Is superficial to say the least, especially considering the “sound bite” culture that we live in now. This is another aspect that is being talked about in this session now. Again I find that rather than these esteemed TV personalities, journalists and editors face the issue directly, they are amplifying excuses.
What I would like to hear is that these leaders would have a sudden light-bulb moment and look 5 years or more in the future and realise that they should invest in both technology and people and envisage a time where a viewer can not only choose the channel he watches, but click on an item and get more information about that information.
Okay, that might be too far away in the future for this region, but there is nothing stopping them to do investigative reporting and publishing that on their internet site, and a summary (full of sound bites) being broadcast. That would mean that the internet site would drive TV content, rather than the other way around as is happening now.
That doesn’t mean of course that all of the TV content does not rise to the required standard, but it – like the traditional newspapers – need to really re-invent themselves. People are much more sofisticated now and require much more in-depth knowledge in order for them to make informed decisions.
Comments
Its sad but true. In the past ten years, journalism in Bahrain has not moved forward as much as it should have. I think in general the country is heading for quantity rather than quality when it comes to newspapers. There is no such thing as investigative reporting/journalism. And I doubt there will be anytime soon.
As for televised news, its rotten to say the least. If we look at BTV news now and BTV news 30 years ago (or however many years its been operating), we’ll see that it is the same.
I unfortunately agree with Ali, but I think, as Mahmood notes (or implies) elsewhere… blogs have the power to change that. The Bahraini blogosphere is really active (could be more active but still, much thanks to bloggers like Mahmood it’s really influenced the flow of information, freedom of speech, etc) and it has given us a powerful media alternative… one that we actually have a voice in.
Oh, and to add my relevance to my point above… Bahrain needs its own Al Jazeera… with little political interference. Can’t say it’s something I’m expecting though.