Busy Playing FTSE
Our exuberant, unceasing, and ultimately human thirst for knowledge has finally been well and truly quenched. The flow of information in our 21st century world is of such a pace and quantity that our critical faculties are swamped on a daily basis with facts, figures and opinion; contributors range from measured commentators to the avid, anonymous web-blogger and the frustrated individual who wants to add his voice to the cacophony.
How then does any information-providing medium distinguish itself from the baying pack? Addressing the inaugural meeting of the Oxford Economics Society, Andrew Gowers, the surprisingly laid-back editor of the ever-popular and ever-distinctive Financial Times, points not to the colour of his paper but rather to the "quality of readers", which means that the FT can focus its energies not on attracting high numbers of readers but rather on attracting a class of readership - politicians, businessmen, and economists - that those who advertise with the FT really want to influence.
Whilst the economic downturn means that, as Gowers admits, "circulation is not at its peak", The FT has developed from a 'paper of record' for the City in the early 1980s, the majority of whose sales were in Britain, to an impressively international paper, with three-quarters of its sales made outside the UK and with more foreign correspondents on its staff than any other European newspaper. It prides itself on "making connections between the political and economic", uniting its internal tensions around a readership that is exacting and precise in its demands.
It is a readership base that is, however, equally precise in its make-up, being predominantly male and giving the paper the lowest proportion of female readers of all the broadsheets. Gowers acknowledges that "it is an issue", in part caused by the fact that "there are too few women in the top positions in business". He is "on a mission to make the paper more accessible and warmer" and hopes that by "becoming more welcoming... without dumbing down" the paper will begin to attract more female readers.
Every medium is now having to work harder than ever before to ensure that its audience isn't captured by the latest trick of an opponent, relying on tactics such as market specialisation as in the case of The FT, the shameless sensationalism of some tabloids (note the recent and sensitive coverage of the vicious public row between Jordan and Posh by The Sun - "Posh's breasts aren't real cuz I've seen them out"), or the introduction of an entirely new size of paper, as The Independent did last September (followed by The Times in November).
Gowers doesn't believe however that "everybody is going to go tabloid in a trice", pointing out that whilst "there's a lot of wait-and-see going on [still] only two papers have gone down that route." He assures any in doubt that "We're [The FT] not going to go tabloid." The Independent is, of the two, far more committed to the move, having withdrawn their Saturday broadsheet version entirely in favour of the 'Compact' one. Whilst sales seem to indicate that the move was initially successful, cynics are yet to be convinced that it has rescued The Independent from the financial mire it descended into in part because of the relentless price war The Times and The Daily Telegraph have been waging since the 1980s.
As newspapers battle it out in the marketplace, the pressure on reporters to land the year's biggest scoop is even greater. "The more contentious your story, the better your sourcing has to be, the more sure you have to be," says Gowers. He was so incensed by the "bad journalism" of Andrew Gilligan that following the release of the Hutton Report he wrote a piece under his own name for the first time since becoming editor. "Gilligan had one source that he misquoted and misdescribed... He was then allowed to go on air, unprepared." To Gowers, Gilligan was "a rank amateur" who was "unchecked and working in an unprofessional way". The fact that the BBC then failed to acknowledge their mistake was to him a "betrayal of journalism" and it is his opinion that following Hutton "their reputation has to be repaired."
"The only effective regulation of journalism on a daily basis is within an organisation. There should be an elaborate, well developed and well honed system of editorial checks and balances." Of the British media in general, Gowers cites a number of examples of bad journalism - journalism that is "agenda-driven" and "opinion-distorted" - but believes too that "people are fed up" and that "the tide is turning."
With the events of the Hutton Inquiry still fresh in the minds of most, it is perhaps the ideal time for self-appraisal within British journalism with regard to the integrity of its reporting and its obligations towards its readership.
Given that, as Gowers notes, "quality is a factor in the market" and if the public is indeed becoming increasingly dissatisfied, as he claims, the desire for quality may come to be the driving factor in the market over and above the clever tricks of marketing teams and the irresponsible pandering to the public thirst for sensation.
3rd Apr 2004