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Audience perspectives on paying for local news: a regional qualitative case study

journal contribution
posted on 2023-05-20, 22:52 authored by Ross, A, Elizabeth Lester, Claire KonkesClaire Konkes
Local and regional journalism is perceived to aid the functioning of democracy. Yet local publications are increasingly being forced to close due to the collapse of predigital news business models. An emerging area of scholarship considers potential funding solutions for local news media. One key enquiry is how local news publishers may attract more revenue from their audiences. This is a difficult task for all news organisations, yet even more so for local news publishers due to evidence news consumers are less willing to pay for local news than other types. This paper contributes by developing a deeper conceptual understanding of factors contributing to people being unwilling to pay for local news. We use data from a 2019 three month digital ethnographic regional Australian case study to identify several structural and relational factors that contributed to participants being unwilling to subscribe to their local publication. We consider how these findings may be used by local news publishers to maintain and increase their subscription base.

History

Publication title

Journalism Studies

Volume

22

Issue

8

Pagination

1066-1082

ISSN

1461-670X

Department/School

School of Creative Arts and Media

Publisher

Routledge

Place of publication

UK

Rights statement

© 2021 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group

Repository Status

  • Restricted

Socio-economic Objectives

The media

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