Seminar report

Goodbye Big Dog: slow death foreseen for local media

The negative effect of globalisation on rural areas is growing according to Rebecca Gallegos.
Gallegos gave a seminar on the subject of globalisation vs. localisation at the University of Newcastle yesterday.
The warning signs of this trend began in 2001 when Prime local news was axed.
“Lack of local content effects rural areas’ sense of community, reduces employment, connectivity, provides less access to information and therefore a loss of cultural knowledge,” Gallegos said.
Recently Newcastle MP Jodi McKay voiced her concern about declining local news content.
Triple J program Hack has documented the emergence of rural news being presented from Canberra by journalists who have never visited the area.
“Localisation is produced by nurturing local owned business. Why is local media important? Everyone wants to know what is going on in their own backyard,” Gallegos said.
She also stated media organisations are finding it difficult to justify the cost of local media, finding it easier to access news services rather than employing local journalists.
“Media watchdogs are threatened by the separation between judiciary and journalism,” Gallegos said.
There are problems regulating online journalism in the global environment.
The laws which were made for a local jurisdiction are incapable of regulating international publishing, and are therefore incapable of protecting the rights which they are designed to protect.
Gallegos also shared some positive news identifying a trend in the USA and Britain of consolidated media moving back to localisation.
In Britain the government has provided stimulus packages to rural newspapers.
The state based versions of A Current Affair are examples of this trend in Australia. Gallegos argued that some local content is derived from the global market due to concentrated ownership of trans-national corporations.
“Local is often produced within and by globalisation. Examples include Master Chef and Idol,” Gallegos said.