Engaged Journalism: Connecting with Digitally Empowered News Audiences by Jake Batsell, Columbia University Press, 2015
Author Jake Batsell examines the shift in journalism from one-way to two-way communication (xv). He focuses primarily on the Seattle Times, the Texas Tribune, the Christian Science Monitor (Boston), the CNN Brief Blog (Washington), the Daily Post (Wales), the Las Vegas Sun, Politico, and the Washington Post.
Batsell claims that engagement is the most important component of modern journalism. He analyzes definitions of the term, landing on his own: “the degree to which a news organization actively considers and interacts with its audience in furtherance of its journalistic and financial mission” (7). Ideally, Batsell says, engagement includes readers paying for content, but he acknowledges that paywalls alone are not viable for reaching that ideal (9). He warns that engagement can hurt journalism if not handled responsibly.
Unlike Hirst (Navigating Social Journalism: A Handbook for Media Literacy and Citizen Journalism by Martin Hirst, Routledge, 2019, ISBN: 978-1-138-22500-8), Batsell advocates for journalism that “empowers audiences to satisfy their own curiosity, . . . measures effectiveness and captures value” (11). He doesn't specify exactly what he means by "effectiveness," however, and I find his emphasis on giving readers what they want, rather than reporting the facts of what happened, alarming. That sounds more like a social media aim than a journalism aim.
Engaged's primary focus is how news organizations can increase engagement by attracting sponsors, building reader/user loyalty, and appointing an event planner (41). Ultimately, it reads more like a guide for social media influencers or news station ownership than a journalism textbook (25-30). While it covers the narrow niche of journalism finance well, it’s not broad or historically-inclined enough for an undergraduate introductory journalism course. I don't plan to use it in any of the courses I teach.