(50) Sun hasn't decided which side to back in EU referendum, claims its editor

Link: http://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/mar/01/sun-eu-referendum-editor-tony-gallagher-brexit

 

 

Summary:

 

The Sun editor, Tony Gallagher, has said he hasn’t decided which side the newspaper will back at June’s referendum on EU membership, despite the “extremely sceptical” tone of its EU coverage. He did not directly address a question about whether he had the “freedom” to decide the Sun’s line on the referendum – likely to be a reference to the Eurosceptic views of the paper’s owner, Rupert Murdoch – but Gallagher told the Newsworks conference in London on Tuesday that the Sun’s stance on the EU was tailored to its readers. Gallagher, who was speaking at the Newsworks conference in London, also revealed that the newspaper is preparing to debut a channel on the mobile platform Snapchat Discover in “the next month or two”.

Key data/statistical information:

• “We have written about 55 editorials on Europe since I arrived on 14 September and the tone of them is extremely sceptical,” said Gallagher
• The Daily Mail website Mail Online is already on Snapchat Discover, which provides media outlets with a dedicated channel to deliver content, often video, to the platform’s more than 100 million users

What's my view?

I think that it is shocking that the Sun has stated that their stance on the EU is tailored to its readers. This presents a pluralistic view that the audience have some sort of power to choose what media they want to consume as the sun reveals that they are tailoring to their audience's taste. Also, the part of the article shows the new and digital media side and how the newspaper industry has to now look for ways to maintain their audience by reaching out to them through social media. The sun is planning to use the mobile platform Snapchat Discover in order to keep their audience interested and to make money as less and less people read newspapers.