which owns networks like TSN and CTV. In March, a mid-day announcement came with a swift shutdown to all of HuffPost’s Canadian operations. Twenty-three employees were laid off.  

That’s just this year.  

During the start of the pandemic, 3011 media jobs were slashed, with at least 1269 of these permanent layoffs, according to Canadian journalism associations.  

Across industries, companies were forced to shut their doors or scale back, as the economy plunged with pandemic lockdown measures. These companies stopped buying advertising. Meanwhile, digital ad dollars continue to be funnelled into platforms like Facebook and Google, which don’t produce news content. Or pay for it. With dwindling profits, newsrooms cut costs by cutting journalists.   

Marie Gomez (Source: Glendon, York University)

That’s scary news for Marie Gomez, a video journalist for CityNews in Winnipeg. She was hired last year after graduating from a journalism program at Seneca College. 

“When you’re new, you don’t really have a lot to stand on,” she says. 

Gomez is worried she doesn’t have the experience to compete with journalists who’ve been in the industry for years.  

What’s to blame?

Canada’s media industry was already in decline before the devastating economic effects of COVID-19. From 2013 to 2020, at least 250 Canadian newspapers closed down. In 2019, there were at least 188 layoffs at TorStarCBC, and other news outlets. The pandemic only exposed and exacerbated problems already in the journalism business.  

Losses in advertising revenue is largely to blame as audiences shifted their attention online and the Internet gave people platforms to share their own content.  

But the shift to digital hasn’t meant that fewer people are paying attention to news. Readership has been growing for media outlets. It just hasn’t translated to revenue. COVID-19 has only underlined the demand for journalism.  

“News will always be important because people need to be informed and they need to be informed from reputable sources,” says Gomez.  

The trouble is getting people to pay for it.  

2020 saw an extra four percent of Canadians willing to pay for news—up from the previous nine percent since 2016. But this only amounts to thirteen percent of Canadianwho access paid news content online, according to a report by the Reuters Institute. For media outlets, subscriptions don’t bring enough revenue to cover losses of advertising dollars.  

What’s to come?

In February, Canada committed to making Facebook pay for news content, and vowed not to give in if the social media platform blocks news on its website as it did in Australia. Facebook had shut off news in that country when Australia proposed legislation that would require Facebook and Google to pay Australian publishers for news links. 

Canadian Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault said Canada could follow Australia’s example, mandating tech giants Facebook and Google to reach deals to pay news outlets, or to agree to on a price through binding arbitration. France’s model of requiring large tech platforms to negotiate with publishers who seek to be compensated for use of their news content is another option 

Facebook hacommitted $8 million over the next 3 years to support Canadian media, on top of the over $10 million invested the last four years.   

In March, News Media president and CEO John Hinds released a statement emphasizing a need for legislation. 

“Facebook is trying to avoid paying for content by coming up with an arbitrary fund approach,” Hinds said  

(Source: NewscastStudio)

In an article for The Conversationreporter Robert Cribb proposes a government funding model for “public interest” journalism that would bring together media outlets, academics, and journalism schools to do investigative reports.  

Gomez recognizes she will need to adapt and be flexible to work in a media industry ripe for change. 

“TV journalism will just translate into online platforms in the future—I foresee live streaming, YouTubing as more profitable in the future. It just needs to be legitimized,” she says.   

She suggests new journalists will need to work on skills they’re not as good at to get familiar with all aspects of media content creation. That will give them more opportunity to get in the industry.  

 

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