Media Quality Yearbook 2017: Six Main Findings
The main findings of the 2017 «Quality of the Media» yearbook, published by the Institute for Public and Social Research at the University of Zurich, were presented on Monday in Bern.
They show that the digital structural change of the public sphere is continuing. The Internet and especially the platforms of the global tech intermediaries have thus developed into the central instance of the public sphere. This is changing the form and structure of the public sphere. If we look at the media providers with their offerings and the reach that such offerings achieve, the public sphere takes on the form of a "long tail" (see illustration below).
"In the front of the tail" there are only a few providers with a strong reach - in Switzerland, these include (still) the professional media providers. "Back in the tail" there is a large amount of providers and offers, each of which reaches significantly fewer people. These include, among others, the new professional offerings, the professional PR services that are available on the net by means of Corporate Publishing have direct access to the audience, and also the controversial so-called "alternative" information offerings.
All providers "in front" and "behind" in the tail are caught in the maelstrom of global tech intermediaries and platforms. Some seem to be benefiting from them at the moment, but for most media providers, the relationship with tech intermediaries and platforms is proving extremely difficult and, above all, unpredictable. This "platformization", especially coming from Google and Facebook, is putting pressure on professional journalism in Switzerland.
Against this background, this year the Fög is moving the following six main findings into the center:
1. professional information media are more important than ever before: The digital structural change is promoting the formation of a "long tail" online public in Switzerland. This is characterized by a further growing concentration in the area of professional information providers who achieve a high reach. At the same time, there is a growing "long tail" of providers who achieve only a low reach and are not or only partially oriented toward traditional standards of professional information journalism. Professional information media are therefore more important than ever before. They have the indispensable task of performing a curating and monitoring function in the free wilderness of the digital network.
2. digital first in Switzerland, too: The digital structural change is also reflected in the fact that media consumption in Switzerland is increasingly taking place on digital channels. In Switzerland, too, 41 percent of the population already obtain information mainly via news sites or social media. For Swiss media providers, it is positive that, in an international comparison, online use in Switzerland is somewhat more direct via news sites and thus the media brands themselves than via search engines or social media. But in Switzerland, too, the global tech intermediaries are increasingly important as feed channels for news and are even the most important access portal to news for the youngest age group. This unbundled media consumption is weakening the media brands of the professional information providers here. In addition, the economic dominance of the global tech intermediaries is also taking its toll on the information media.
3. uncontrolled growth in the digital network: The structural crisis in professional journalism favors the emergence of controversial alternative media that position themselves in direct opposition to the established information media and sometimes spread conspiracy theories. These currently still eke out a marginal existence in Switzerland. The low level of polarization and the high level of trust in professional media currently still limit the spread of alternative media in Switzerland. With individual contributions, however, alternative media can achieve high coverage in certain situations, also as a result of networking among themselves.
4. the quality of news sites increases: Many professional information providers "at the front of the tail" are still doing measurable quality journalism on multiple channels, and the quality has improved for some providers over the past three years. In particular, the quality of professional online news sites, long inferior to their press and broadcast counterparts, has risen noticeably. It is true that, on the whole, low-quality offerings still achieve the greatest reach in the Swiss media arena. But a mass audience can also be reached with good media quality. Examples of media that combine good quality with reach include the Sunday titles Il Caffè, Le Matin Dimanche and the NZZ am Sonntag or the subscription titles Corriere del Ticino, 24 heures and the Tages-Anzeiger, in addition to information programs on public radio.
5. Facebook depresses the quality of information providers: In terms of their basic functional logic, social media are emotion media and can have a quality-leveling effect on professional information media if they bow too strongly to this logic. For example, our new analysis of what is offered on Facebook shows that many information media studied offer lower quality on Facebook, and thus on an increasingly important platform for news, than on their own channels. However, providers of subscription newspapers are bucking this trend to some extent. In addition, individual media providers are proving that they can trigger user reactions on social media even with high-quality contributions. This is true of quality media, which "in line with their profile" also offer quality contributions on social media to which the audience responds.
6. concentrated media market: "Front in Tail" has further accentuated the already high media concentration or decreasing provider diversity in Switzerland. In German-speaking Switzerland, the three largest Swiss media companies dominated 71 percent of the online reach market for professional information media in 2016. In Suisse romande and Svizzera italiana, the figure is as high as 88 percent each. The diversity of media providers is clearly limited. This is compounded by recent developments at Tamedia, a dominant player in the Swiss press and online information market. The announcement that it will integrate various titles even more closely into centralized editorial teams over the next few years means a further restriction of the diversity of media content, including at the level of national and international hard news reporting. Other media houses are also likely to follow suit. This picture is matched by the NZZ Group, which announced the discontinuation of the print edition of the Ostschweiz am Sonntag has announced.
