Minister underlines importance of high quality reporting

Logi Einarsson, minister of culture, innovation and higher education, says it is essential to raise public awareness, particularly among young people, of the importance of paying for high-quality news reporting. He says people in Iceland are much less willing than those in the other Nordic countries to pay for news content, and that young people are particularly unlikely to pay for news subscriptions. "We need to create a culture where people see this as a necessity," Logi says. People need to understand the importance of news being edited by professionals and be willing to pay for such news reporting. Logi says the government plans to launch an awareness campaign in co-operation with Blaðamannafélag Íslands (the Icelandic Union of Journalists) to increase people's understanding of the role of the media, as part of broader government measures to respond to the difficult situation facing the sector. Traditional revenue has declined at the same time as a large share of new advertising revenue is going to foreign technology companies. Logi says the media have rarely been more important than they are now, as social media and new technology have changed the way people access information