Pictured left: Ian Jarrett

This week I read an article that made me feel it’s time to beat a hasty retreat from years spent in traditional journalism.

Alan Rusbridger, editor of The Guardian in the UK was talking to a media audience in Australia about the splintering of the Fourth Estate.

 These words from Rusbridger had me all a-Twitter.

 “The lowest paid jobs in society are those that anyone can do, but can’t be bothered or don’t have the time to do, like cleaning or driving.

 “The danger for plain reporting is that it will be increasingly seen in that light – as a service that anyone can do, if they can be bothered or have the time.”

 The Guardian editor was making the point that people who are actually trained and employed as journalists are struggling to be heard above the din from Twitter and the like.

 And it’s not just the din. Twitter is increasingly a breaking news source for events such as the volcanic ash cloud in Iceland when people were searching for up-to-the-second information on delayed and rescheduled flights.

 Twitter is no longer confined to those who want to tell the world – or rather their three followers – about what they had for breakfast.

 There is no great mystery about social, or open, media, Rusbridger said. 

 “It’s about the fact that other people like doing what we journalists do. We like creating things – words, pictures, films, graphics – and publishing them. So, it turns out, does everyone else.”

 And before anyone chuckles at the plight of journalists, Rusbridger says other industries are being disintermediated in the same way and are also having to reinvent themselves to stay afloat.

 “The most urgent of these is retailing,” he says.  “For thousands of years we have had to travel to a shop to buy goods because the shopkeepers have controlled their distribution, just as media companies have controlled information.

 “Now we can go direct to the source of the goods, wherever they are in the world. The volume of shopping online is now ballooning and just about everything is now being bought on the internet and delivered to homes in packages – books, shoes, clothing, food, household items. 

 “Traditional retailers sitting behind the counters in their stores in shopping malls and strips are now facing huge challenges; many won’t survive,” says Rusbridger.

 “Those that do will provide something extra that can’t be bought online, some sort of added value or service.

 “The same goes for journalism. It doesn’t matter whether it’s free or paid, to survive it must do more than just report what readers could find out for themselves… if they had the time.”

Featured image credit (Vintage typewriter, telephone, old books on the table desaturated photo): Ockra/iStock