The Hybrid Media System

by Andrew Chadwick

  Despite all of these developments online, older news media organizations continue to play the pivotal roles in British politics. The media professionals at the heart of these organizations have their reserved domains of power. As we shall see in chapters 8 and 9, they remain deeply embedded in the routines and insider networks of Westminster, Whitehall, and the major metropolitan centers. They interact with politicians and senior civil servants on a daily basis in the Westminster lobby system, which, by its very nature has an exclusive membership—one that does not include bloggers. Politicians still largely stage their media interventions to coincide with the rhythms of the broadcasting and newspaper newsrooms, which remain important routes to large audiences and maximum publicity. Older media organizations have the collective financial and organizational resources to outscoop exclusively online upstarts, and to leapfrog newer media outlets with the launch of expensive new initiatives such as online television delivery platforms like the iPlayer and ever more elaborate web environments that combine editorial authority and popular participation. As chapters 8 and 9 will reveal more fully, the patterns of sense making among political staff, journalists, and activists suggest that in this hybrid system older media logics increasingly operate in relations of interdependence with newer media logics: professional news organizations increasingly capitalize on newer media as a resource, tapping into the viral circulation of online content and weaving it into their news genres and production techniques, while also regularly engaging and interacting with newer media actors.

  The United States

  Similar hybrid forces now shape the media system of the contemporary United States, which forms the context of my interpretation of election campaigning in chapters 5 and 6, and of my discussion of WikiLeaks and news making in chapter 7.

  To get things underway, consider Bruce Williams and Michael Delli Carpini’s powerfully concise summary of the current situation in America, which they gleaned from data from the U.S. Census Bureau, Media Dynamics Inc., and the Pew Research Center Internet and American Life Project. It is worth quoting at length:

  To list the developments in communications that have occurred over the past twenty-five years is to be reminded of how radically different the media environment of the early twenty-first century is from what preceded it. For example, in 1982, as Shanto Iyengar and Donald Kinder were doing the research for their seminal work on the agenda-setting power of television news, News That Matters, fewer than 2 million personal computers were sold in the United States; the average home received approximately ten television channels; only 21 percent of American homes had a VCR; and the internet and mobile phones were, for all intents and purposes, nonexistent. By the late 2000s, annual U.S. computer sales had grown to 250 million, more than three-quarters of U.S. households had at least one personal computer, the average number of channels received had increased to more than 130, greater than 90 percent of homes had VCRs and/or DVD players, more than three-quarters of U.S. households had an internet connection (and more than 50 percent had high-speed connections), the number of websites increased from about 100 (in 1993) to more than 160 million, more than three-quarters of adult Americans had a cell phone or PDA (Personal Digital Assistant), and nearly one-third of households had a digital video recorder (DVR) such as TiVo.

  On any given day in December 2009, more than seven of every ten adult Americans went online. And what do people do when they go online? …. [Consider] the extensive and diverse range of activities engaged in by sizable percentages of people who use the internet, ranging from sending or reading e-mail (90 percent), to seeking directions (86 percent), looking for medical information (80 percent), buying a product (75 percent), seeking news (72 percent), visiting a government website (66 percent), watching a video (62 percent), seeking out political information (60 percent), social networking (47 percent), reading a blog (39 percent), playing online games (35 percent), and donating to a charitable cause (19 percent).… [Consider] the generally still small but collectively revealing percentages of “wired” adults who act as information producers by sending e-mails (90 percent), sending instant messages (39 percent), uploading photos (37 percent), sending text messages (35 percent), rating a product (31 percent), tagging online content (28 percent), sharing files (27 percent), posting comments to a newsgroup or blog (22 percent), participating in a chat-room discussion (22 percent), sharing something online that they created (21 percent), creating content specifically for the internet (19 percent), creating their own web pages (14 percent), working on someone else’s webpage (13 percent), creating their own blogs (12 percent), remixing existing online material (11 percent), and/or creating an online avatar (6 percent) (Williams & Delli Carpini, 2011: 77, 84–85).

  These developments have both shaped and are shaped by shifting patterns of media use. American television audiences have fragmented over the last three decades. Contrast broadcast television’s heyday—the mid-1960s era of 6.8 stations per household and duplicate programming (Prior, 2007)—with the early twenty-first century, when 85 percent of American households face a bewildering yet empowering choice of several hundred cable television channels, and when about 78 percent of the public can access vast swathes of online content (International Telecommunication Union, 2011). Americans are continuing their love affair with television, but they are increasingly switching their attention from just a few general channels to a broad range of channels and platforms that cater to niche interests. Advertisers and program makers have responded to this by creating ever more differentiated content. In 2009, the average number of television channels watched per week in the United States was 16, with just 2.2 hours per viewer devoted to each channel. From the early 1980s to the early 2000s the big three broadcast networks—ABC, CBS, and NBC—lost around a third of their audience share. When it comes to television news, cable national news audiences overtook nightly network news in the mid-2000s. Local television news is also under threat as a result of the recent declines in advertising income. Network news retains its dominance during important events such as elections and recent disasters like the 9/11 attacks and Hurricane Katrina, though even here the growth of cable has been very strong: the cable audience for election night in November 2008 was 27.2 million, close to the 32.9 million for the networks. News programming has changed over the last decade, too, as greater competition and cost-cutting have diminished the amount of investigative and basic journalism while increasing the quantity of talk shows driven by opinionated “celebrity” news anchors. At the same time, there has been an insurgence of alternative sources of news, such as late-night comedy, reality shows, socially engaged television drama, cinema, and music, which blur the boundaries between news and entertainment and often engage and educate viewers in politically relevant ways. All of these trends are stronger among younger segments of the population, but as the young age, they carry these habits forward through the life course (Williams & Delli Carpini, 2011: 78–79, 82).

