The Basque Media Observatory has presented in Euskalerria Irratia the Basque Media Yearbook of the season 2023-2024, using a hybrid formula halfway between the interview and the press conference.

The Metropoli Foral program interviews the annuary with Igor Astibia, director of Hekimen, and Libe Hernando, editor of the Observatory's yearbook, and Hibai Castro. The interview was broadcast by radio and video streaming. And journalist Behstrategy has called online to follow this annual presentation as a press conference.

A difficult year

As Astibia explained, “2023 has been a difficult year for the Basque media, due to the innovations demanded by artificial intelligence and the digital transition, and the increased availability of raw materials”.

In this regard, “Hekimen has tried to secure more funding”, negotiating with administrations for ambitious grants. “In Álava, in Bizkaia and in Gipuzkoa, on the one hand, and in Navarre, on the other hand, relations to improve subsidies are underway,” adds Astibia. It also highlights the stock market created by the Government of Navarra for innovation.

Fleshy yearbook

“On an annual basis, the Basque Media Observatory publishes this book, which includes works, projects and highlights. Among these thirteen articles we will find some of the main issues that will be on the table the year we have just begun,” explains Castro.

Inside and out

First, and to contextualize the time in which we live, we present two chronicles that go beyond the media sector, in two articles written from the Observatory and from the Hekimen Association. It is set at both international and Basque level. The challenges posed by digitisation, in an increasingly rapidly changing global environment, are playing an important role in the planning of the Basque media and are doing hard work to adapt to new needs.

In the Open Signature section of the essay, we will find the opinion article by Lander Arretxea. This environment of great changes and speeds that we have mentioned, does so from a constructive and positive perspective, addressing optimism in the face of a possible situation of dystopia, in the text that has ludically called self-help as an exercise.

The section of the media sector is opened by the article that makes a historical review of the Basque radio. On its 35th anniversary, the Yearbook offers you a special place. In the section of the sector we will also find articles that inform us of the transformation process of Berria, the strategy of digitalization of EITB and the university diploma of journalism in Basque in Iparralde.

Academic studies

In the section on longer studies and researches, we will find an article that addresses the concept of social value of the Basque media, which deals with the cases of Argia and Alea, approved by Eneko Bidegain and collaborators of Mondragon Unibertsitatea. Garazi Sánchez from UPV/EHU and his colleagues from the NOR research group have analyzed the consumption habits of youth information in the article Youth and Information, based on the Ikusiker panel. Ainara Larrondo and members of the Gureiker group of the same university have measured the presence of the mention AA in the digital dialogue of the Basque networks.

The following article explains in depth the Structural Adequacy Index for the Development of the Hearing created by the HEKA group of the UPV/EHU, led by researcher Iñaki Zabaleta. Then, Ane Martinez, from the NOR group, compares the consumption of contents in Basque with the sociolinguistic spaces. Arantza Gutierrez, from the research group Visibility of Women in the Media, has focused on the program of ETB Sustraia, to analyze the visibility of women farmers. Finally, Libe Mimenza and his partners have worked on Hekimen’s media web traffic in 2023, in an article that analyzes annual developments.

The Basque Media Yearbook is available on the web 2023-2024 behategia.eus. Articles are also translated into English via automatic translator Elia