For many new media technology proponents, the face of journalism must change in order to accommodate the revolutionary technological developments. The advent of social networks – such as Twitter – is pushing conventional journalism into the twilight zone, making it become unrecognisable, almost as if in a trance brought on by the werewolves and vampires of new technology.

Not so for Ted Koppel, a renowned US journalist, who once worked as ABC’s Nightline anchor. A former managing editor at Discovery Channel, Koppel believes in the virtues of conventional journalism. Giving a keynote speech at a recent meeting of the African Media Leaders’ Forum (AMLF) held in Lagos, Nigeria, Koppel is convinced that Africa would do well not to repeat the mistakes that US journalism has made in embracing new media technologies hooker, line and sinker.

Currently NPR (National Public Radio) and BBC senior news analyst, Koppel believes that there are two major influences on traditional journalism – technology and economics – working in tandem to disfigure the practice of journalism.

The economic factors include the influences of advertisers on news content, rendering journalism captive to the commercial interests of media owners. In the US, where so much media business is tied up in the marketplace, the value of news is often determined by the extent to which a media house can pander to market considerations. More often, the market wins, reducing journalism to entertainment. The normative basis of journalism is often called into question, dismissed as ideologue or demagoguery.

Koppel is not impressed by the consumerism that characterises American society. He does not believe that journalists must give the people what they want. Rather, he believes that professional journalists must give the people what they need. In other words, it is journalists who are discerning, largely because they have spent years accumulating the professional competence that is needed for making such decisions.

He particularly regrets the bifurcation of the American media system into “liberal” and “conservative” audience camps. This, according to him, is indicative of a media system that gives people what they want. It becomes a divisive media system, never really discerning what is needful for society at large, but appealing to either the liberal or conservative impulses of the market.

Next, Koppel argues, the technological imperatives of “brevity” and “speed” have rendered journalism devoid of political context. He is particularly concerned about the advent of Twitter. According to Antony Mayfield, in his e-book entitled ‘What Is Social Media’, Twitter represents a clear leader in the field of “microblogging”, which refers to social networking combined with bite-sized blogging, where small amounts of content or updates are distributed online and through the mobile phone network. Twitter users can send messages of up to 140 characters instantly to multiple platforms. 90 per cent of Twitter interactions are not made via the Twitter website, but via mobile text message, or Instant Messaging. Its suitability as a vehicle for breaking news has encouraged the BBC and CNN to introduce Twitter feeds. Even Barack Obama, as a candidate for the US Presidency, took to Twitter.

Koppel believes that the brevity and speed associated with Twitter can be the downfall of traditional journalism. It is inconceivable for Twitter to embrace the kind of contextual political detail that is required for investigative journalism, for example. But perhaps in answer to Koppel’s concern, the idea of using Twitter for breaking news – in the same way as the BBC and CNN do – is a fair proposition for conventional journalism.

As Dr Tamela Hultman of AllAfrica.com pointed out at the same meeting in Lagos, Twitter can be used “as a head-up for in-depth news”. This position would in fact agree with Koppel’s own view that Twitter as an instrument must be distinguished from Twitter as journalism. But even as an instrument, Koppel dismisses Twitter as not “a highly valued instrument”. Clearly, Twitter cannot replace the practice of journalism, but it can enhance it for the benefit of ordinary citizens who might be interested in the bare bones of news.

At the core of Koppel’s disenchantment with social media is an underlying concern about the definition and quality of journalism.

Koppel would be comfortable with citizen forms of journalism if it was made clear that these were distinct from professional journalism. He would concede, it seems, that new media technologies have made it possible for citizens to organise themselves around various forms of private and public communication, but not necessarily journalism.

As such, Twitter certainly becomes an instrument in the service of citizen “journalists” or, more accurately, communicators. Here, a key issue is how citizen “journalism” – if at all there was such a thing – could lay claim to the high standards of verification that professional journalism is held to. Koppel believes that the message of traditional journalism must influence the technology. Here, he differs from Marshall McLuhan – a renowned Canadian media scholar – who believes that “the medium is the message”.

But perhaps a point of clarification is in order here. McLuhan’s use of the word “message” does not refer to information or content, as many of his critics seem to suggest. Rather, it refers, in his own words, to "the change of scale or pace or pattern" that a new invention or innovation "introduces into human affairs." What this means is that journalism, as a social practice, is not immune to the impact of any new technological invention or innovation. Its texture is likely to be affected in ways that may not be anticipated by its practitioners.

This is perhaps the point that Koppel seems to have failed to grasp – a point that Prof John Lavine, Dean of the Medill School of Journalism at Norwestern University, forcefully made during the same meeting in Nigeria. According to Lavine, new media technology has a way of making serious journalistic content become more “engaging” and “entertaining”.

But Koppel’s push for that “old-time religion” of journalism is important in three respects. First of all, it cuts through the hype about just how revolutionary new media technologies are. It is possible that such technologies do not in fact advance our social practices – including journalism – in such stupendous ways as we seem to think. In fact, as some critics of new media technology (Benjamin Barber is one of them) would argue, technology can hold back deliberative forms of democracy. The over-emphasis on Twitterific speed may be a stumbling-block to serious citizens’ thinking and deliberation over matters of State policy. Here, one needs serious journalism, built on a strong investigative foundation.

Second of all, Koppel’s concern causes us to think seriously about the actual impact of new media technology on journalism. There is so much techno-hype that it is almost impossible to be positively critical of technology. I think we need more people who assume a social-shaping stance on technology if only to enable us to become more objective and sober about the real impact of technology on our institutions and social practices.

Lastly, particularly in the context of Africa, Koppel’s reservations about Twitter should make us appreciate traditional journalism even more. This is not to suggest that the practice of journalism in Africa is not changing as a result of technology. It is. But we must acknowledge the fact that we have not yet messed up in the same way as our Western counterparts have. People still buy newspapers in many countries in Africa. People still listen to the radio – indeed the majority of them.

In Western societies, there is a tendency among people not to want to pay for news content anymore, given the fact that there are now newer, but often less trustworthy, online sources of content. As such, a new media business model seems to be illusive in such societies.

Although we may argue that Africans’ reliance on traditional newspapers and broadcast media is because the Internet is not yet widespread on the African continent, we have an opportunity to fashion a media system that does not become captive to the trappings of the new media market.
What the future of journalism looks like in Africa is neither here nor there, but it is important to learn lessons from elsewhere.