  At the same time, however, we need to exercise some balance when interpreting these trends. Audiences may be more fragmented and the range of media much greater, but television is still hugely dominant for the American public. In fact, while Americans are now consuming more media than ever before, they are also watching more television than at any point in the nation’s history. Measuring these things can be like walking through a minefield, but according to respected industry research company Nielsen, in 2011 television was still six times more popular than the internet. By then, around 289 million Americans were watching an average of 159 hours per month of television, compared with a total of 191 million who were using the internet on a computer for an average of 26 hours per month (Nielsen, 2011a).

  There are, however, interesting trends in the area of video. By 2011, around 142 million Americans were watching video on the internet for an average of five hours per month, while 29 million were watching video on a mobile phone for an average of four hours per month (Nielsen, 2011a). These figures may be small when compared wit
h those for traditional television, but they are still significant, and they grew substantially during the late 2000s: between 2008 and 2011 time spent watching video on the internet using a computer grew by 80 percent, while time spent watching video on a mobile phone grew by 20 percent. Growth in television time-shifting through the use of DVRs like TiVo was also significant for the American public during the late 2000s: between 2008 and 2011 this practice increased by 66 percent (Nielsen, 2011b). As early as 2009 Nielsen found that each month around 60 percent of television viewers were also using the internet while watching television (Nielsen, 2010). As in Britain (and elsewhere), there are also newer set-top box technologies that hybridize television, film, music, gaming, and internet video, such as the Apple TV and the Boxee Box. There is also some evidence that streaming television online is beginning to have a negative impact on cable television subscriptions (Nielsen, 2012). As we shall see in chapters 6 and 7, online video is changing some of the power structures of U.S. presidential campaigns, but in ways that are far from obvious, not least because online video now often works interdependently with television.

  A sense of balance is also required when we consider patterns of political news use, particularly during U.S. presidential campaigns. By the presidential election of 2008, there had been significant shifts in this field. That year, 56 percent of citizens reported that they had received some campaign news online—an increase of 15 percent on 2004, and 26 percent on 2000. There were also steep rises in the numbers of people reporting the internet as their “main source of campaign news” in 2008. Back in 2000, this stood at just 11 percent. In 2004, it had risen to 21 percent. By 2008, it had reached 36 percent (this was higher than for newspapers, which in 2008 stood at 33 percent). If we break these numbers down by age, the results are even more startling. Among the under-30s, 58 percent stated in 2008 that the internet was their main source of campaign news, compared with 60 percent who named television. In other words, among the young, the internet was just as important as television for following the 2008 campaign (Pew Research Center, 2008a).

  These trends are undoubtedly significant and some scholars, including Philip N. Howard and I, have discussed the rise of digital distribution and the growing group of political “omnivores” who consume news across a wide range of platforms (Howard & Chadwick, 2009). The growing importance of a range of secondary media for political information has been an established trend since the late 1990s (Massanari & Howard, 2011). But let us unpack these U.S. data a little, as a means of exploring the complex interactions between older and newer media logics.

  When faced with findings that reveal a “rise” in the consumption of campaign news “online” and a “decline” in the consumption of campaign news in “print,” we need to consider just how much online campaign information actually originates with newspaper sources. By 2008 all significant American newspapers and, indeed, broadcasting companies, had ceased to rely solely upon print and broadcast distribution and had moved into a variety of online distribution models. Campaign news that originates with “newspaper,” “radio,” and “television” companies now also spreads across the internet via at least four principal mechanisms: the organizations’ own websites; their formal presences on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and other social media sites; the news syndication sections of the major websites, such as Google News, MSN, and Yahoo; and the gigantic video and audio content hub that is YouTube. Given the adaptation to the internet among newspapers and broadcasters and the amount of print and broadcast news that is now repurposed for online consumption, it is very difficult to identify the true significance of these declines in audience numbers for “newspapers” and “television.” The 2008 Pew surveys do nevertheless provide some interesting clues.

