Has the rise in PR had an effect on Journalism and News Media?

More and more i'm seeing more publicists. Being owner of a website has really opened my eyes because I get over 20/30 emails a day from publicists. PR definitely has had a positive/negative effect on journalism and the news media.

PR (Public Relations) for those who don't know is the exposure, publicity and information management of a organisation or individual to the public which is set to convince and persuade people to maintain a certain view point. Publicists have become a source of news as they actually  now apparently account for 40-70% of information that what appears as news.

Sir Tim Bell, of Bell Pottinger, defined the impact of PR by saying "A strong story placed in the newspaper, picked up by everybody else, will actually have more impact than an advertising campaign." (Michie D., 1997, pg. 6). Which is very true, if a publicist can supply that one strong story it can make a greater impact. 

The rise in PR has been ridiculou  back in 1997 there were 300 publicists then by 2006 there were 1815 with another 1444 more employed, this is a 3000+ increase over 9 years alone. The amount of jobs within the PR industry has increased and still is increasing.

In this era of news media a journalist will now deal with a PR operator throughout their  normal day. Journalists are now swaying from journalism and taking a PR path. PR has made such a impact it has now been deemed necessary. 

PR and journalism aren't very different in what they bring to the news room. They both rely on research, fact digging and ability to put across a story to make a impact on the reader. PR and news media go hand in hand as reporters need data/news and contacts and publicists need reporters.

The line between the both professions are being blurred in the sense of factual news and how it affects and impacts new media. Senior practitioner Julia Hobsbawn suggested that “at least 60% and more commonly 80% of any broadsheet outlet has got a PR element in it” which we may not notice as the public, but have you ever seen a post on one site feature on another but just a few different word changes? it all derives from a press release.

It is easier to seek news from a PR source than out and about in the streets. This up-rise in PR works in a good and bad way, it's good because there is more content being produced and more facts are being given. They are given the information they need from the comfort of there desk, can you blame them for not turning it down?

This can be a bad thing because it defeats the purpose of a reporter going out and finding stories and being practical. It also gives the impression that anyone can be a journalist if they are just re-typing up another persons press release. In this era of news media, most stories written in newspapers originated from a source and are often a copy an paste article. 

In the world of news media today PR run the stories, journalists have to rely on this sort of short-cut in order for the publication to run efficiently. In a study conducted by Justin Lewis Et Al it was found that up to 41% of press articles and 52% of broadcast news contains PR material. PR and journalism need each other for a effective news media.

The increased number of national newspaper journalists has remained the same since the 1960s but the size of newspapers has doubled. More and more content is being thrown newspapers way. The rise of PR means that all areas of journalism have changed, Nick Davies said that too many journalists now produce ‘churnalism’, regurgitating news heard from sources, basically PR masked as journalism. A journalist who is constantly given and fed news is less likely to go out to find their own because they have been given pre packaged news. This is a negative impact on news media because the journalist stops thinking for themselves.

To end with, i feel news media has been affected more than most people think. If PR continues to rise, which i think it will, the question of 'who is a journalist' would arise. The once known difference of Journalism and PR will become blurred, and in the future they will be known as the 'content generators'. Although not ever media outlet runs solely on PR, in a few years time we may not be saying this. As much as anyone can criticise PR, the news media needs PR. The fact is, journalists need to do more in less time and if pre-packaged news is what they find effective then that is how it will continue to run.