Print media will be dead in 10 years: Discuss.

Will print media be dead in ten years? That was the topic of conversation last week as The Juice Academy teamed up with Discuss, Manchester, to host a debate.

The debate was a first for The Academy, with apprentices Gemma Morris, Nathan Youd, Jake Wharton and Sam Hutchinson battling for and against the motion. Dave Goddard, former journalist and Head of Media at Tangerine PR, hosted the event with Michael Taylor, co-founder of Discuss, moderating.

Prior to the event, the panel were mentored by representatives from various companies, including: Lucy West from ITV, Guy Patrick from The Sun, and Paul Gallagher from Manchester Evening News.

Proceedings started with Sam, Smoking Gun PR’s social media apprentice, giving her argument that print media will be dead in ten years. In her own words, Sam had “eight minutes to save the world.”

“Rather than newspapers, we’re going to be looking at news brands.”

Next up was Tangerine PR’s very own Nathan Youd. He stated: “Traditional media is not dead. Print media is not dead. It is fuelling social media.

“A recent study for instance found that 95% of local news is being created by newspapers, not blogs or other social media, which are simply regurgitating what they find in papers.”

So, with the help of a newspaper printed in the year he was born (1994), Nathan had got started the counter argument.

The next eight minutes belonged to Jake, social media apprentice at Oldham Council, who, like Sam, was arguing for the motion.

Pulling no punches, Jake argued he’d “Rather be swiping a tablet on the train” than consuming news through traditional print means.

Gemma, De Poel’s social media apprentice, gave her closing arguments against the motion. In her view: “print media, particularly newspapers have gained a certain amount of trust with the public” and remain a more credible source of news.

Gemma’s vision for the future of news was, in my opinion, a powerful one: “I do not believe print media will be dead in ten years’ time. Yes the readership may decline, and more free newspapers may become available, solely relying on advertisers, but I don’t see the death of print media.”