ABC News 24 – a handy service for niche journalists

Tim Burrowes

August 23, 2010 2:00

It may not have many viewers yet, but ABC News 24 saves specialist journos having to leave their desks, argues Delimiter’s Renai LeMay

When media commentators discuss the future of journalism, they usually agree on at least one thing: It will involve much fewer generalists and more reporters dedicated to exhaustively covering niche fields.

This appealing vision — if it was framed as a TV commercial — would feature a highly informed hack attending a popular press conference and asking a series of insightful questions while generalist reporters looked on in dumb amazement at the depth of the niche knowledge on display.

After massaging information out of the subject with her adept touch, the niche journalist would turn to the camera and casually discuss how her degree in the subject gave her a depth of background knowledge that generalists couldn’t match — before flashing her smile at David Hasselhof, who would jump into the journalist’s red sports car with her and ride away into the sunset.

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Tim Burrowes

Tim Burrowes is the publisher of Mumbrella and Unmade. He co-founded Mumbrella in 2008 and sister title Unmade in 2021. He's worked in the UK, Middle East, Asia & Australia and has specialised in writing about the communications world for the last 25 years. He wrote the book Media Unmade, published in 2021, and became the presenter of MediaLand on ABC Radio National in 2025.