International Communication Gazette

The promise of convergence and the maturing internet appear to create arenas of communicative plenty but, instead of the end of spectrum scarcity, we are witnessing a new challenge of ‘coexistence’ and fierce competition over spectrum between the broadcasters and mobile telecom providers. Some European countries have already decided on further reductions in the broadcast spectrum, though the vast majority disagreed with the mobile industries’ proposal at the World Radiocommunication Conference in November 2015 that the entire ultra high frequency band should in future be shared by mobile broadband and broadcasting. This article explores the proposition that broadcasting requires adequate spectrum in order to deliver the information and cultural assets that are vital for citizenship, at a cost likely to remain significantly lower than comparable service delivered via subscription or broadband providers.

The authors argue the continuing importance of public service values for journalistic practice and news provision in the emerging context of networked communications. Divergent perspectives regarding the economic viability of news production in for-profit and nonprofit sectors are reviewed, in application to two categories of media organizations: legacy media and digital native media. The authors assess the contemporary situation for news firms in the USA and Europe to arrive at a general understanding. Results suggest the public service ethos in journalism is at risk. This encourages the importance of collaborative efforts on the part of policymakers, news providers, and the academic community to address a complex set of problems in news production and provision today. The article makes a case for preserving historic professional values in journalistic practice but is not focused on the narrower interests of a particular sector or institutional arrangement. The authors encourage developing a comprehensive contemporary news media system to secure ongoing innovation, enhance diversity, and advance quality. The article concludes with actionable proposals regarding media policy, operational partnerships, education, and professionalism.

This article examines the roots and consequences of public service broadcasters’ strategic commitment to digital universalism and the ‘anything, anywhere, anytime’ paradigm of mobile media delivery. Using policy analysis, expert interviews and case studies it traces the adaptation of national public service broadcaster to global information capital, linking broadcasters’ pursuit of multiplatform ubiquity with competition policy, the rise of ubiquitous computing and its commercial realization in global mobile media markets. It then analyses the challenges of implementing a public sector mobile agenda in the Australian context, where the scope of mobile broadband uptake is internationally significant. The analysis explores the dynamics of mobile media planning and investment at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the Special Broadcasting Service, identifying new expressions of universalism in online access and accessibility, new costs in research, design, development and delivery, and significant debates emerging around the prioritization, privatization and commercialization of public resources.

In 2014, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation released a five-year plan entitled A Space For Us All. The plan outlined a bold new vision for the Canadian public broadcaster, placing digital mobile content at the forefront of the corporation’s priorities. This article examines the shifting priorities of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation against established principles of public broadcasting. It also interrogates the relationship between mobile digital media and legal obligations of the public broadcaster under current Canadian broadcasting regulation. Drawing upon Canadian broadcasting history, contemporary data and recent examples from sport and politics in Canada, the article questions this new direction for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and argues that despite the significant new opportunities in mobile digital media, traditional broadcasting methods remain the dominant tool to reach mass audiences and will provide a significant forum for public information and debate for the foreseeable future.

According to recent European estimates, the life expectancy of broadcasting as a free-to-air television platform is not more than 15 years. BBC, Yle and the UK regulator Ofcom have reached this conclusion in their reports about the future of news, media distribution and digital terrestrial television. Although broadcasting is seen as necessary until 2030, all three assume that digital terrestrial television can – under certain conditions – be replaced with delivery using internet protocol. However, it seems that the idea of IPTV taking over digital terrestrial television is just a sophisticated version of ‘black box fallacy’, driven by the expected growth of the new media ecosystem. The problems in replacing a socio-technological system have largely been neglected.