Digital native news media are becoming a blooming phenomenon, expanding globally. Up until now, however, the scholar community has paid little attention to online-born media, compared to the high interest devoted to the legacy media brands. Drawing upon the extant literature on this emerging topic, this editorial summarizes the empirical and theoretical contributions of the thematic issue entitled “Digital Native News Media: Trends and Challenges.” The author highlights that the studies selected for this thematic issue not only explore the innovative characteristics and opportunities of digital native media in thirty countries, but also provide a cautionary tale about their structural problems and limitations.

https://www.cogitatiopress.com/mediaandcommunication/article/viewFile/3044/3044

Exploring Digital Native News Media

The unprecedented lockdown recently occurred due the COVID-19 pandemic has irrupted globally exposing entire population and affecting all areas in our living: politics, economy, entertainment, work, markets, education. According to OECD data young people felt lonelier and sadder during this period increasing their exposure to technology and the consumption of digital media. In this regard the aim of the research presented is study and describe the usage of digital media among university students during the COVID-19 lockdown. A comparative study between Spain, Italy and Ecuador focuses on the usage of smartphones and content consumption during March-May 2020. Data gathering was made with the design of a questionnaire applied to a sample of 3oo undergraduate students of Journalism, Communication and Education from three public universities. Quantitative methodology was used for this descriptive-comparative study among three different countries. Results obtained show high access to technological equipment in general, with specific increase in smartphones and laptops usage being the two devices that have experienced a greater increase in use. Regarding the consumption of information, informative contents on the COVID-19, news data about the virus, as well as the statistics of progress of the contagions occupy first place. It is worth mentioning that, in the opinion of the young people surveyed, they have been able to recognize fake news and have avoided its spread, thus understanding the notion of Infodemic, established by the World Health Organization. Conclusions allow us saying that online news channels and media were the most consumed, as were social networks, which grew among youngest as channels of communication, and verified consumption of news on official channels and government spokespersons.

Smartphone usage among students during COVID-19 pandemic in Spain, Italy and Ecuador

The newspaper industry is in a deepening revenue crisis and the advertising side of the news business has virtually collapsed as a result of global competition with technology platforms, as well as...

Do Small Streams Make a Big River? Detailing the Diversification of Revenue Streams in Newspapers’ Transition to Digital Journalism Businesses

Technological platforms, such as social media, are disrupting traditional journalism, as a result the access to high-quality information by citizens is facing important challenges, among which, disinformation and the spread of fake news are the most relevant one. This study approaches how journalism students perceive and assess this phenomenon. The descriptive and exploratory research is based on a hybrid methodology: Two matrix surveys of students and a focus group of professors (n = 6), experts in Multimedia Journalism. The first survey (n = 252), focused on students’ perception of fake news, the second (n = 300) aims at finding out the type of content they had received during the recent confinement caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Results show that most of the students prefer online media as a primary source of information instead of social media. Students consider that politics is the main topic of fake news, which, according to the respondents, are mainly distributed by adult users through social networks. The vast majority believe that fake news are created for political interests and a quarter of the sample considers that there is a strong ideological component behind disinformation strategies. Nonetheless, the study also reveals that students do not trust in their ability to distinguish between truthful and false information. For this reason, this research concludes, among other aspects, that the promotion of initiatives and research to promote media literacy and news literacy are decisive in the training of university students.

/pdf/journalism-students-and-information-consumption-in-the-era-4fyq6kcykh.pdf

Journalism Students and Information Consumption in the Era of Fake News

This article starts from a paradox. Business models are often associated with change - especially radical ones - but have often been used in a static manner to describe the business model of a company. After providing our definition of a business model as a combination articulating resources and competences, organization of activities and a value proposition, we introduce dynamics by showing how different voluntary and emergent changes can alter positively or negatively its consistency. We illustrate our discussion with the case of Arsenal football club, an organization which faces important modification in its business model over the last ten years. We conclude with the importance for managers to insure a dynamic consistency between the different elements of their business model by anticipating the repercussions of changes affecting one dimension on the others. This ability enables an organization to maintain sustainability while modifying its business model.

Evolucion de modelos de negocio: hacia una vision de la estrategia en terminos de coherencia dinamica

From its onset on the 1990s, both digital native (with sister headings on the analog platform) as digital native news media have experienced a constant transformation process. The accelerated technological evolution linked to the changing information consumption habits of the users demanded a constant reinvention capability. Furthermore, the need for profit and the drop in advertisement sales have pushed the media to redefine their structure, content and social media presence. The Ibero-American scene has experienced a sprout of a mixture of digital native news media. They are journalistic projects, conceived from and on the Internet, which have reached considerable renown and becoming reference media on the information level. Internet prompted a reduction of the costs related to the creation of media outlets. However, the establishment of a sustainable business model is one of the main challenges. The research presented looks at the business models of Ibero-American digital native news media based on a comparative analysis of 14 case studies, alongside interviews with their founders. The findings include, among other things, a tendency for business models based on diverse and hyper-specialized content targeted at micro-audiences. This research found an interest in horizontality, participation and user engagement, and noticed the need for these media to diversify their income sources.

/pdf/native-media-and-business-models-comparative-study-of-14-imzvkc8ptz.pdf

Native Media and Business Models: Comparative Study of 14 Successful Experiences in Latin America

Since the advent of the Internet, websites have become the nerve center of the digital ecosystems of media, companies and all kinds of institutions. Currently, the impact of the global coronavirus pandemic has placed healthcare issues at the center of social debate, including hospitals and their websites as digital sources of trustworthy information. COVID-19 has intensified the need for quality information and the legitimacy of sources fighting the infodemic situation. In this regard hospitals become essential social actors in the spread of healthcare information. Within this framework, a qualitative study is presented with descriptive components and based on content analysis. This study examines 58 websites from the best hospitals included in the "America Economia" ranking health sector from Latin America. The study applies an analysis methodology based on previous research focusing on specialized web studies, defining an analysis model on six variables and 65 thematic indicators. The research concludes that hospitals occupying first positions in the medical services directory are not necessarily those that have the best websites. Similarly, it is worth noting that a quarter of the studied sample do not devote a specific space to reporting coronavirus information. Brazil, Colombia and Chile are the countries with the highest number of hospitals among those with the best websites. In conclusion, digital media, specifically websites, could constitute legitime resources of healthcare information consumption, so their accuracy and proper development seem to be significant to become genuine sources that not only could provide better healthcare services but help avoid the spread of misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic.

https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/23/9145/pdf

Tracking Websites' Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

The Internet has transformed work dynamics and introduced new tasks, roles and types of content in the journalist’s work. These transformations invite us to reflect on the skills and abilities that these communicators must acquire in order to be able to function with solvency in the work scenario. In this sense, communication faculties play a decisive role in achieving this task. Based on this, a comparative study is presented between four universities (Spain: Complutense of Madrid and Autonoma of Barcelona; and Colombia: Sabana and Rosario, Ecuador: San Francisco University and Eqinoccia University) to find out what presence data journalism has in their respective curricula. In this way, the work analyzes the objectives, the type of subjects, the syllabus and the evaluation system, among other aspects, of the set of subjects of the curricular offer with the objective of identifying which themes and from which approach they work in each center.

Augusto Ventín

Papers

Native Media and Business Models: Comparative Study of 14 Successful Experiences in Latin America

Tracking Websites' Digital Communication Strategies in Latin American Hospitals During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Emerging lines in the teaching of university communication the inclusion of data journalism in universities in Spain, Colombia and Ecuador