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October 9, 2024
Event
Vacancy
Article
The Future of Media: Content Consumption Trends
Media, like any other field, is undergoing radical changes under the influence of technology. Those who studied at journalism faculties had to learn Ripley's Law, which helps to understand how one innovation triggers a chain reaction of changes. Today, video and messaging apps are confidently displacing traditional news websites, altering the way content is consumed and its format. This creates new opportunities for both content production and consumption, but it also adds challenges for media outlets striving to maintain their positions.
Digital media today
New platforms demand adaptation and rethinking of strategies, opening up space for bold decisions. The internet, social media, streaming services, and mobile applications have become indispensable for users. This is not just a convenience, but an opportunity for brands to engage more deeply with their audience and create personalized content. A new study from the Reuters Institute showcases the current state of the media market. In 2024, news consumption through social platforms has become more diverse: a significant number of users choose YouTube (31%), WhatsApp (21%), TikTok (13%), and Twitter/X (10%) as their news sources. The trend indicates that short videos are becoming increasingly important, especially among young people—66% turn to them weekly. Traditional news websites remain less popular (22%), posing challenges for their monetization. Meanwhile, concerns about fake news on TikTok and X remain high due to the spread of misinformation and deepfakes.
In September of this year, it became known that a deepfake posed as Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba while attempting to contact an American senator. This is yet another example of how video falsification technologies pose a threat to international communication. Manipulations with deepfakes diminish the level of trust, even in official statements. As a result, publishers and platforms will need to adopt new tools to combat fake news and verify the authenticity of information.
Video is the king of modern content. Netflix, YouTube, and Amazon Prime dictate the format of consumption: watching anywhere and whenever it's convenient. It’s no surprise that vertical video, adapted for smartphone screens, has become popular across all platforms, from TikTok to Facebook. Additionally, thanks to algorithms and AI, content recommendations have become personalized. Your preferences shape a personalized news feed and recommendations, which, on one hand, allows users to see only topics of interest, but on the other hand, traps them in an information bubble.
Considering the popularity of videos, it's not surprising that the podcast format is rapidly developing, with recordings available in both audio-only and video interview formats. As early as 2021, Suspilne conducted research demonstrating the growing popularity of this segment, and today even major streaming platforms like MEGOGO offer a lot of similar content.
Since smartphones have become the primary tool for consuming news, mobile content is gradually becoming the standard for media. Both Ukrainian and foreign media have their own mobile applications, such as The Economist, Ukrainska Pravda, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal.
What to expect next?
Cases are already emerging where large media organizations are beginning to fight against artificial intelligence. While some use AI to personalize news feeds, for example, The New York Times has even been involved in lawsuits with technology companies OpenAI and Microsoft. The media filed a lawsuit for copyright infringement involving the use of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, and as of August this year, the publication updated its terms of service, prohibiting the copying of content for training machine learning systems or AI. However, according to PwC, the use of AI in media is only expected to increase by 2025.
In a study, PwC China representative Wilson Chow asserts that the global entertainment and media industry has always thrived due to technological revolutions. He states that for the industry to continue growing, it is essential to integrate cutting-edge technologies such as Generative AI, transform business models, creative approaches, and actively utilize new technologies in advertising.
The increasing influence of AI on content consumption is also confirmed by research from Deloitte. According to experts, generative artificial intelligence will have a significant impact on content creators. However, the majority of respondents (70%) prefer watching TV shows or movies written by humans, even though nearly half (42%) acknowledge that generative AI is capable of creating competitive entertainment content. Furthermore, 22% believe that such technologies could even surpass human creativity by producing more engaging narratives. Generation Z and millennials are particularly active in using generative AI: 18% have used it to create images, while 25% have used it for writing texts. These results suggest that AI is unlikely to replace journalists' work; however, those targeting a young audience should look for ways to integrate technology into news feeds or the selection of topics that may interest readers.
Digital media certainly do not limit themselves to just textual content on websites; in addition to video and audio, another format may emerge in the future—AR and VR. Virtual and augmented reality in media can offer interactive and immersive formats. One can take inspiration from the "Career Goal Hut 2.0" project—a conference in the metaverse on the Spatial platform organized by the online institute Projector and the career service Lezo. Instead of a traditional online event on Zoom, the organizers allowed each participant to obtain a virtual avatar and join various zones where they could listen to lectures from employers, familiarize themselves with the meta-rooms of companies, and even submit resumes. For media, such solutions will enable the engagement of diverse audiences and capture the interest of the younger generation, who are unlikely to purchase printed copies of newspapers.
The Ukrainian startup Sensorama (Sensorama Lab, a virtual and augmented reality laboratory) has already implemented a project commissioned by the Swiss Ministry of Internal Affairs. For the social campaign “Youth and Media” (Jugend und Medien), the company developed a special helmet for first-person filming. This technological solution allowed viewers to consume immersive content by observing events from the perspective of the main character.
Such innovative approaches have attracted the attention of younger audiences and conveyed socially important ideas regarding online safety, gaming addiction, and access to prohibited content. The immersive nature of narratives is likely to impact media as well. This format is already actively used on social networks, such as Snapchat and TikTok, where users can create videos with real-time filters. An interesting observation from Reuters' research pertains to the topic of news avoidance. As many as 39% of respondents confirmed that they sometimes or often avoid consuming news. In the context of the war in Ukraine and the Middle East, the proportion of this category of people may only increase.
This underscores the need for media professionals to create so-called "evergreen content" – information that is independent of time and current events, maintaining its relevance over an extended period. This can include advice, compilations, and other useful materials that will attract readers to a website or viewers to a channel. Overall, just like in other fields, media will not be able to avoid the influence of new technologies, and perhaps industry titans like The New York Times, in their struggle against AI, resemble the English Luddites of the 19th century. Determining the balance between preserving traditions and adapting to innovations will become increasingly challenging each year. The same goes for deepfakes in videos.
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