Public Information Flows in Rural Australia

Abstract

Geographical studies of the transmission of information have focussed overwhelmingly on private information flows based on direct, face-to-face contact. Very little attention has been directed to media-based public information flows despite the potential importance of this type of flow in regional development. Yet an examination of newspaper content for the New England region of New South Wales for 1971 and 1977 reveals that major changes are occurring in newspaper-based information flows. Rural newspapers are becoming increasingly aspatial and parochial in their news coverage and the flow of information between rural centres is changing from a complex system to a less complex system. The reasons for these trends are not entirely clear, but may relate to economic and technological changes within the newspaper publishing industry as well as to the fortunes of regional policy in Australia.