Video Games and Journalism

I have read Philip Trippenbach’s essay on Video Games: a New Medium for Journalism. He makes some interesting observations:

• despite the recession, sales are growing at double-digit rates, while other media sales figures are steady, or declining.
• 48% of 16-29 year olds are ‘active gamers.
• There are more gamers than football fans in the UK and video games outsell both movies and music.
• gamers as a group are more interested in politics – and more politically active – than non-gamers

Philip Trippenbach  says “Where games really come into their own is as a medium for deep explanatory journalism – especially journalism about complicated systems with many interrelationships, interacting forces and factions”.

“These can be important situations to understand, such as factional politics on the streets of Baghdad in 2005-06, or the complicated realities of the global fight against malaria”.

The BBC and other news providers currently struggle to engage younger audiences. Video games could prove to be the medium that solves this problem.

Dr. John Pavlik talks about his new book Media in the Digital Age. There is a bit about video games towards the end.

Sofia

A basic ideas framework

So, by now, everyone should have tried to have made the first contact with a potential interviewee.

Here is the fledgling skeletal frame-work for our presentation. Obviously, this is a first-ditch attempt, and I imagine that it will evolve pretty quickly from here. Doubtlessly, we will get rid of bits and add in new ideas as we do more research and get more involved in the project. But I believe that it’s very important for us to think thematically, even at this early stage.

A skeleton of ideas

So: What is the impact of social media on news gathering techniques and output?

1) The concept of news (output)

-News is now 24 hour, it’s available wherever you are (on your mobile/laptop). You can choose which news you look at, at any point (internet, iplayer radio shows).
So… News has moved away from being a top-down, rigid array of stories decided upon by “outletters”. Where it was once a single product made by two or three major agencies, it is now a MARKET of thousands of products. With a democratic element! (Digg.com, Web 2.0, etc.)

2) The integrity of news (output and gathering techniques)

The parameters of news have clearly been changed by social media. But by their inclusive nature, have social media diminished the reliability of news? I.e.: blogs, Twitter, and other forms of citizen journalism. Anybody can get a story out, but do people really treat that genre of news in the same way that they treat traditional forms, eg: BBC broadcasts, broadsheets, C4? Anyone can be a journalist these days, but does this put journalists out of a job? Or do we still look to established, respected and professional news outlets to guarantee us quality, accuracy and reliability? (And impartiality?)

3) Moral and legal restrictions (output)

If blogs don’t adhere to reporting restrictions, then does this make those very restrictions redundant? Eg: Guardian injunction collapsed by Twittering. Has news become more gory and crude? Does the unpoliceable internet mean an end for the ethical and legal frameworks established in print and broadcast to protect individuals and the audience?

Is there any way of policing the internet?

4) The job of a journalist (news gathering techniques)

Journalists have to work around the clock now…. Just like they used to in the olden days!! Facebook and other social networking sites give journalists a much quicker access to sources. Twitter means you can find a story as it happens. Does this quicken the pace of news? Do journalists now spend more time trawling the internet than actually going out and finding things the old fashioned physical way?

Trawling the net

That’s over and out from me. As I said, this is a bare skeleton, and we will need to flesh it out, if not reorganize the bones. It would be cool to have some feedback on this. Maybe we can simply use this as a springboard from which we can bounce ideas around.