New Roles of Journalism and Disruptive Media: A Challenging Future

Dear Colleagues,

To fulfill their social mission (i.e., informing) journalists have always needed media. Their activity is an essentially mediating one, even if (or especially when) new genres and environments hybridize information and entertainment, exploiting the opportunities provided by new technologies and digitalization.

Journalism has been changing throughout history, adapting to societal transformations. In today's globalized world, with the explosion of social networks and the emergence of new tools, the profession is (as it has always been) in constant evolution. Changes in technological, industrial, and social environments, such as artificial intelligence, metaverses, augmented reality, new business models, new communication platforms, increasingly affordable digital tools, the opportunities of web analytics and social networks, the need to deal with fake news, fact-checking, visualization, machine learning, and data journalism, also transform journalism. These phenomena pose new challenges that require adaptation and training to be confronted, without renouncing the watchdog role of a profession that was once called the Fourth Estate.

This Special Issue aims to debate, from different perspectives, how to face these demands and propose answers to these new challenges. Its content is linked to the XXIX conference of the Spanish Society of Journalism (SEP) that will take place in Barcelona on June 29 and 30, 2023.

The call for papers covers different areas, according to the thematic lines proposed by the organizers of the aforementioned congress. Authors are therefore invited to cover these subjects from various perspectives:

• New profiles and roles of journalism professionals.
• Business models of the new journalistic enterprise.
• Needs for the training of journalists.
• Journalists 4.0: from digital journalism to the metaverse.
• Artificial intelligence and journalism: the challenge of automation.
• Journalists facing disinformation and fake news.
• Personal branding and journalists: reporters or influencers.
• Brand journalists: from press offices to branded content.

Dr. Pere Franch
Guest Editor

Valentina Laferrara
Guest Editor Assistant

References

Fisher, C., Park, S., & Lee, J. Y. (2021). Who writes a press release? Changing audience perceptions of journalists as marketers of news, not just reporters. Journalism, 22(8), 1964–1982. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884919847803.

García-Galera, M. C., Martínez-Nicolás, M., & Del-Hoyo-Hurtado, M. (2021). Innovation in university journalism education programs. A systematic review of educational experiences in Spanish universities. Profesional de la información, 30(3). https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2021.may.07.

Hermida, A., & Mellado, C. (2020). Dimensions of Social Media Logics: Mapping Forms of Journalistic Norms and Practices on Twitter and Instagram. Digital Journalism, 8(7), 864–884. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2020.1805779.

Jahng, M. R., Eckert, S. & Metzger-Riftkin, J. (2021). Defending the Profession: U.S. Journalists' Role Understanding in the Era of Fake News. Journalism Practice. https://doi.org/10.1080/17512786.2021.1919177.

Jones, S. (2017). Disrupting the narrative: immersive journalism in virtual reality. Journal of Media Practice, 18(2–3), 171–185. https://doi.org/10.1080/14682753.2017.1374677.

Mellado, C. (2022). Roles and digital identities on Twitter and Instagram: An ethnographic study of Chilean journalists. Profesional De La información, 31(4). https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2022.jul.14.

Negreira-Rey, M., Vázquez-Herrero, J., & López-García, X. (2022). Blurring boundaries between journalists and tiktokers: Journalistic role performance in TikTok. Media and Communication, 10(1), 146–156. https://doi.org/10.17645/mac.v10i1.4699.

Nelson, J. L. (2019). The next media regime: The pursuit of ‘audience engagement’ in journalism. Journalism, 22(9), 2350–2367. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884919862375.

Newman, N. (2023). Journalism, Media, and Technology Trends and Predictions 2023. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.

Olausson, U. (2018). The celebrity journalist. Journalism Studies, 19(16), 2379–2399. https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2017.1349548.

Olausson, U. (2017). The reinvented journalist. The discursive construction of professional identity on Twitter. Digital Journalism, 5(1), 61–81. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2016.1146082.

Palomo, B., & Palau-Sampio, D. (2016). The adaptive journalist. Innovation consultants and directors analyze the qualities of the communication professional. Profesional de la información, 25(2), 188–195. https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2016.mar.05.

Ross Arguedas, A. A., Badrinathan, S., Mont’Alverne, C., Toff, B., Fletcher, R., & Nielsen, R. K. (2022). “It’s a Battle You Are Never Going to Win”: Perspectives from Journalists in Four Countries on How Digital Media Platforms Undermine Trust in News. Journalism Studies. https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2022.2112908.

Saldaña, M. & Vu, H. T. (2022). You Are Fake News! Factors Impacting Journalists' Debunking Behaviors on Social Media. Digital Journalism, 10(5), 823–842. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2021.2004554.

Sixto-García, J., Silva-Rodríguez, A., Rodríguez-Vázquez, A. I., & López-García, X. (2022). Redefining journalistic narratives, distribution strategies and user involvement from innovation in digital native media. Journalism, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/14648849211062766.

Schapals, A. K., Maares, P. & Hanusch, F . (2019). Working at the margins: Comparative perspectives on the roles and motivations of peripheral actors in journalism. Media and Communication, 7(4), 19–30. https://doi.org/10.17645/mac.v7i4.2374.

Suenzo, F., Boczkowski, P. J., & Mitchelstein, E. (2020). The crisis of the written press: A bibliographical review to rethink it from Latin America. Cuadernos.Info, 47, 1–25. https://doi.org/10.7764/CDI.47.1867.

Tandoc, E. C., & Maitra, J. (2018). News organizations’ use of Native Videos on Facebook: Tweaking the journalistic field one algorithm change at a time. New Media and Society, 20(5), 1679–1696. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444817702398.

Vázquez-Herrero, J., Negreira-Rey, M.-C., & Zago, G. (2022). Young audience wanted! Journalism looks to the future. In B. García-Orosa, S. Pérez-Seijo, & Á. Vizoso (Eds.), Emerging practices in the age of automated digital journalism: models, languages, and storytelling (pp. 56–66). Routledge.

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Journalism and Media is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• journalism
• media
• business models
• digitalization
• artificial intelligence
• disinformation
• branding