Guidomedia

I wonder whether you can recall your first memories of television news? For me, it was watching the Granville train disaster unfold on Channel Ten's Eyewitness News. I can also remember the royal wedding and, two years later, Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser's lip quivering as he conceded defeat to Bob Hawke.

Perhaps you think I'm callow, and can remember much earlier events than that. But I feel old – very old – when I think about how much television has changed in those decades. Back then, our politicians seemed to speak in entire sentences, not sound-bites. Live crosses were used to deliver breaking news, not just as a ‘bridge' into stories. And celebrities wore a suit-and-tie, not ice-skates.
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But rather than be sentimental, today I want to describe old and new media, especially in the way both report news – and ask the question: "is there room for both or are we watching the death of the evening news"?

Let me offer the punchline right away – I believe the evening news offers a convenience that won't die fast, even under the threat of news media formats. Rather than erode the evening news, I suspect new media will grow the overall market for news. Do I think the evening news is under threat? Yes, but the greater threat is not other formats: it's credibility.

I also want to discuss a transformation in the way Telstra communicates; how, in my opinion, it is representative of a worldwide industry trend; and what it might mean about the future of our profession.

The media adapts

Before I get started, let me make one point. Traditional media is very adaptive – it has always evolved to accommodate new challengers.

Since the printing press was invented in the fifteenth century, there aren't many forms of news or many communications channels that have disappeared altogether. Instead, they have adapted. And adapted very well at that.

Newspapers have adapted to competition from broadcasters; cinemas have survived the threats from TV, video and more recently DVDs. And video never really killed the radio star.

Probably all that is happening is that television is adapting to the new challenge – it's becoming more interactive and participatory. More on that later.

Television news's future

So the answer to my question – will television news survive – is ‘yes, for two major reasons'.

First, Australian governments of all kinds have a demonstrated record of protecting free-to-air networks from competition. For instance, they have prevented a fourth commercial network which, in my personal opinion, is long overdue. And they imposed anti-siphoning rules which, for far too-long, weren't balanced by a ‘use-it-or-lose-it' rule.

By contrast, it seems to me the same governments are deterring investment in infrastructure that challenges free-to-air television. By this comment, I mean that the Trade Practices Act deters investment in new optic-fibre, HFC or copper networks – because the ACCC seems determined to regulate not for consumer outcomes, but to produce particular market shares.

The second reason why television news will survive is far more prosaic. The way television puts together news, sport and weather at the end of people's working day is functional, convenient and immensely popular. New media hasn't even come close to matching it.

But my prediction that television news will survive doesn't mean it is impervious to challenge.

The challenge of new media

Perhaps the biggest challenge is that it can't offer the same personalisation, interactivity and diversity offered by new forms of media.

Let me give you some data -

* 57 per cent of American teenagers create content on the internet,

* 39 per cent of Americans read blogs regularly,

* The fastest growing website of its kind is Myspace, and

* The fastest growing newspaper is online and comprises entirely user-generated reports.

The challenge of new media confronts businesses like mine, as well as broadcasters.

That's why Telstra is one of the first major Australian companies to develop an alternative website to complement its mainstream homepage. Our website, called www.nowwearetalking.com.au, contains information about our arguments, public forums to invite debate, and online polls. It is interactive, discursive, irreverent and invites disagreement – things that perhaps haven't traditionally been Telstra values. But as an instrument of communication, our alternative website has much more credibility than telstra.com.

Companies the world over are beginning to use alternate websites with great effect. Perhaps the best example is www.willyoujoinus.com, an attempt by oil company Chevron to engage consumers and get ahead of the public debate on renewable energy.

Another example is Telstra's new corporate podcasting service. It allows Telstra to broadcast events and interviews to narrow segments of our overall audience. Because it's an MP3 format, it tends to reach an audience quite impossible to reach using traditional broadcast methods.

A third example are our staff blogs, which are unfiltered and unedited save for ensuring compliance defamation laws. Earlier this year our staff even began using mobile phone-based blogs, giving them even greater immediacy and credibility. These blogs offer individual segments of our audience direct insights into Telstra – all with much greater detail and credibility that traditional channels. And these blogs offer Telstra the opportunity to more quickly set agenda, frame issues and engage with micro-segments of the community.

If you're thinking this is no big deal, just remember how staid, docile and conservative Telstra's communication was – just one year ago.

The Financial Times recently carried an article on similar changes in the marketing model. Jim Stengel, the head of Procter & Gamble, the world's biggest advertiser, says similar things about the impact of new media on marketing –

The hoary old advertising message broadcast from on high is giving way to a more personal, targeted and interactive approach… New technology has eroded the ability of advertisers to reach consumers through 30-second television commercials…There is no ‘mass' in ‘mass media' anymore…

In other words, new media presents the same challenge to big corporates as it does to news broadcasters. Whoever we are, our responses must recognise that media which is accessible, informal, discursive, interactive, personalised and fallible is – increasingly – going to get the better of traditional command-and-control, top-down information sources.

