British news media more trusted than US media

July 8th, 2006

First, the Pilgrims. Then the Beatles. Now the Times, the Guardian, and the BBC. The latest British invasion of America is under way and it appears the timing and target for colonisation are right. You’ve already seen the ships headed west: the Times is now publishing a print edition in New York. The Guardian has hired a chief for its US efforts while plotting online and print assaults. And the BBC has pushed its international news channel, BBC World, on to cable systems in America. But, of course, the real object here is not victory in old media. It is the internet. That is the sea that enables you to navigate and conquer the globe today

muses jeff jarvis in What the British invaders are really after in the US

And why is this happening?

News Corp isn’t trying to sell print advertising here. So even at $1 a copy, there’s surely no profit in this. But that’s probably not the goal. Putting the Times on newsstands gives the brand presence here and exploits Rupert Murdoch’s advantage over his fellow colonisers – he owns the New York Post and its presses. So the print product is, I suspect, merely a vehicle to market the online product, where the real money will be. I think this is a harbinger of things to come for many media companies; old media will live to drive people to new media and print becomes what we like to call “value added” (read: “worth less”). And the strategy is working on me: I’m going to Timesonline.co.uk more often. Rupert has my mindshare.

And what have been the reasons that this opportunity has arisen?

I believe opinion is a potent weapon for UK media because for decades, American newspapers and networks have deluded themselves (and their audiences) into believing that they are objective and opinion-free, while British broadsheets have skilfully created great journalism with perspective. The reason that political blogs have exploded here is that readers are dying to hear that perspective and also to get a new point of view on our own politics to balance all the bombast on talk radio and cable news. This is also why British news brands have taken hold here and now have a platform for growth.
The other great advantage for the invaders is that American news media are staggering from plummeting circulation, depressed ad revenue, declining trust, and a lack of invention and daring.

Murdoch, is probably one of the few digital immigrants (his words not Maurice Saatchi’s) to have embraced what the new world has to offer. He has taken calculated risks, in an effort to keep his empire, profitable and sustainable. I am sure he will be slowly steering News Corp into becoming a contender for the future.

More voices less credibility

More people are turning away from traditional news outlets, with their decorous, just-the-facts aspirations to objectivity, toward noisier hybrid formats that aggressively fuse news with opinion or entertainment, or both. Young people, in particular, are bypassing mainstream sources in favor of alternatives they find on the internet or late-night television. At the same time, public discontent with the news media has increased dramatically.
Americans find the mainstream media much less credible than they did in the mid-1980s. They are even more critical of the way the press collects and reports the news. More ominously, the public also questions the news media?s core values and morality.
A short-lived upswing in the media’s image in the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, served only to cast these negative attitudes into sharp relief

Where Americans go for news

Trust in Governments, corporations and global institutions continues to decline

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