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HAVE WE NOTHING better to be doing than checking the news? Apparently not – and that’s a great thing. According to a major annual digital news survey published this week, over half of Irish adults are very interested or ‘extremely’ interested in the news.
This figure – 56% – doesn’t even include those who said they were ‘somewhat’ interested in the news. If it did, that figure would rise to 91%.
As a news ‘practitioner’, let me say hallelujah. Zooming in on the super-interested – the verys and the extremelys (sic) – Ireland’s 56% is miles ahead of the UK (38%) and well above the European average of 45%.
This is heartening reading for the Irish news industry. The figures come from the 11th Reuters Digital News Report for Ireland, whose annual publication is anticipated by those in the online news space with the same levels of anxiety and hope as actors waiting for the Oscars shortlist. If not as glamorous.
There is no other comparable major survey that allows us to understand our place in the vast information landscape that consists of traditional media competitors, tech giants, newsfluencers – sorry – and online, print and broadcasting platforms. It also helps that the Ireland version of the report is just one part of a global report into the industry that goes out on the same day. It helps us feel both connected to what’s going on in the wider world and to appreciate just how very engaged Irish people are with a wide variety of topics, especially compared to *other* countries.
Irish people cast their net wide
It’s not just good news for us. It’s good news for us all. Irish people crave information and they crave connection with it, and to a certain extent, they feel well served. The survey asked people what kind of sources they had consulted for news in the past week. It found that 58% had used TV for news in the past week, 58% had used online news publications (and this didn’t include social media or blogs), 47% had used social media for news, 36% radio, 22% printed newspapers and 12% had listened to podcasts to get updated. Irish people will cast their net wide to get what they need.
What we have to do in the media now, even more than ever, is respect the curiosity and smarts of the Irish news fan. We were very happy to see that over a quarter (26%) of the survey participants said they came to The Journal for news in the past week. Only the online arm of the publicly funded broadcaster RTÉ attracts more weekly online readers than we do. We’re so grateful for your attention and your engagement.
We are also realists. For all of those super-users of news sources, 41% of those surveyed often or sometimes want to avoid the news. It’s a bit of an improvement on last year (44%) but still worrying and yet understandable. A person can be both – someone who needs the news, but also has the propensity to be laid low by it. Feeling the need to check the news these days can be akin to checking to see if the roof has been ripped off the shed in a thunderstorm. You don’t really want to put your head out in it but you’d prefer to know.
This is why there is increasing space being sought and made for getting information in a way that doesn’t feel like getting hit very hard and very frequently on the head. If we believe – as I do – that people who are constantly held to account by their readers, their industry codes of principles and some of Europe’s most, eh, robust, defamation laws are the ones well placed to deliver trustworthy news, the question for us isn’t why we should do it, but how.
Really caring about local news
At the launch of the Reuters Digital News Report for Ireland in Galway last Tuesday, some of the most thoughtful people in the room were those working in regional-focused media. Irish people really trust regional media – newspapers, radio, local outlets who are close to their audiences. Most people – 84% – say they care about local news.
But local media is – like many of us – under a lot of pressure to keep going, to stay locally owned and locally relevant. Coimisiún na Meán, Ireland’s media regulator who funds the research in the Reuters Ireland report, has launched local democracy and court reporting supports to progress vital innovations and capacity in this area. It’s very welcome but, as CnaM would itself admit, it’s not a panacea.
It’s time for a pact between the readers who want the news – so, so many – and the media people who want you to enjoy the experience enough to really value it. To get very real about that, it’s valuing it enough to see it as an experience worth paying for and supporting in some consistent way so that it stays an important part of Irish life and society.
From our end – the media who want you to love getting the news and for us to make a decent and sustainable living by making it so – there’s much to open our eyes and ears to. There has been celebration about the figure of 20% of people surveyed in the Reuters report who are willing to pay to access news. That’s up on last year, and it’s a big jump from the 7% who were willing to pay 10 years ago. Wouldn’t it be fantastic if that figure got closer to the number of people in Ireland who agree they can afford to pay for a streaming service that they feel informs and entertains them and generally makes their world better?
You tell us
When we receive contributions to The Journal readers’ fund, we invite those readers to tell us why they decided to support our service. That helps us to understand what they value (and what we could do more of, start doing, do better).
Sometimes, readers will cite specific work that they like:
“Delighted that you are investigating Ireland’s offshore wind that is actually near shore! So much that is not appreciated about this industry.”
Or,
“I particularly enjoy reading your articles on Ireland’s defence forces and general European/Irish security issues.”
But most often, these most committed of readers give us a sense of the moments where how they were being given information was as important as what was being relayed.
“Your election tracker is brilliant. I have been in and out of it constantly since the count started. I really liked how easy it was to go back and see all the counts and distribution of votes. And easy to compare overall to 2020. Really very well done.”
“Keep up the good work. I like your quizzes.”
Best of all are those moments when the reader hits a spot where they want to invest in what we currently do – and suggest improvements to drive us forward:
“You play a pivotal role in combating disinformation in Ireland. Happy to support. Suggest 90 second video explainers so readers can share your fact checkers with those who won’t engage with text or long-form content.”
(If you are that supporter and you are reading this, check out some of our new YouTube shorts in that space!)
So, yes, we’re listening and we’re doing, and we’re a bit excited and nervous about the future. And yes, news via the medium of interactive quizzes is always on the table.
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