  As Table 3.1 reveals, the websites of America’s traditionally important broadcast and print news organizations like CNN, Fox, the New York Times, and the Washington Post feature prominently among the top websites for campaign news. These sources are joined in the table by newer media players—the semi-professional blogs such as the Drudge Report and the Huffington Post had established large audiences by 2008, just like their British counterparts I discussed above. And yet, chief among the newer media are Yahoo, MSN, Microsoft, and AOL. These are portals and news aggregators that mostly repurpose the content of the big news brands (like CNN and the New York Times) whose own websites already feature among the most popular sources of news. In other words, television and newspapers, and their audiences, are now well and truly online, and in a variety of forms. This should caution against simple narratives about the decline of older news media.

  Table 3.1 Top Websites for U.S. Presidential Campaign News in 2008 (percentages)

  CNN 27

  Yahoo 17

  MSNBC/NBC 13

  Candidate websites 13

  Fox 11

  MSN/Microsoft 9

  Google 7

  New York Times 6

  Local newspaper/TV/Radio 5

  AOL 5

  Other conservative blogs/sites 5

  Political parties/organizations 4

  Drudge Report 4

  Polling sites and aggregators 3

  Washington Post 3

  YouTube 2

  Huffington Post 2

  Other liberal blogs/sites 2

  BBC 2

  ABC 2

  Other blogs 2

  Politico 2

  Notes: responses from those voters who stated that they got campaign news online. Respondents could list up to three responses.

  Source: (Pew Research Center, 2008a).

  The rise of the internet as a source of campaign information is genuinely significant; nobody could deny that. But just as significant is the fact that television has not declined: it is still the most important campaign medium for two-thirds of American voters. Even 60 percent of the under-30s still cited it as their main source of news in the 2008 campaign. And, while those citing television as their main source of campaign news fell overall from 76 percent in 2004 to 68 percent in 2008, this is best seen as fluctuation around a solid base, because in 1996 the number for television was 72 percent and in 2000 it was 70 percent. A similar trend can also be observed for radio (Pew Research Center, 2008a).

  Of course, we also need to consider the relative importance of different media during campaigns. The pattern here is somewhat clearer, with television emerging as relatively strong and printed news as relatively weak. While, as I have argued, we need to bear in mind that many newspapers have maintained their power by remediating print content for online distribution, in 2008 purely print media continued their long-running decline, and this was particularly the case among younger voters. Television and the internet were the most important media overall for gaining information about the campaign. Because Pew often ask respondents to list their two main sources of campaign information, they captured this new duopoly. Television and the internet are prospering, but the outlook for newsprint is bleaker.

  Television’s remarkable endurance is also reinforced by emerging patterns of online news consumption. Among online media, reading blogs and visiting candidate websites were quite popular in the 2008 campaign. Roughly a quarter of the electorate consumed campaign information in this way. But watching videos was by far the most popular form of online activity: 39 percent of voters reported having watched a campaign-related online video. The age divisions were again pronounced: 65 percent of voters under thirty years old watched online video but this dropped to 38 percent for voters aged between thirty and sixty-four, though 38 percent of voters in this age group is still a huge number of people. Furthermore, using Pew data, Jeff Gulati reports that 28 percent of all voters viewed a candidate’s speech online, 27 percent watched an interview, 23 percent saw at least one candidate debate, and 21 percent viewed at least one advertisement (Gulati, 2010). While there was plenty of content from speeches, interviews, debates, and advertisements that appeared only online in 2008, most of these important campaign events were first med
iated by television, before being remediated by online media.

  In other words, the basic context of the contemporary American presidential campaign is that publics voraciously consume online video, but a large amount of that video does not actually originate online. So here we see two trends that are very similar to what we saw in the British context: first, older media in general have adapted and are now powerful players in online news; and second, American citizens increasingly use digital media to engage with campaign content that has originated in some way with television. As new internet video platforms like Hulu and the iTunes Store continue to expand, these trends are likely to continue. And, as chapters 6 and 7 reveal, if we switch the analytical focus away from opinion surveys and toward a consideration of the actual interactions among campaigns, media, and publics, things look even more hybridized.

  Since the turn of the century, the growth of blogging and user-generated content of all kinds, spanning activities such as social movement activism, election campaigning, and governance has been even more remarkable in America than it has in Britain. But again, as in Britain, matters are often more complex than they first appear. U.S. broadcast and newspaper media are working through a period of adaptation and change as they capitalize on the internet for their own purposes in sourcing, assembling, and distributing news. Richard Davis’s case studies of the interactions among professional journalists, campaign staff, and elite bloggers illuminate the opportunities but also the constraints experienced by all of these groups (R. Davis, 2009). Marcus Messner and Marcia DiStaso’s (2008) analysis of the content of the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the 120 most popular U.S. blogs finds evidence of “intermedia agenda setting”: in other words, bloggers source from newspapers and journalists source from bloggers. The celebrated cases of blogger power in the United States, such as, for example, the exposure of Senator Trent Lott’s controversial remarks at a political dinner in 2003 that prevented him from becoming Senate Majority Leader, are best interpreted as the outcome of conflict, competition, and interdependence among bloggers and elite broadcast and newspaper journalists (Drezner & Farrell, 2008).