Key Takeaway

The balance between text and speech is shifting again. Social feeds, short video, YouTube and podcasts increasingly deliver ideas through voice and image rather than long-form text. For Georgia, the change is already visible: social media and messaging apps have overtaken television as the main news source, and younger audiences are far more likely to live inside feed-based media.

The implication is not that reading is obsolete. It is the opposite. The most valuable communicator will increasingly combine two capabilities: the ability to understand complex written material and the ability to explain it clearly, briefly and persuasively in spoken form.

Georgia is already a social-media-first information environment

Geostat’s 2025 ICT survey shows that among people aged 15 and over who used the internet in the previous three months, 95.4% were online every day or almost every day. Social-network participation reached 96.0%, while 45.3% used the internet to read online news, newspapers or magazines.

According to calculations by BTU researchers, that is a 50.7-percentage-point gap. Social-network participation was about 2.12 times as common as online news reading within this population. The comparison does not mean social-media users do not read – social feeds contain plenty of text but it does show how strongly the information environment is organized around feeds and social interaction.

BTU calculations – the changing information environment

Video is mass media; podcasts are emerging among younger Georgians

The 2024 Georgia Media Consumption Survey found that 56% of internet users had used YouTube in the previous week. Among 18–34-year-olds, the figure was 69%. Instagram reached 59% and TikTok 49% in the same age group.

Podcasts remain a smaller medium overall: 12% of the public reported listening in the previous 30 days. But use reached 21% among 18–34-year-olds and only 5% among people 55 and older. According to calculations by BTU researchers, podcast use among the youngest adult group was about 4.2 times as high as among the oldest group.

Among podcast listeners, 81% consumed Georgian-language content. The oral shift is therefore creating a distinctly Georgian-language space for business, education, media and expertise.

The new orator is not only a politician

In the past, oratory was associated with politics, courts and formal speeches. Today, speaking to a camera is becoming a professional skill. Founders explain products in video. Managers address teams online. Professors record short lectures. Experts translate complex subjects into podcasts and social media.

In this environment, speech becomes part of distribution: the way knowledge, ideas and products reach an audience.

According to an assessment by BTU researchers, the value of Georgian professionals who combine deep expertise with strong public explanation is likely to rise. A specialist who can communicate knowledge clearly can reach a much larger audience and market than one who remains invisible.

A new competitive skill for business

For Georgian companies, the shift has a practical consequence: more customers encounter products first through video, social feeds or short audio. Companies therefore need people who can explain a complex offer in 30 seconds without destroying its meaning.

This is particularly important in finance, insurance, technology, healthcare, education and B2B services. The ideal communication model is not short form instead of long form, but two layers: a clear spoken explanation that earns attention, followed by detailed text for people who need to make a serious decision.

AI will accelerate the spoken-media shift

Generative AI makes video, voice, scripting and presentation cheaper. A small Georgian company can produce forms of media that once required a separate team.

But AI also makes poor communication cheaper: shallow scripts, synthetic confidence and factually wrong statements can spread quickly. In the new environment, credibility becomes more valuable precisely because production becomes easier.

The emerging orator therefore needs more than delivery. They need fact-checking, source judgment and the ability to distinguish persuasion from manipulation.

What education should change

If younger audiences increasingly learn through video and audio, education should acknowledge that reality but not replace long-form reading with short-form content.

Schools and universities need to develop two skills at the same time: deep reading and public speaking. A student should be able to understand a 20-page argument and then explain its core idea in three minutes. They should be able to evaluate written evidence and defend a position in front of an audience.

According to an assessment by BTU researchers, this dual literacy — deep reading plus strong speaking – may become one of the most valuable general skills of the AI era.

Conclusion

Georgia has already entered an information environment in which social media and messaging apps lead television as the main source of news, YouTube is mainstream and podcast use is far higher among younger adults than older ones. Voice, face and public speaking are therefore becoming more professionally important.

The danger is to confuse good speaking with good thinking. Georgia’s reading-literacy results already show that complex text comprehension is a challenge. The answer to the new age of the orator is therefore not speech instead of reading. It is both.

The strongest communicator of the next decade will be someone who can read a difficult idea, understand and verify it and then explain it simply, briefly and persuasively.

Prepared by the academic team of Business and Technology University and the BTUAI Research Team, Tbilisi, Georgia.