Despite all the positive signals regarding the digital market, German news and information providers are looking with concern at recent surveys. “Germans are tired of news,” was the headline of the Hamburg-based Leibniz Institute for Media Research, which is responsible for the German section of the international Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2022. The study says that interest in news has declined overall. Only 57% of adult Internet users are still interested in information about current events. That is 10 percentage points less than in the previous year. At the same time, one in 10 people aged 18 and over often deliberately tries to avoid the news. However, the Leibniz Institute also presented positive trends. For example, the willingness to pay for digital news services increased significantly in 2022. 14% of respondents said they had spent money on them, five percentage points more than in the previous year. Among those aged 18 to 24, this figure even reached 23% (2021: 9%).
The podcast market continues to send positive signals. According to the MA 2022 Audio II media analysis, 39.5% of the German-speaking population have already used a podcast. In the previous survey, the figure was 36.9%. A study by the digital association Bitkom also revealed optimistic figures. Today, 43% of people in Germany listen to podcasts, 19% even on a daily basis. The medium is even more firmly anchored among younger listeners: More than one in two of those aged 16 to 29 consume podcasts.
It is not only in terms of economics that the media industry faces numerous challenges that are crucial for the future of public and commercially-organised information providers. Several studies show that journalism is also under pressure from other quarters. Insults, intimidation and physical attacks have sadly become the norm at protests against the measures to fight the coronavirus pandemic and marches by so-called contrarians. The European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF) in Leipzig documented a new negative record for the year 2021. With 83 documented assaults, 14 more incidents were counted than in the previous year. No reliable figures are available on the countless digital threats and intimidation attempts to which journalists are subjected by e-mail or on social media platforms.
In the World Press Freedom Index, published annually by the organisation Reporters Without Borders, Germany has dropped from 13th to 16th place (as of the end of 2021). According to Reporters Without Borders, this is due to a decline in media diversity and the numerous attacks on media professionals during demonstrations.
On the international stage, the situation in Russia is particularly worrying. Russia has more or less completely abolished press freedom and now ranks 155th (out of a total of 180), according to Reporters Without Borders. Hundreds of independent international media professionals have left the country, and they have been threatened with prison sentences of up to 15 years for spreading allegedly false information. The newspaper Novaya Gazeta, under editor-in-chief and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dmitry Muratov, ceased editorial operations completely. Seven media workers were killed while covering the war in Ukraine in 2022. Reporters Without Borders also notes that more journalists are in prison worldwide than ever before. UNESCO reports 86 targeted journalists killed worldwide. From 2019 to 2021, that number averaged 58 per year, according to the UN cultural organisation.