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Sola Ojo, Kaduna
The ublisher and Chief Executive Officer, BusinessDay Media Limited, Frank Aigbogun, on Wednesday expressed hope that fake news would save journalism the world over.
The veteran journalist, who stated this during the day-one of the School of Media and Communications (SMC), Pan-Atlantic University (PAU), Lagos, Online Media Conference 2020, believed that fake news would push citizens to real media outfits based on trust and credibility.
The SMC had for the first time xorganised a three-day online conference with the theme: Journalism in the Digital Age: Essential Skill Requirements for its alumni, as a continuous engagement to keep them abreast of the realities in today’s digital media World especially in the face of COVID-19 and post COVID-19.
In a paper entitled: ‘Journalism in the Digital Age: Myths and Realities”, Aigbogun debunked myths like, ‘contents will always be king’, ‘Facebook is a threat to journalism’, ‘Good journalism must be objective’, ‘Fake news will destroy journalism’, among others.
To him, only good journalism would save journalism and not any of the myths in the media world.
‘Fake news will save journalism because citizens are rushing to subscribe to reliable journalism. The audience is willing to pay for good journalism. That was why I believed that only good journalism will save journalism and good journalism is worth paying for,’ he said.
Speaking on the business side of journalism, he noted that advertisers are not only interested in the reach of a medium, but they want to know how long do the clickers stay on the website.
He warned that ‘if in 2020, a publisher is not charging for digital content, such a publisher should not be in publishing let alone of journalism.’
The BusinessDay publisher urged media owners and practitioners to go beyond tradition to concepts like solutions journalism, data journalism, explainer, fact-checking, among other innovations, in other to remain relevant in the media business.
About 120 journalists across the country – cut across print, electronics and new media – registered and currently participating in the three-day conference via Zoom.
