JOURNALISTS’ EXPERIENCES IN CONVENTIONAL MEDIA ORGANIZATIONS IN THE FACE OF EMERGING NEW MEDIA IN EDO STATE.

The conventional media journalists have diverse experiences since the influx of new media. technologies especially web 2.0 applications in journalism practice. Therefore, it becomes necessary to examine journalists’ experiences in conventionalmedia organizations in the face of emerging new media in Edo State. The tenets of agenda setting, technological determinism, and social presence theories were used in this study. Descriptive survey design was employed. with the aid of 12-item questionnaire. The sample for this study constituted 300 journalists in Edo State through the purposive and proportionate stratified sampling technique. The sample reflected and represented all the journalists in Edo State. Data generated were presented and analysed in frequency tables, simple percentages, mean scores, standard deviations and Pearson’s Product Movement Correlation Coefficient (PPMCC), which aided the answering of the research questions and testing of the hypothesis formulated. The study found that conventional media journalists make use of new media technologies to make their work easier. Also, the study revealed that new media has had a profound effect on the activities of conventional media journalists as they with the help ofnew media technologies have greater access to a wider global audience, easierprocesses of news production and the boundaries of journalism has been falling asmore people are engaged in the processesof news gathering more than ever before.The study also found that ethical, governance, the loss of advert revenues, infrastructural, and technical challenges have emerged with the new media dominance. It was also discovered that new media has profound effects on conventionalmedia news production as the new media provides multiple advantages for conventional media operations and there is a significant change in the experiences of conventional media journalists in the face of the emerging new media in Edo State. The study concluded that new media technologies constitute necessary tools for conventional media journalism practice. Therefore, it was recommended that the conventional media organizations should put in place measures to own the necessarynew media organ/infrastructure. Also, that a raft of careful legislative policies be put in place to mitigate the occurrence of ethicalbreechesin news production.