In an event held on Wednesday August 9th, hosted by Tapsell to commemorate Journalist's Day, a panel of media editors in the ecosystem discussed the role of media in business.
According to IDEA, in the media panel, Mehrak Mahmoudi, the editor-in-chief of Peivast, Amir Mostakin, the editor-in-chief of Digiato, and Hadi Moradi, the editor-in-chief of DMBoard, were present. The panel was moderated by Ahmad Attarzadeh, the editor-in-chief of Iran Deconomy and the marketing manager of Tapsell.
At the beginning of the panel, Attarzadeh looked back at the past decade and asked about the role of media in the ecosystem’s growth. Mostakin responded: “During these years, media in the technology sector and startup companies have contributed to each other’s growth. Perhaps if it wasn’t for the media, large companies would still find their place, but undoubtedly, the media helped small and medium-sized companies to be seen and played an important role.”
However, Mahmoudi expressed a different view, saying: “Media and business have separate roles. The task of startups is business, and the task of media is information dissemination. As someone who has always been in the media seat, I never thought I was working against businesses; but if I think that the content, I publish is beneficial to users and may be detrimental to business, I might still publish it.”
Moradi added: “The development that has taken place in these years is that the media’s approach to businesses has been more supportive. Considering that I have experience on both sides, I believe that maturity has not yet developed on the business side, and the correct perspective has not formed. In a way, they don’t know how to interact with the media and lack the acceptance of criticism. In my opinion, specialized media can only contribute to industry growth when this acceptance exists from businesses and they don’t see criticism with hostility.
The media must maintain its independence
The editor-in-chief of Peivast, in regard to the interaction between media and businesses, explained: “We work with PR and businesses, but we’re not friends. I have never been popular among businesses; my pen has been sharp, and I have always written facts and criticisms. However, the problem starts when a journalist wants to gain popularity through these interactions.”
The editor-in-chief of Digiato also commented after mentioning the critical view of media towards businesses: “In the past 10 years, growth has occurred on both the business and media sides, but media growth has been greater. Nevertheless, we need to move towards a more critical perspective. Media is not an ice cream or pizza shop that everyone should be satisfied with.”
The Role of Media: Editorial Content or Advertisements?
Attarzadeh referred to media’s revenue and news values and asked how media have focused on revenue and advertorials in the past decade.
Mostakin explained: Although a media outlet cannot be a business, the point is that it shouldn’t limit its priority to revenue generation; the priority of a media should be a greater impact. In the media, we have examples where the media itself becomes a showcase for individuals. I believe that the technology media landscape is relatively healthy and among specialized media in Iran, technology media have been much more successful than other outlets because they managed to penetrate into the heart of society.
Mahmoudi also added: Instead of selling news, media should create a revenue stream, and the distinction between news and advertisements should be clear. If money has been received for a piece of content, it should be communicated to the audience that this content is an advertisement. The dangerous situation arises when we publish paid content but don’t disclose it to the audience.
Disappointment in the State of Media
The editor-in-chief of DMBoard, in the final part of the panel, mentioned the state of social media and said: Nowadays, users are more engaged with social media platforms than news websites, and on the other hand, filtering and restrictions have led to a decrease in the number of audiences. We are not moving towards growth compared to the previous year, and this is a distressing incident.
After expressing disappointment and the uncertain future in the digital economy, Mostakin said: I think we need more specialized media, and I agree with Hadi on this.
Mahmoudi also added: The future outlook can be divided into the long term and the short term. Certainly, we have a few difficult years ahead, but the future is not just like this.
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