ABSTRACT
News organizations have similarly embraced web analytics. Surveys of journalists in the United States have shown that almost all newsrooms use one or more web analytics program. A few newsrooms have even started considering data from web analytics in evaluating the performance of their journalists, such as introducing a pay-per-click scheme. Web analytics influences numerous stages of the news construction process. The use of web analytics should also be examined through the prism of journalistic roles and journalistic ethics. Web analytics allows journalists to know what audiences want, and while giving what audiences want is a way to attract traffic, it also treats audience choice as an end for an economic goal rather than as means to a journalistic mission. Journalists also feared that incorporating the results of readership surveys in editorial decisions might compromise their valued editorial autonomy. The numbers offer immediate and easy recommendations—journalists can just follow the click.
