Cooperation a chance for world media industry to prosper
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Fundamental changes have taken place to the media industry worldwide -- the digital-era squeeze, the global economic depression and the developing nations' thirst for more voice are all calling for new wisdom for the media industry.
Facing multiple challenges, world media organizations realized it's time to draw strength from one another for survival and business expansion, agreed the participants to the World Media Summit held on Oct. 8-10.
Cooperation between tradition and new
The media practitioners must keep positive and alert in grasping opportunities for growth as the border between traditional and new media is increasingly eroding away, said the editor-in-chief of the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), Robert James Thomson.
There has been a trend of the so-called old media going digital and finding opportunities in the new media market, said Thomson.
According to the Associated Press President and CEO Thomas Curley, the "new era of the new media" not only has brought about challenges, but opportunities as well.
He explained in detail a recent cooperation between AP and Twitter, the on-line popular micro-blogging site, when covering the U.S. Congress hearings on the appointment of a new Supreme Court Justice, Sonia Sotomayor.
"We worked with Twitter to promote the content ... And then we did a blog ... to provide insight, some context to what was going on," he said.
"That approach to the story telling generated three times the traffic that the regular AP story generated. So that's another indication that if we embrace these new media opportunities, we will be able to get larger audiences," he added.
Partnership contributes to growth
Richard Sambrook, director of the BBC's global news division, is ready to share the corporation's experience in partnership building at the Beijing summit.
"Partnership has been a creative stimulus," Sambrook said in an interview. "That (partnership) has benefited both us and our partners for nearly two decades."
According to Sambrook, BBC has learnt to choose partners for their ability to contribute to its strategic objectives. BBC now has seen its news and other program supplies expanded to around 2,000 partner stations around the world. "Our FM radio partners now bring us around 53 million listeners a week -- benefiting both us and them," he added.
Cross-media cooperation, usually involving broadcast stations, print outlets and Internet sites, has been a "key to the success of traditional media," said Gebremichael Gebremariam Melles, director of the Ethiopian News Agency (ENA), the oldest wire service on the African continent.
"Media convergence mainly emerges in two ways," said Gebremichael. One has something to do with the convergence of actual industries, such as wire services, newspapers, magazines, radio and TV while the other is concerned with the convergence of voice, video, and data within a common computing platform, explained the ENA Director.
Media cooperation vs. national cooperation
Cooperation between media houses of different nations also help promote understanding among their peoples, thus contributing to improving links between nations.
ITAR-TASS Director General Vitaly Ignatenko fondly recalled the media cooperation between Russia and China on news coverage during their reciprocal national years.
The Russian people take special interest in Chinese publications on bilateral relations, and publications about China's economy are also very popular, said Ignatenko.
Such exchanges, beneficial for journalists from both countries in gaining a deep understanding of the national conditions of China and Russia, should be expanded in the future, said the ITAR-TASS chief.
His remarks were echoed by Abedallah Hassan, the Middle East News Agency (MENA) editor-in-chief, who believed the inter-agency cooperation between MENA and Xinhua would develop alongside cooperation between Egypt and China.
"We in MENA care for cooperation with Xinhua," said Hassan, adding that MENA has formulated cooperation protocols with Xinhua.
The MENA chief also predicted more development in Egyptian-Chinese relations because China has always made good relations with Egypt a priority.
Stronger voice for developing nations
For media in developing countries, cooperation means new chances to give them a better say in shaping the world opinions.
The western media groups are influencing the world with a monopoly of ideas formed from the western perspective, said Molalet Tzedek, senior press officer of the African Union.
"Narrow control by a few corporations ...... is where the danger lies. We are rapidly approaching centralized corporate control of the news," Tzedek said.
Kaori Hayashi, an associate professor on media at Tokyo University, proposed that developing countries make united political attempt for a modified world media structure.
"It's hard for developing nations to set up an international major media organization in accordance with the market principle. Media should think about its role in the society and share the desire to build a new order," Hayashi said.
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