In accordance with what has been happening to newspapers across the globe, Arab News too adopted the line of the major international titles by not straying from traditional methods of gathering and publishing news, while ringing in the new advancements in media and communications as and when needed.
The recent improvements made in technology and in telecommunications have allowed newspapers and news reach new levels — both in terms of the speed of news dissemination as well as reaching its target audience. It is only through this technological revolution that it has been possible for news organizations to spread news far and wide and even to areas that were not able to reach before.
In the age of new media and digital media, print media sensed that in order to stay relevant they had to make a leap to the new formats due to one main reason — that’s where the readers are. The younger generations weaned in the many forms of digital devices are the target audience. And it is this chunk of readership the print media needed to capture to stay alive in the fast-changing, tech-savvy world.
Arab News knew early of the potential and power of the Internet, that’s why the paper was one of leading Saudi newspapers to appear on the Web when the World Wide Web was at its infancy. Arab News’ website on an average receives more than hundreds of thousands of visits on a daily basis, with roughly similar or more unique visitors from all around the world.
The website added to the paper’s ever-growing number of readers not just on domestic level but all over the world, in addition Arab News on the Web took the print version to new and uncharted places and allowed for greater level of interaction between the paper and its readers.
One cannot talk about the Web without mentioning social media websites; through social media websites such as Facebook, Arab News added on more than 7,000 fans. On Facebook our readers post their insights, their feedbacks and updates.
Twitter has proved itself beyond its micro-blogging tool. Twitter in the past few years has become an essential tool for collecting news tips. A tweet powered with a hashtag can lead to major stories. It is a powerful instrument that when utilized properly can be a great tool for the newly emerging citizen journalism facet of news gathering. That’s not all citizen journalism has become an essential aspect for newspapers in order not to miss any breaking news.
This became evident in the Kingdom during the unfortunate girls school blaze in Jeddah with news websites and apps playing an essential part today and will continue to do so in the future in the changing dynamics of news and news gathering.
With advances made in mobile technologies as well as in telecommunication anyone now equipped with a smart phone can type a story, take a picture and communicate with the newsroom in order to publish it on all platforms of the news organization.
Arab News appears now in its iPad version at a click of a button at Apple’s iTunes store. Our readers can download the app and start reading news. The experience while flipping the pages on their iPad is seamless. From iTunes app store and Google market Arab News can be also downloaded and enjoyed.
Arab News’ breaking news is also published through SMS and MMS messages to guarantee no news goes unreported.
Wherever new advances in technologies are made Arab News will always be there.
