oa Waardevolle journalistiek. Op zoek naar kwaliteit vanuit het gezichtspunt van de gebruiker

Valuable Journalism. Looking for quality from a user perspective

This article will show why audience research is of crucial significance for the quality of both scholarship on journalism and professional journalistic practice. First, a better understanding among scholars and professionals is needed of how today’s media audience has grown more self-aware and appears to ask for a widening of the democratic repertoire of journalism. Second, more audience research is needed because established routines among viewers, listeners and readers are in flux. Other news media (news sites, Twitter, journalistic blogs etc.) have given rise to other news needs. The third angle of this article pertains to the importance of journalistic narrative forms. News items should not only be important and useful. People also want to enjoy journalism. This enjoyment should not be associated with superficial entertainment or a feel-good experience; rather, the pursuit of news enjoyment calls for a re-gauging of the journalistic values at issue in quality journalism.