Public and Commercial Media

In the second lecture of the semester, the class took their first steps into learning about journalism by discussing public and commercial media- what are they? What do they make? How do they continue to make it? What are their formats? What is their role in society?

Regardless of being similar in many aspects, the two variations of media are actually rather different. Whilst commercial media is considered to be ‘dumbed down’ with content tailored to attract audiences (consumers), pubic media is made more for the interest of the public, with political and minority groups frequently targeted. Although these two media are often constructed for two crowds, they must both conform to certain regulations.

Commercial media survives on the successfulness of their business as they are not funded by the government but by the profits gained from their consumers. Their obligation is to be truthful and provide a comprehensive account on the recent, relevant accounts of the day, a discussion forum and clarification of societies rules and expectations, however not everyone agrees. Commercial media may be considered as corrupt, with values focused on profit and entertainment rather than intelligent articles that count as news.

The ultimate purpose of public media to serve the public and democratic processes by delivering quality, relevant information, not to gain a profit. Television broadcasters such as ABC and SBS are considered to be a public media, as they focus on all interests, including politics and national heritage.

I agree that commercial media does not always provide comprehensive, intelligent information and instead focuses on profits through entertainment and unimportant news stories, I believe that they still provide bulletins and resources that are interesting to different groups of people. This also applies to public media creating a wide range of informative topics for different ethnic, political and religious (amongst other) groups. I don’t think that commercial media should produce media that is untrue, however deviating from the set format and directing material that is for entertainment purposes is not an issue, that the media types can coexist together and cover the spectrum of news.

An example of a commercial media on the television that is both truthful and comprehensive is the ‘NRL’, a sport product aired on the pay television company ‘Foxtel’ and the free to air channel ‘Nine’. The NRL does not just air rugby league matches but also provide discussion programs directly related to the game or players. These programs do rely on audience numbers and therefore the entertainment to keep those consumers watching, but the materials used are always relevant and often comprehensive, investigative and true.