The significant investments that Stuff and NZME have made in video news are starting to look like wise moves even if the payback has yet to fully materialise.
Their current major initiatives – Stuff’s production of Three’s nightly news and NZME’s two breakfast video shows on Herald Now – are unlikely to be financial saviours for either group. They are, however, the foundations that will allow both groups to take advantage of significant shifts in news consumption.
Their strategic thinking was given a boost last week with publication of the latest Reuters Institute Digital News Report which has found growing audience enthusiasm for online video content at a time when search referrals to digital news sites is plummeting toward ‘Google Zero’.
The Reuters report surveys 48 markets (Australia is the closest we get). For the first time, all of the surveyed countries report a majority of people watching online video news. Seventy seven per cent of people globally consume it each week. In 45 of those markets, more people watch online video news than broadcast television bulletins. And 57 per cent of 12 to 15 year-olds identify a single platform as their most important news source. It is TikTok – the go-to site for short-form vertical videos.
It is noteworthy that this growth in online video consumption is all happening on third party platforms. Worldwide, video consumption on news websites and apps has dropped five per cent in the past year. The report is unequivocal: “…if news videos from mainstream news organisations are being watched, that consumption is likely happening somewhere other than that publisher’s own website or app”. Over the past three years the proportion who consume video on news websites and apps has dropped from 28 per cent to 23 per cent.
In a New Zealand context, that points to a future where few will be watching Garth Bray’s HeraldNow Business or Ryan Bridge Today on the Herald website, or repurposed Three News on Stuff, but will turning to YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok.
These current productions, however, will not be the focus of future news output by the likes of Stuff and NZME – or TVNZ for that matter. Two-hour, one-hour or even thirty minute news programmes will not cut it with platform users. The videos they watch are bite-sized and often shared as part of other posts.
The Reuters report makes it clear, nonetheless, that video is a strong drawcard at a time when other news media are getting less and less cut-through. It represents an opportunity for news producers but not without significant challenges.
As always, the first challenge will be to make it pay. The platforms that carry these videos are in it for themselves, not the producers of news. Ways need to be found to attach monetary value to the content that users post on social media. One way might be the indelible attachment of short commercials much as you now see at the beginning of some Stuff videos. Ad duration would need to be limited, like the attention span of some social media users. Or there could be static strap ads top or bottom of the video content. One way or another, news producers need to be thinking hard about financial compensation before the trend overtakes them.
Another challenge will be cut-through. Amid the cacophony of noise on social media, how do news producers get their content noticed? It is impossible to reduce the noise because it is the very essence of social media – everyone speaking at once. The answer lies in being noticed.
Unfortunately, the long-term decline of mainstream news organisations means that masthead names that once carried immense weight, no longer do so among audiences who never acquired the habit of reading them, watching them, or listening to them.
It is also clear that the forms of reportage with which you and I may be familiar do not engage audiences whose definition of ‘interesting’ has been conditioned by exposure to emotive content and the creation of fast rising ‘personalities’. Both will continue to be driven by digital analytics. The report gives some clues to the ways in which news would have to change to accommodate the trend.
One pointer was the need to engage in short-form journalism. Although the report was encouraged by the willingness of young people to watch longer videos, that sign of light was clouded by the fact that ‘long-form’ was about five minutes. I can’t see that audience watching an hour-long news bulletin. They are far more likely to access single items of a couple of minutes or less and then only if they catch their attention. And how do they do that?
There has been much talk in media gatherings over the past year about turning journalists into ‘content creators’. The aim is not only to take advantage of technical tools including AI but also to make the content more personal, to let the journalist shine through. If news organisations are to capitalise on the video news trend, they will have to do more than make their reporters recognisable. They will have to turn them into personalities, and to let them show their emotional sides.
It can pay dividends, but the question is who will get paid? Unless mainstream media companies can develop strategies that play to their size, the winners will be individuals who break away to do their own thing.
An article by Cardiff journalism professor Karin Wahl-Jorgensen, published in Stuff newspapers last Friday, spoke of “boutique media producers”, some of whom had amassed significant fortunes using social media platforms to disseminate their material. US podcaster Jo Rogan, for example, has an annual income of $US60 million and is worth about $US200 million.
Professor Wahl-Jorgensen raised another matter that will be thrust into stark relied by moves toward platform-based video news.
“These changes significantly affect what news gets to us and which sources we trust. Traditional journalism trades in trustworthy knowledge, based on the professional skills of journalists and the faith we have in the major news organisations they work for – what scholars refer to as ‘epistemic authority’. However, as part of the emergence of boutique media, we have seen the growing importance of what might be called ‘affective authority’ – authority based on emotional connection.”
A shift in the form of what gives news its authority raises professional and ethical issues that organised journalism accepts it must address. There are question marks, however, over whether individuals or “boutique media” will feel the same imperative to abide by set standards. “Affective authority” is a polite way of saying emotional button-pushing power, and there are innumerable examples in this world of that going to someone’s head.
The video news trend is not only a challenge for media whose heritage lies in print. Broadcasters will be equally affected by the trend. The report confirms that fewer people each year are watching broadcast television. Inevitably Television New Zealand will be faced with the prospect of ending its terrestrial transmissions. It is preparing for that day by advancing its streaming services – the FIFA World Cup is the most ambitious example to date. Once the transmitters are switched off, the nature of One News will change: News At Six will become news-whenever-you-want-it. TVNZ could be drawn into the social media video news environment very quickly: It would be well-advised to up its online game now.
The Reuters Institute report is a mine of information about where digital media are headed –even if it seems that, for every graph, there is another mounting challenge. You can access the full report here: https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2026-06/DNR%202026%20FINAL_2.pdf
