Online media in india
Online journalism in
India is a growing field shared between traditional media and the growing
blogging community. Large media companies, traditionally print and television
focused, continue to dominate the journalism environment now online but a
growing group of dedicated bloggers are providing an independent voice.
Growth
Although Indian
newspapers were using computers for writing and page layout as early as 1987
they were slow to move to online editions of their papers. By 1998 only
forty-eight papers had online editions. By 2006, the count had climbed to 116.
This despite the fact that in 2007 India had 42 million Internet users and was ranked
fifth among online populations. The number of online news editions is seen as
especially low because of the multitude of languages spoken in India. Of the 22
languages officially recognised, only 12 of the non-English languages were
accounted for in a survey of online editions.
Current environment
India’s internet
penetration is low – only 3.7%. Also, most websites are only available in
English, which skews the viewership to only 10% of the population that is
concentrated in urban centers. Conversely, India ranks third in number of
Twitter users. LinkedIn offers a group that targets members that are online
journalists in India with content, connections, and job opportunities unique to
that segment. Popular discussions offer members an opportunity to share
opportunities, discuss activities that affect the industry, and provide peer
review for articles before publication on the internet. With the emergence of
high speed data and faster mobile data services such as 3G and LTE, videos from
some of India’s best TV journalists have been made available online. Both NDTV
and CNBC, two TV news reporting power houses in India, also have a strong
online presence. The top five journalists in India all come from within the
ranks of these stations. Another emerging favorite platform for journalists is
Twitter. Journalists from all walks – Business, Political, Sports, and Religion
- have come together to form a list for ease of following the person or topic
that one might find interesting.
Traditional media
companies
The internet in India
was not available to private users until 1995. By 1998 there were only 48 daily
newspapers that operated on the internet. By 2006 the number has steadily
climbed to reach 116 newspapers and is predicted to grow as more people in India
get access to the web. The first newspapers to adopt an online format were
generally English speaking because they had more of a global audience. However,
as more users gained access more Indian language papers began to surface. A lot
of these new websites were generic versions of the daily paper and were not
edited once published. They were operated by minimal staffs. In some instances
a single editor would upload data to a third party pre-formatted interface
which would allow stories to be published under general headings such as Local
News, International, Sports, etc. A large majority of online newspapers in
India don’t receive advertisement revenue for their web editions and, with the
exception of the major papers, most websites are being operated at a loss. Most
publications have been slow to incorporate modern web features such as video
clips or imbedded audio. One of the biggest concerns is economic viability due
to lack of ad revenue. India journalism sites have also been slow to adopt the
modern practice of online purchasing. This means that when someone visits the
website they are unable to order the paper directly or purchase products
through advertisements.
Criticism
Many online newspapers
in India are criticised for being hastily thrown together with little care from
publishers about content. A majority of websites lack simple features such as
“about us” or feedback. While the major publishers like the Times Group will
list email addresses of its writers and editors many of the small daily newspapers
only have a simple imbedded box on their website for feedback. This makes it
difficult for readers to communicate with newspaper staff.
Online media with print
products, such as OPEN magazine, have been instrumental in providing checks and
balances on other forms of media. OPEN broke that Barkha Dutt, widely regarded
as India’s top journalist, was involved with the Radia tapes controversy, which
very little of the print media discussed. Radia, a lobbyist, was involved in
corruption regarding the use and sale of 2G wireless spectrum. Her attempt to
rehabilitate her reputation was hampered by the combative style she tried to do
it with.
