Is Australia in the throes of a mass burial for its quality fourth estate? Financial results for Fairfax and News Limited would suggest so, fuelled further by the recent headlines that Hancock Prospecting has become the largest single shareholder of Fairfax Media causing concern about potential editorial interference. But are online publications a quality substitute for newspapers? Are online media, blogs and tweets able to do the job that the fourth estate has been doing?

Paul Ramadge (Editor in Chief of The Age) and Eric Beecher (Crikey Proprietor and former Editor of the Sydney Morning Herald) debate the future of quality newspapers in Australia. The discussion also features academic Mary Debrett and is chaired by Robert Manne.

Presented by La Trobe University Ideas and Society Program, March 2012