A Comparative Research on Digital News Production Practices of Local Newspapers: The Case of Turkey, France and Azerbaijan

Aysel ÇetinkayaFollow

Session

Management, Business and Economics

Description

The functions of the local press are related to basic journalism functions such as bringing the wishes, expectations and problems of the people to the agenda, building a bridge between the local governments and the people, mediating the development of democracy and the inclusion of the problems on the agenda of the political decision makers. In addition, the local identity they have is also effective in the fact that these press organizations play an active role in the development and identity building process of the region they address. In addition to these features, local newspapers, which are an important part of the media eco- system, can also assume the position of news providers on prominent issues related to their regions to the national or international press.

In today's world, where digitalization has become a way of life and the dependence on new communication technologies in daily life is increasing, journalism has also taken a different form by digitalizing. Therefore, the local press has entered into a compulsory transformation depending on the technological developments in the media sector. In this context, by creating creative applications and business lines in the production of news for the local press, with the opportunities offered by new communication technologies; While providing the opportunity to reach different audiences without time-space boundaries, difficulties in adapting to the digitalization process have started to threaten the existence of the local press. However, the increasing demands for democratization and multiculturalism in the globalization process, which has accelerated with the development of new communication technologies, has led to a search for glocalization, which includes the local press and where localization demands increase. In this context, although the basic functions of the local press have not changed, the news production process has changed based on social media, artificial intelligence, mapping, location or application. In addition, the search for a wide variety of new and creative formats such as digital storytelling and multimedia/transmedia content production started to gain importance in the adaptation process of local journalism to digitalization. In this context, the main purpose of this research is to determine the creative and innovative news production practices developed by local newspapers in the digitalization process in different countries. Five local newspapers operating in the cities with the highest population density in France, Turkey and Azerbaijan were included in the sample of the study. The reasons for limiting the research to these three countries are the existence of a strong local/regional press in the country as a result of the breaking of the monopoly in the media in France; The problems experienced by the local press in adapting to the media ecosystem in Turkey and the ongoing debates on the independence of local/national media organizations from political powers, which played an important role in the struggle for sovereignty during the disintegration of the USSR. In this context, semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with senior executives and journalists working in the newspapers included in the sample in order to determine the digitalized news production practices of local newspapers in France, Turkey and Azerbaijan. The interview form is based on Radcliffe, D., Ali's (2017) studies examining the adaptation levels of local newspapers to the digitalization process in the USA on profitability-adaptation to new journalism practices and the changing role of journalists, and

Ripolles et al. (2020) to identify new and creative content formats that local newspapers can use in the news production process. In addition, a section has been added to the interview form in which how the examined press organizations position and differentiate their functions within the framework of the future of the journalism profession, within the framework of glocality and digitalization. As a result of the research, significant differences were found in terms of the capacity of the local press to fulfill its basic functions, such as the level of adaptation of local newspapers to the digitalization process with different content practices, depending on the social, political and economic structures of the three countries examined, and the capacity of the local press to carry out the basic functions of the local press, such as conveying the problems and demands of the region they are located to the national press/political decision makers.

Keywords:

Local press, digitalization, glocalism, news production

Proceedings Editor

Edmond Hajrizi

ISBN

978-9951-550-47-5

Location

UBT Kampus, Lipjan

Start Date

30-10-2021 12:00 AM

End Date

30-10-2021 12:00 AM

DOI

10.33107/ubt-ic.2021.497

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Oct 30th, 12:00 AM Oct 30th, 12:00 AM

A Comparative Research on Digital News Production Practices of Local Newspapers: The Case of Turkey, France and Azerbaijan

UBT Kampus, Lipjan

The functions of the local press are related to basic journalism functions such as bringing the wishes, expectations and problems of the people to the agenda, building a bridge between the local governments and the people, mediating the development of democracy and the inclusion of the problems on the agenda of the political decision makers. In addition, the local identity they have is also effective in the fact that these press organizations play an active role in the development and identity building process of the region they address. In addition to these features, local newspapers, which are an important part of the media eco- system, can also assume the position of news providers on prominent issues related to their regions to the national or international press.

In today's world, where digitalization has become a way of life and the dependence on new communication technologies in daily life is increasing, journalism has also taken a different form by digitalizing. Therefore, the local press has entered into a compulsory transformation depending on the technological developments in the media sector. In this context, by creating creative applications and business lines in the production of news for the local press, with the opportunities offered by new communication technologies; While providing the opportunity to reach different audiences without time-space boundaries, difficulties in adapting to the digitalization process have started to threaten the existence of the local press. However, the increasing demands for democratization and multiculturalism in the globalization process, which has accelerated with the development of new communication technologies, has led to a search for glocalization, which includes the local press and where localization demands increase. In this context, although the basic functions of the local press have not changed, the news production process has changed based on social media, artificial intelligence, mapping, location or application. In addition, the search for a wide variety of new and creative formats such as digital storytelling and multimedia/transmedia content production started to gain importance in the adaptation process of local journalism to digitalization. In this context, the main purpose of this research is to determine the creative and innovative news production practices developed by local newspapers in the digitalization process in different countries. Five local newspapers operating in the cities with the highest population density in France, Turkey and Azerbaijan were included in the sample of the study. The reasons for limiting the research to these three countries are the existence of a strong local/regional press in the country as a result of the breaking of the monopoly in the media in France; The problems experienced by the local press in adapting to the media ecosystem in Turkey and the ongoing debates on the independence of local/national media organizations from political powers, which played an important role in the struggle for sovereignty during the disintegration of the USSR. In this context, semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with senior executives and journalists working in the newspapers included in the sample in order to determine the digitalized news production practices of local newspapers in France, Turkey and Azerbaijan. The interview form is based on Radcliffe, D., Ali's (2017) studies examining the adaptation levels of local newspapers to the digitalization process in the USA on profitability-adaptation to new journalism practices and the changing role of journalists, and

Ripolles et al. (2020) to identify new and creative content formats that local newspapers can use in the news production process. In addition, a section has been added to the interview form in which how the examined press organizations position and differentiate their functions within the framework of the future of the journalism profession, within the framework of glocality and digitalization. As a result of the research, significant differences were found in terms of the capacity of the local press to fulfill its basic functions, such as the level of adaptation of local newspapers to the digitalization process with different content practices, depending on the social, political and economic structures of the three countries examined, and the capacity of the local press to carry out the basic functions of the local press, such as conveying the problems and demands of the region they are located to the national press/political decision makers.