The challenge of credibility

The other challenge to the evening news is credibility. When Walter Cronkite used to say “That's the way it is”, viewers believed him. The crown of credibility began to slip one generation later – the generation of Brokaw, Jennings and Rather in America; and of Henderson, Naylor and Dibble in Australia.

Today's Australian television news is, mostly, married to what the networks still insist is “current affairs”. These are programs that have all the credibility of freak shows, and none of the fun. They serve a diet that's low in news protein and high in voyeuristic calories. The relationship between prime-time news and current affairs is a sham marriage between the anodyne and the incredible.

Perhaps that's why Tony Blair said sharing his life with the news media is “kind of like sharing an apartment with someone who is somewhat deranged”.

The problem might not be so bad but for the lack of remedies available. I have found the Australian Communications & Media Authority to be notoriously slow, unwieldy and ineffective. And the Press Council is sometimes seems so weak that it makes ACMA seem like the star chambers of Tudor England.

I was amused last month to hear ACMA – the Australian Communications and Media Authority – chastise A Current Affair for a dodgy story about chicken breasts. The network was compelled to address its shortcomings in a ‘compliance program'. Finding a compliance program in current affairs studios would be like finding Chaucer in the Big Brother house.

Telstra recently complained to ACMA about a segment on Today Tonight which made numerous errors of fact. I say we complained “recently” because it was only a year ago. Since then we've received a very courteous acknowledgement, and upon subsequent prodding they assured us it was receiving “active” consideration. (Makes you wonder what “inactive” consideration might look like.)

In other words, what I'm saying is that the greater threat to the evening news is not the advent of new media, it is credibility. I believe any slump in audience will have much more to do with credibility than with the challenge of new media.

Telstra in the media

Before I close, let me turn quickly to Telstra in the media.

Telstra is easily the highest-profile company in the country. At the moment, the company receives – every day – an average of 150 mentions on television news, 350 mentions in newspapers, and 450 mentions on radio news. Put another way, that is nearly three times more coverage than the next-most prominent company: Qantas. And it is more than the Commonwealth Bank, National Australia Bank, BHP Billiton, Woolworths and the ACCC combined.

We have partly invited that profile, in order to change the conversation to shareholder advocacy. We have invited that profile by sometimes challenging the Government and regulators where we disagree with them. It's never personal, it's just that we disagree. And we have earned the opposition of many vested media interests for two more reasons – we are beginning to emphasise new media channels that disintermediate journalists; and, frankly, we are emerging as a competitor to the advertising revenues of News Ltd and Fairfax in particular.

Have we been effective? We have certainly made headlines and attracted enemies.

The ABC's Jon Faine told listeners this week he'd bought Telstra shares knowing he'd lose money funding the Government's social agenda. 3AW's Neil Mitchell calls Sol Trujillo the “Mexican bandit”. And today's Herald Sun describes Sol as "a true Mexican raised on chilli peppers". The fact is he isn't Mexican, can't speak Spanish, and his family moved to America before any of our families moved to Australia.

So, have we suffered some brand damage? You bet. And certainly not everyone agrees with our position. But the point is – those who disagree most vocally are those who stand to lose the most when old channels of communication are bypassed. But none of this has surprised Telstra: it is the inevitable consequence of our approach.

Conclusion

Warren Buffet, the world's most successful investor, once said –

People will always want to be entertained and informed. But people just have two eyeballs, and there are only 24 hours in a day. Fifty or sixty years ago, media for most people consisted of the local movie theatre, radio, and the local newspaper. Now people have a variety of ways of being informed faster (if not necessarily better), and have more entertainment options, too. But no one has figured out a way to increase the time available to watch entertainment.

Clearly Warren hasn't heard of time shifting - the art of doing multiple things at the same time, therefore squeezing more than 24 hours in a day – we're experts on that at Telstra, and I expect most of you are too.

Let me conclude by repeating: I believe the evening news offers a convenience that won't die fast, even under the threat of news media formats. Rather than erode the evening news, I suspect new media will grow the overall market for news. I do believe that new media formats will compel the evening news to evolve – just like media since the printing press has always adapted. I do believe it will need to become more accessible, informal, discursive, interactive, personalised and fallible. In the end, I think this will only grow the overall market.

But I think the greater, more immediate threat to the evening news is credibility. Put simply, the evening news faces a choice between a gradual adaptation to new media formats or a quick suicide at its own hand.

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