Times of India group
The Times of India
Group is the largest media conglomerate in India. Its flagship paper is the
Times of India which is the largest English publication in the world by
readership with just over 7.65 million daily readers. It is also the publisher
of the largest business news paper in India, The Economic Times. The Times of
India opened their web portal in 1999 and in 2003 they published an electronic
version of their newspaper. Some Indian journalists, such as luminary M J
Akbar, have made the leap into online journalism. Akbar has been working in
journalism since he joined the Times of India in 1971 and currently heads the
Sunday Guardian as the Editorial Director of India Today Group and Headlines
Today. The Sunday Guardian is notable for having made a successful pivot from
being a print only paper to one which includes online content in their media
portfolios. Today, M J Akbar is just one example of a growing number of
journalists who have embraced online media while maintaining a strong presence
in the print media market.
Dainik Jagran
Dainik Jagran has been
India's most read newspaper for 23 consecutive years with a daily readership of
over 16 million. It's the flagship publication of Jagran Prakashan Ltd (JPL), a
large media conglomerate in India. JPL launched MMI online in 2008 to handle
all of its digital offerings. Most notable is jagran.com which has recently
aligned with yahoo.com to bring a large range of offerings to its visitors.The
website can see up to 50 updates in one day. In 2011, INEXT was re-launched
along with the website inextlive.com. This website launched by Dinesh Shrinet.
INEXT is the first bilingual daily news published in India. It currently
publishes content from at least 9 different major cities. Besides managing
content MMI Online is also actively looking for gaps in the web offerings so
that it can bring new content to the country. MMI online also is working to
transition India into web 3.0.
One India
Oneindia.in (owned by
Greynium Information Technologies Pvt. Ltd) is an Indian Internet portal –
delivering content, community and commerce to Indian consumers, businesses and
the global Indian community. As of 2008, Oneindia.in has been serving the
Internet audience for the last 8 years (the language portals have been live
since April 2000). It is a multilingual website in all South India languages
and English. This online media house was founded by B.G. Mahesh. One India
launched its Hindi portal in 2007.
newspapers were slow to
launch their web editions. Only 48 dailies had their web sites by 1998 when
this researcher undertook documentation of status of online journalism. An
extension of this study established that there were 116 Indian dailies with web
editions in year 2006.
Internet Era
India joined cyber
world in 1995, quite late compared to the West, although Internet was available
to researchers earlier also. In the initial period, net access was limited to
only four metros. It was very slow. Computer penetration was very low. However,
the penetration improved as prices of computers began falling and net
connectivity spread to small towns when private service providers came on the
scene.
By 2007, India had an
estimated base of 42 million Internet users, which was 3.6 per cent of the
world users. Although this base was far below the Internet users of USA (which
was 210,575,287), China (162,000,000), Japan (86,300,000) or Germany
(50,426,117), India ranked fifth in the list of top twenty countries using
Internet.
Data and its analysis
After the first
exercise mentioned in (a) of Methodology was carried out, a list of 114 Indian
newspapers with Internet editions was available. (Annexure 2). Language-wise
break-up of these dailies is as follows:
Table 1: Number of top
newspapers with online editions (arranged alphabetically)
Language Number of
newspapers
with web editions
Assamese 01
Bengali 07
English 39
Gujarati 06
Hindi 17
Kannada 04
Malayalam 07
Marathi 12
Oriya 04
Punjabi 01
Tamil 06
Telugu 06
Urdu 04
Total 114
These 12 non-English
languages are out of the 22 languages officially recognised by the Government
of India. The data shows that newspapers in the rest ten languages do not have
web editions. These languages are: Sindhi, Nepali, Konkani, Manipuri, Kashmiri,
Sanskrit, Bodo, Dogri, Santhali, and Maithili. Publications in these languages
do not have large circulation and cater to populations concentrated in smaller
pockets in their respective regions.
English, not included
in the schedule of official languages, is co-official language that can be used
in the government administration. It is understood by educated people spread
over in different parts of the country, predominantly residing in cities and
towns. English newspapers are published from metros and larger cities to cater
to the readers in their jurisdictions. Most of them have large circulation
figures and enjoy prestige among the elites. Advertisers patronise these
dailies because of the circulation figures, high visibility among bureaucrats,
industrialists and the educated class.
