Alexey Volin Tells Students of ASU about Requirements Set by Modern Media Industry

On May 17, Mr. Alexey Volin, Deputy Minister of Digital Development, Communications and Mass Media of the Russian Federation, met future journalists and managers at the Territory of Writing & Thinking of Astrakhan State University.

The distinguished guest told about remarkable changes in skills that a successful media rep ought to master. “There’s no traditional journalism now”, he said, “Now any specialist ought to be proficient not just in Philology, but also in Internet technologies; you should also master excellent communication skills”.

According to Mr. Volin, a successful journalist ought to be able:

• to find and present interesting stories;
• to think how to deliver that information to their audience – will it be an article, a video, or a series of photos; ways to deliver that material may be combined, or a new way may be invented;
• to select the most suitable channel to present information, which determines whether that story would reach its potential recipients and awake their interest.

Messengers are becoming a new type of media. For example, they help residents of Yakutia’s remote settlements receive urgent news, as there are many problems with other media in that region owing to huge distances. In this case, a journalist has to solve an interesting, but difficult task – to make their story not longer than two sentences without losing anything important.

The guest determined the qualities that any future journalist ought to master:

• Ability to work with information: finding, collecting, analyzing, detecting regularities in it, and forming information blocks;
• Ability to tell a story: present information in an interesting and comprehensible way, without confusing or losing anything;
• General erudition: a journalist should be able to write in practically any theme and have a good knowledge in that sphere to be able to deliver that story to its readers;
• Commutative skills: a journalist should be able to find a common language with people and perform joint activities efficiently;
• Good socialization skills: a university can help develop them significantly by providing quality education and forming a corporate community of its alumni.

In the second part of the discussion, our students asked Mr. Volin questions. The topical themes to discuss were “Do paper newspapers have a future?” and “Do we need mass media now that plenty of information is available on the Web”. The event participants were also interested in Mr. Volin’s opinion of Russian and foreign media: which media he could characterize as efficient and remarkable ones and which media projects were the most memorable for him over the past year.