Panel Topic: How are connective media Platforms influencing the news and our news habits?
Key Points:
- “Catering to people’s niche interests becoming profitable business model in networked era” (Russell 71)
- Web 2.0 shift from news personalization to socialization
- Massive changes in control towards social media companies
- Social media considered valid news source
- “Journalism isn’t being disrupted by better journalism but by things that are hardly recognizable as journalism at all.” (Debrouwere 7)
- 30 % of general U.S. population get their news from Facebook (Anderson Caumont)
- 10% of U.S. population get their news from Youtube (Anderson Caumont)
- 8% of U.S. population get their news from Twitter (Anderson Caumont)
- Consumer Participation
- Creator
- Selector
- Recommender
- Participant
- Curator
- Distributor
- Social Networks structured as “egocentric” → individual at the center of the community (Russell 79)
Concerns:
- “...by not receiving the same news, or experiencing the same media events, members of the public are no longer bound by common mediated experience.” (Sunstein 2002)
- Challenge typical norms of journalism
- Non-partisanship role
- Gatekeeping role
- Objectivity→ inherently subjective
- “…we’ve probably reached peak content: the point at which the glut of things to read, watch, and listen to becomes completely unsustainable.” (Fray MediaShift)
Traditional Media Vs. Connective Media:
- Traditional
- Gatekeepers gather news then tell audiences what’s important
- Objective
- Central interest to citizens (Facebook is eating the world)
- Largely shaped by political influence and large media corporations
- Follows predictable patterns and forms of coverage--amplifying bureaucratically credible sources and reflecting national interest (Russell 85)
- Connective
- Reduces role of editor→ user decides what’s important
- Audiences serve as fact checkers and critics
- Audience aren’t just on the receiving end anymore they are producing and informing news outlets what they should be writing about
- Connects citizen-to-citizen→ horizontal rather than vertical
Influence on Traditional News Organizations:
- News organizations shift of personalization services based on topics of interest from social network platforms (Russell 79)
- Using social media to build branded communities of users and connect with the public
- Stories posted on FB, Twitter, News Apps/Widgets
- Language used in stories→ casual, conversational
- Social media sites (ex-FB) offer cheaper and better forms of advertising reaching broader audiences than newspapers and websites
- News organizations creating their own social media accounts
- Outside competition from social media and other connective media platforms, rather than competition from other major news outlets→ changing journalistic product and practice
- “Forty-two percent of sources used across all of the coverage analyzed were national political actors, clearly demonstrating that the news was largely shaped by political elites and from national perspectives.” (Russell 86)
Questions:
- Do you think the benefits of connective media platforms outweigh the concerns?
Visual:
The Divine Right of the Editor
References:
Anderson, M., & Caumont, A. (2014, September 24). How social media is reshaping news. Retrieved April 9, 2016, from http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/09/24/how-social-media-is-reshaping-news/
Debrouwere, S. (2012, May 5). Fungible [Web log post]. Retrieved April 9, 2016.
Facebook is eating the world. (n.d.). Retrieved April 12, 2016, from http://www.cjr.org/analysis/facebook_and_media.php
Fray, P. (n.d.). Can We Save Journalism? Retrieved April 12, 2016, from http://mediashift.org/2016/03/can-we-save-journalism/
Russell, A. (2011). Networked: A contemporary history of news in transition. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.
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