Exploring the Prospects of Print Media in an Evolving Digital Culture in Ghana

Abstract

Neo-globalisation era has presented the news media in Africa with opportunities and challenges. In Ghana, there are some shifts in how print news media operate in digitalised context. Yet there is dearth of research about digitalising newsrooms and its implications for the development of a vibrant press in Ghana. Print media in Ghana are in the throes of innovating albeit at a slow pace and in a re-oriented fashion to connect with a globalised media landscape, which seems to be in a constant changing mode. Re-orientation in the manner of producing and delivery of news content in an emerging digital ecosystem means that theoretically actors operate in a network, which privileges a mutually responsive communication process over a top-down elitist approach. The paper argues that for the press in Ghana to remain relevant and contribute towards providing information and news to media savvy readers, it needs to adapt to transformations in newsroom practices happening globally. Newspaper organisations’ initiatives at introducing new technology in newsrooms are occurring at a time the government of Ghana seems to be championing a drive for a digital economy. How these attempts feed into global discourses of networked newsrooms is what the paper would examine.