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Channels will be more focussed
Mannika Chopra

THIS year, according to information sourced from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, 28 licences were issued to new news channels, while 44 were given in the non-news category. In a space already cluttered with news networks — over 65 at last count — and reeling with entertainment channels — over 500 — you have to wonder where the space is to accommodate these new entrants.

It would not be wildly off the mark to say that most of these channels will not be representing established or leading news channels but more local business and political interests eager to create a dent in the media world.

News may arrive by satellite 24/7, but it is the same news in a perpetual loop. News channels have had the same news values, the same line-ups. If you step out of the format, you are a designated pariah rather than a game-changer. Is this what we will see again next year? As we wrap up 2009 and get ready to enter the second decade of the 21st century, let’s see what news will look like in 2010.

Experts say that the recession may be receding but brutal layoffs in the media are still not a distant memory. And as channels struggle with maintaining bottom lines, their business models will still appear shaky, encouraging "desperate" news approaches. With channels making little revenue, the first thing to be impacted will be news content and news gathering, says Uday Shankar, CEO, Star India. The trend will be to take short cuts, depend more on talking heads and studio discussions, emphasise entertainment happenings — always cheaper to fill in the gaping news holes and great for eyeballs — rather than hard news, use feeds from sensation-mongering stringers filing from the districts rather than encouraging field and investigative reporting by your own staff.

Not true, says Rajdeep Sardesai, Editor-in-Chief of CNN-IBN. He sees in 2010, the beginning of the silver lining — the return of news which will start looking and sounding like news rather than tamasha. Channels will necessarily need to be more focussed, less cluttered, still covering the big ticket events but also looking at news with social end economic concerns. Sardesai also hopes to see a trend when the national channels will affiliate themselves to smaller regional channels — Ranchi has six local channels, thereby giving the Big Guys more access to district-level happenings.

As larger channels need these feeds, the notion of these collaborations perhaps will be more equal. And yes, the role of technology will increase; each anchor, each reporter will have a twitter or facebook account keeping their constituency updated as news unfurls. Social networking sites will be then a way to increase audience bases.

For Barkha Dutt, Group Managing Editor-English, NDTV, the news line-up will remain the same with politics taking prime position. Social and economic issues will be covered but as ever they will be used as political footballs. But 2010 will, she feels, be the time when new media will make its presence felt even more strongly. Channels will need to recognise that youngsters see news on the move, on their computers and laptops. News delivery then will be more strategic, more interactive, reaching out to individual news consumers because today social networking sites have changed the way the youth sees the media.

With the burgeoning of blogs, every blogger is in a sense a journalist reacting to news, which means that channels will become more inclusive and ground-breaking. Having said that, English news will remain to be conservative unlike the Hindi channels. With the news space getting more fragmented, more competitive, the loyalty of the audience will not be to a particular news bulletin on a specific channel but more to an individual, or to a programme. The big change, if it comes, will be in the area of regional news. The dependence on feeds from local cable channels will determine a new equation.