Mobiles Can And Will Be Newspapers’s Saviour Says Mark Hollands

The Newspaper Works CEO, Mark Hollands, claims if he was launching a news company now he would drive it through a mobile interface instead of desktop.

In an interview with B&T he said, “There’s this enormous disruptive influence caused by mobile, that’s hovering its way through society, at this point in time and changing habits. Few people are bothering with news across desktops if they’re going to phones.

“There are probably going to be consequences or other things that get changes as result of that so here’s a bit of pet theory, I actually wonder what the future of journalism is on the desktop?

“If I was getting into this game now, I’d be mobile. I don’t even want a website particularly. I might have to do simply because I’m bound to. But honestly I wouldn’t drive my business through a desktop interface, I would drive it through a mobile interface.”

However, Hollands insists that rather than mobile being a threat to journalism and newspapers he sees the multi-platform offering as a huge opportunity, adding that each of the product lines, print, desktop and mobile, have to effectively fight for their existence.

As a consequence, he said some will run print better than others, some will run desktop better than others, and some will run mobile better than others.

“I don’t see anything threatening,” he added. “I see opportunity. Mobile is massive, just massive. But the future desktop, the future of print, the future of radio, this is, we’re all going to find our place. There’s nothing to say that one place is no better, no worse than other. A lot of CEOs say, ‘oh there’s never been a more exciting time,” and everyone goes, ‘yeah’ you would say that,’ but it’s true.”

The Newspaper Works, which champions the views of all the major Australian newspaper publishers is holding its annual The Future Forum at Sydney’s Hilton Hotel on September 10 and 11.

The theme for this year is ‘Influencing a Connected World’ and keynote speakers Sir Martin Sorrell, founder and chief executive of WPP, and Raju Narisetti, the senior vice president, strategy for News Corp (US), will be joined by a whole host of movers and shakers in the industry, including Huffington Post vice president, brand strategy and sales and head of branded content Lauri Baker, Google’s director, strategic partnerships and partner business solutions Jason Washing.

The Newspaper of the Year Awards will be held on September 11, at the conclusion of the forum.

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