Through the medium of the World Wide Web, … restrictions placed on the distribution of news disappear; readers around the world can look through a local news service as easily as readers in the service’s home town. Small-town papers have the same ability to reach readers across the world as large metropolitan operations, so the polarity between serving a community and increasing market size assumes a new importance. Newspapers are built upon geographical distinctions; when those distinctions disappear, how does a news provider define and serve its audience?
Predictor: Ritzenhaler, Gary
Prediction, in context:In a 1994 article for Computer-Mediated Communication magazine, Gary Ritzenhaler, assistant editor of the Florida Compass, a student-run “WWW news prototype,” writes:”During the spring of 1994, seven students at the University of Florida’s College of Journalism and Communications developed a prototype for a World Wide Web-based news service called the Florida Compass … Two powerful influences were pulling our embryonic publication in opposite directions: the desire to serve our local community and the desire to attend to the global market available through the medium we chose for our experiment. Every traditional newspaper finds its own balance between local, national and international news, between deep roots in a community and a global extension. Through the medium of the World Wide Web, however, the restrictions placed on the distribution of news disappear; readers around the world can look through a local news service as easily as readers in the service’s home town. Small-town papers have the same ability to reach readers across the world as large metropolitan operations, so the polarity between serving a community and increasing market size assumes a new importance. Newspapers are built upon geographical distinctions; when those distinctions disappear, how does a news provider define and serve its audience?”
Date of prediction: January 1, 1994
Topic of prediction: Getting, Sharing Information
Subtopic: Journalism/Media
Name of publication: Computer-Mediated Communication
Title, headline, chapter name: Pyxis Cyberea
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.december.com/cmc/mag/1994/jun/pyxis.html
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Butler, Lawrence