Sports journalists in the digital age

The research commenced in 2013 and is ongoing.

The two key aims of this project are to:

• explore how sports journalists are protecting their professional base in a ‘democratised’ digital media environment
• investigate what it means to be a professional sports journalist in the digital age.

The findings of the project are informing and shaping industry practice. Simon McEnnis co-ordinates a 20-session staff development training course for Sky Sports journalists and disseminates his research findings in this forum.

The key findings to date are that sports journalists are facing significant internal and external challenges to their professional and occupational bases.

Sports journalists face external challenges in that they are now one of many voices in public communication alongside clubs, organisations, non-mainstream media and bloggers. However, sports journalists are proving resilient and adaptable in operating within a shared digital environment. Sports journalists are leaning heavily on their occupational mythology and cultural authority, built predominantly around access to the wider professional sports environment, to dominate participatory online spaces such as social media.

Internally, the occupational group has become more complex and fragmented due to both newsroom re-organisation and multi-platform editorial strategies. Sports journalism has always been characterised by tensions across publications through quality versus popular dichotomies. However, the introduction of online journalists into sports desks has seen tensions and hierarchies arise within – as well as across – organisations. The print, newspaper tradition has a clear set of norms, values and beliefs that contribute to its status as ‘proper’ sports journalism while online practitioners are viewed as undermining professional standards and reputation.