The (mobile) news ecosystem milestone

Abstract

Chapter 5 Mobile Ecosystems and News zooms in on the significant blending of news and mobile media. The chapter begins with a concise historical account into the early steps toward mobile news that publishers took by the turn of the 21st century. Next follows a closer assessment of the rise of mobile application (app) ecosystems, most notably Apple iOS and Google's Android that were launched in 2008. Interestingly, Apple repeatedly featured The New York Times when promoting the first iPhone model in 2007 and its emerging mobile ecosystem, albeit there were no formal partnerships with The New York Times to do so. Since then, millions of apps have been developed for the mobile ecosystem, including most news publishers who use smartphones in their news work both for production and distribution. This chapter offers a critical assessment into how the rise of mobile ecosystems represents a significant milestone for the news industry, involving a gradual dislocation of news journalism to apps on mobile ecosystems and platforms that are non-proprietary to the news publishers. Thus, in many ways, mobile communication has become a problematic environment for journalists and media companies where they need to compete for attention on uneven terms with companies producing the devices (e.g., Apple) and the platforms (e.g., Google and Facebook). Moreover, journalists and media can choose between only two mobile operating systems with important consequences for the political economy of news and smartphones. This dependency will be discussed in critical terms. However, the issue is not just about smartphones but about the Internet itself that has been captured by global tech companies and divided into geographically separated regions, the Western world, China, as well as Russia. The dominating business models for smartphones are advertisements (Android) or hardware and apps (Apple/iOS) which means that the functions in operating systems are optimized for ad revenues or control over apps. News media have very little say in how people can access their content. This has also grave consequences for publishers when they lose control over the datafied relationship with their audience. This chapter also examines how mobile technology is changing the work of journalists, for instance, how virtual newsrooms increasingly are becoming reality not just because of COVID-19.