The New Media Professor at the Department of Mass Communication, Umm Al-Qura University, Dr. Usama bin Ghazi Al-Madani, confirmed that online journalism has imposed itself on the media scene as a strong competitor to paper journalism. This is in addition to the emergence of new applications that vie with the press to attract the reader.

This was stated in a lecture entitled, “Online Journalism: Complementary or Alternative?”, which was delivered by Dr. Al-Madani on Tuesday, 23 Safar, 1441 A.H., in the Event Hall at the College of Social Sciences, in the presence of a number of the academic staff and students.

Dr. Al-Madani explained that due to the challenge imposed by the Internet, online journalism has imposed itself on the media scene as a strong competitor to paper journalism. This is in addition to the emergence of new applications that come under different names, such as ‘citizen journalism’ and ‘mobile journalism’.

He also pointed out the most important advantages of online journalism as being the simultaneous transmission of text and videos, to deliver a multiform message and keep the visitor interested as long as possible. He added that there are some other advantages that the reader of electronic media enjoys, including keeping updated with the latest news and having instant access to it, unlike traditional newspapers, as not much time is spent on monitoring and analyzing events. This is in addition to the absence of censorship on the material published.

Dr. Al-Madani concluded his lecture by highlighting the difficulties and challenges facing the paper press in the face of online journalism. He also explained the differences between electronic newspapers and news websites. At the end, he answered the questions of the audience.