CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

• Background of the Study

Journalism is the investigation and reporting of events, issues and trends to broad evidence. Though there are many variations of journalism, the idea is to inform the intended evidence about topics ranging from government and business organization to cultural aspect of the society such as art and documentary.

In modern society, news media have become the chief supplies of information and opinion about publics’ affairs, but the role and status of journalism along with other forms of mass media are undergoing changes resulting from the internet.

In media organization setup, the ICTs acts as an information generator, checker, controller, processor, filing system and report preparation system. It performs the work of news process at high speed, the kind of repetitive, simple clerical processes and graphics which have long been carried out by human beings and even some of those which management would have carried out.

ICTs can be defined as an electronic machines that can store, organize and find information, do calculations and control other machines.

The idea of ICTs started with the primitive people. For example, the farmers used to count the number of heaps cultivated with pebbles and succulent stems. This is a form of ICTs because the aiding of counting from this concept. In addition, the four figure table used in mathematics is a computer, it is aid that helps in counting. Our old people now still keep memory of events by using charcoal to put strokes on the wall in their various house and make reference to those strokes when the need arises.

However, because of rapid technological development in the world, ICTs has taken a new dimension in the form of electronics. In this jet age, things have changed for better in the application of ICTs to journalism with its tools which allows for better efficiency and productivity of news with the aid of ICTs diffuses through journalism more rapidly and more completely than other new technologies.

However its influence has been felt around the globe, the penetration of ICTs into journalism has presented a challenge for journalism educators.

1.2     Statement of the Problem

It is generally accepted that one of the major problems that are hindering efficiency of broadcast in most developing countries like Nigeria is the absence of effective means of gathering and disseminating information.

Sometimes, such information is in bits and never identified and collected together under one pool. The scattered information would be hard to access even for journalist without effective and sufficient knowledge and usage of computer.

Suffice it to say that ICTs have brought great improvement to both human and industrial activities such as the media in the area of information gathering and news dissemination. While some organization utilize in their organization others do not. Even journalists that are expected to make effective use of ICT are lacking in some aspects, while some are not ICTs literate.

This study therefore sought to find the influence of ICTs on the work performance of journalists in AKBC Radio and Television.