Opinions & Interviews

Opinion: Demand for credible information is very high today

BREST, 23 May (BelTA) – The demand for credible information is very high today, Director – Editor-in-Chief of the Belarus Today Publishing House Dmitry Zhuk said at a plenary session of the 14th Belarusian International Media Forum “Partnership for the Future: Journalism and Social Security” in Brest on 23 May, BelTA has learned.

“Today the demand for credible information is very high. We are living in the era when information delivery technology is advancing so fast that we cannot even imagine what it will be like next year. It has become very easy to enter the media market. Any person having a device becomes almost a journalist,” Dmitry Zhuk said.

However, what really makes a journalist is responsibility for what he/she writes. Apart from that, there is also an editorial policy. “This is the instrument to build trust in the publication and this is important for information consumers. You can cause a storm of hype and get attention. You can do it two times, ten times. However, this will not help you keep your audience interested if you are not useful to the public,” Dmitry Zhuk is convinced.

He cited an example of the Znamya Yunosti newspaper of the Belarus Today Publishing House. Its circulation has nearly doubled over two years. Today the circulation is getting close to 50,000. “Why do young people opt for reading a newspaper instead of using mobile devices? We asked them and the most common answer was: this is a good habit. People get used to receiving reliable, trustworthy information in a convenient form. Indeed, a newspaper is not about news, because one can get it from the Internet and TV. A newspaper helps a person better understand and come to grips with his/her issues. If we can reach out to every household, every family and become a useful habit, we will provide social protection for our citizens. To this end, we need to do two simple things: not to lie, first of all, to our own selves, and to take care of the needs of the audience and to respect readers,” Dmitry Zhuk concluded.

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