Traditional news outlets are feeling
the impact of two distinct and powerful trends. Internet
news has not only arrived, it is attracting key segments
of the national audience. At the same time, growing
numbers of Americans are losing the news habit. Fewer
people say they enjoy following the news, and fully half
pay attention to national news only when something
important is happening. And more Americans than ever say
they watch the news with a remote control in hand, ready
to dispatch uninteresting stories. To some extent, these
trends are affecting all traditional media, but
broadcast news outlets -- both national and local --
have been the most adversely affected.
These are the principal findings of the Pew Research
Center's biennial survey of the national news audience,
which documents the rapid emergence of the Internet as a
news source, as well as a significant decline in regular
viewership of broadcast television news. Fully
one-in-three Americans now go online for news at least
once a week, compared to 20% in 1998. And 15% say they
receive daily reports from the Internet, up from 6% two
years ago. At the same time, regular viewership of
network news has fallen from 38% to 30% over this
period, while local news viewership has fallen from 64%
to 56%.
Among younger and better-educated
people, the Internet is making even bigger inroads. Many
more college graduates under the age of 50 go on the
Internet every day than regularly watch one of the
nightly network news broadcasts. And generally, the
survey finds that people who are interested in the news
and go online tend to watch less network TV news. The
survey also finds modest declines in the viewership of
television news magazines and the morning news shows,
but these slips appear unrelated to Internet news
competition.
The digital tide is having less of a
direct negative impact on cable TV news, radio and print
outlets. The Pew Research Center survey finds no
evidence that Internet use is driving down regular use
of cable news channels, daily newspapers, or radio news.
However, all news outlets are being affected by the
public's slowly declining appetite for the news.
Less than half of the public (45%) now
says it enjoys keeping up with the news a great deal and
just 48% say they follow national news closely most of
the time. Both of these percentages represent a modest
decline from two years ago, when 50% said they enjoyed
keeping up with the news and 52% reported following
national news closely most of the time. But the
percentage of Americans saying they enjoy keeping up
with the news has fallen steadily since the mid-1990s.
The generational divide on these
questions is striking. Just one-in-three young adults
(31%) enjoy keeping up with the news. In contrast, well
more than half (57%) of those age 50 and over enjoy
following the news. While younger people don't like the
news so much, they do like having a wide variety of
information sources from which to choose. Older
Americans, who have a greater affinity for the news,
often feel overwhelmed by the increasingly crowded media
landscape.
As a consequence, Internet news is
attracting many younger people who have only a marginal
interest in the news as well as serious news consumers.
In fact, Internet news has a relatively larger place in
the lives of those with access who don't enjoy the news
than among those who do. The Internet, with its headline
news format and capacity for quick updates, is clearly
attractive to this type of consumer. On the other hand,
the Internet's capability for providing more depth on a
given subject also appeals to those with large news
appetites, such as affluent college graduates.
In
that regard, the growth of Internet news has had a
dramatic impact on the way Americans, particularly those
with access to technology, get information on business
and financial matters. For active investors -- those who
have traded stocks within the past six months -- the
Internet has largely supplanted traditional media as the
leading source for stock quotes and investment advice.
The Internet's capacity for personally-designed news and
information is clearly a factor here. Nearly six-in-ten
(58%) active traders who log on to the Internet for such
information have customized online stock portfolios.
So far, this quiet revolution in
financial news has had less of an impact on the general
public and less active investors, who still tend to go
to the traditional media for stock quotes and advice.
But underscoring the general popularity of the Internet
for financial news, 16% of all Americans volunteered
that they would turn first to the Internet for news if
the market were to crash 1,000 points; cable news was
mentioned second most frequently, at 14%.
As Americans grow more reliant on the
Internet for news, they also have come to find online
news outlets more credible. Despite the controversy over
news-gathering techniques employed by some Internet
sites, those who go online generally give Internet news
operations high marks for believability. In fact, the
online sites of such well-known news organizations as
ABC News get better ratings from Internet users than the
ratings accorded the traditional broadcast or print
outlets.
But having a familiar name clearly
helps. Internet-only news sources such as Yahoo,
Netscape and America Online's News Channel get lower
ratings than other, better-known news organizations on
the Internet. Still, the believability ratings for these
organizations are comparable to those of network
television news and other traditional sources. Internet
news organizations that specialize in providing original
content, such as the online magazines Slate and Salon,
were less well-known and got lower ratings from Internet
news users.
Other Findings
Americans have an ever-expanding
appetite for new technology. More than half now own a
cell phone, up from 24% just five years ago. One out of
five Americans (18%) have a satellite dish, and 5% own a
Palm Pilot.
As
large numbers of younger Americans turn to the Internet
for news, the audience for traditional media is aging.
Nearly half of those under age 30 (46%) go online for
news at least once a week, compared to just 20% of those
age 50 and up. These older Americans are far more likely
to say they watched TV news (67%) or read a paper (58%)
yesterday.
More people are finding innovative
ways to use technology in their personal lives. A
sizable minority (15%) of active investors get stock
quotes and market updates via some form of wireless
device, such as a cell phone or pager.
With the viewership of network news
declining, and cable news audiences remaining flat,
network's lead over cable has narrowed to 11 percentage
points (51%-40%) from 17 points (57%-40%) in 1998. When specialty
channels, such as all-sports ESPN are included, the
cable audience is 61%.
CNBC, primarily a business network,
now draws better than one-in-ten Americans (13%) on a
regular basis. But CNBC is the top choice of those
active investors who identify television as the main
source of stock updates.
More than half of Americans (53%) say
they wish they had more time to follow the news. Time
pressures are a particularly big factor for working
women; nearly two-thirds (65%) want more time to follow
the news.
The remote control has become an
indispensable tool for most television news viewers,
especially young people. Three-quarters of those under
age 30 say they watch the news with the remote in hand;
54% of those over age 50 agree.
Men and women have different news
interests, and this is reflected in the news they pursue
online. Technology is a top draw for men, while women
most often seek news on science and health. But overall,
weather information is the leading online news topic.
Reports by the Pew
Research Center - "For The People&
the press" - They are an independent opinion
research group, sponsored by The
Pew Charitable Trusts, that studies public attitudes
toward the press, politics and public policy issues. The
Center's main purpose is to serve as a forum for ideas
on the media and public policy through its research...
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