If Australian news producers were not already aware of the high speed train coming for them, then they surely are now.
Yesterday’s cancellation of Network Ten’s 16-year infotainment juggernaut The Project is a mike-drop, reminding us all that news consumers have changed and traditional media outlets are still racing to catch up.
The cancellation of The Project is a story of the triumph of new news over, well, old news formats.
While Ten’s chairman said axing the project had been on their minds for some time, apparently the cancellation was a shock to The Project team. It does make you wonder though if they should have seen it coming.
It’s a sad reality that what makes news today is not what once did, and the sources to which news consumers are turning are, yes that’s right, not what they once were.
If you look at Australia’s population statistics then we see that our nation is growing and changing. What is not growing however, is the group of people who still follow conventional news formats. Grandma may still sit down with a cuppa to watch Larry Emdur on The Chase and then stay tuned in for the nightly news. But, that’s not the experience for most people, and certainly not younger people.
Hot on the heels of The Project announcement came the news that the future of the ABC’s Q&A might also be in doubt. Again, this is another program which has had a cult following (by myself also) but whose format may no longer resonate with contemporary news consumption behaviours.
The question needs to be asked…do people want news as we knew it, at all?
What’s yet to become clear is how traditional news outlets will ultimately transform themselves to meet the needs of this newer audience as its Baby Boomer audience declines.
It’s a fact (sad, some might say, including myself as a former journalist) that the content the young population is seeking to consume today is not what those of us would’ve consumed 30, 40 maybe even 20 years ago.
It does make me wonder whether the move towards ‘commentary-led’ infotainment – which is how I would categorise The Project – rather than straight fact-based news reporting has to take some responsibility for this.
As any parent will tell you, younger people do not want to be told what to do. The last two generations at least have made it very clear that they won’t be told what to do let alone think.
They want to source their own ‘facts’ and make up their own minds. Perhaps that is why programs like The Project are now less appealing?
There is a conversation to be had around the future success of mid- and long-form news programs.
Young people consume things on the move. And, well, it’s not just young people. Most of the time I find myself as a 50-something … walking, reading/watching; cooking, listening/watching… You don’t need to stand still for much these days. You can purchase just about everything at a drive-through and if you can’t, you can get it delivered by Uber Eats or Amazon next day. Making a commitment to sit in front of a TV screen for a defined period of time at a certain time of day is not the way the world works any more. Life is portable, and dare I say it, people have short attention spans…that is future of news whether we like it or not.
News outlets have generally tacked on portable formats – like Facebook news feeds – to their primary offering whereas platforms like TikTok were built from the ground up to be portable, user friendly and with user generated content which is the very definition of authentic…content created by the very people whom the platform is designed to serve.
When you compare that format to the traditional news outlet model, you can see why the future of news is not The Project but may well be ‘snackable content’ on TikTok or other platforms like it.
I must confess that I’ve not yet become a TikTok aficionado, but I am a fan of getting information quickly, succinctly and with a side serving of laughter in between the more cerebral stuff if I can.
However, another part of me is genuinely distressed by the lack of desire for what I would call ‘proper news’, that is news that impacts society, the economy and ultimately people’s long-term future.
When The Courier-Mail website (Tuesday, 10 June, 2025) posts a “breaking news” story about a change to the Broncos logo, you know we’ve got some hard thinking to do about both news generators and new consumers. The Courier-Mail is right to cover this story of course, as the masthead is simply responding to the desire of its audience to know about the happenings at their favourite football club. But is it important news…? Such is the rise of infotainment over quality news journalism.
This week’s events will only further serve to make news gatherers and news generators think more intently about they can stay relevant in a fast moving and technology-driven environment.
Long live news…but not as we know it today!
Lisa Nixon
Managing Director
