Facebook and Twitter are becoming very popular when it comes to reading our news. It's easy and fast. Not only that but you can see instantly what the news article is about - they only post the title and then send a link to their article.
There are currently around 600million people worlwide on Facebook and 200million on Twitter, so by creating fan pages for news websites you can effectively reach 800million people. That is of course if they join your fan page.
You see it on TV now. TV shows tell you how you can contact them or find out their latest news and almost every single TV show tells us we can reach them on Twitter and Facebook. With so many people signed up to social networking sites isn't this the best media to reach people? Especially young people. Generation Y have grown up with technology and Generation X have very quickly adapted to using it. So this to me seems like the best form of media to get news through to people - other than the 6o'clock news of course.
Not only that but if you buy a newspaper, you get so much information that you don't even want to read. You have to flick through until you reach the section you're interested in or you flick through until a headline catches your eye. With social networking and even just going to a news website such as the New Zealand Herald website, you can filter which news you want to read. I know that I'm interested in national news, world news and sports news, therefore I can join the Facebook groups for Stuff.co.nz but instead of getting everything I only get national, world and sports news. This makes it a lot easier and faster for me to see what is happening. I don't have to scroll through hundereds of pages to reach what I want to read about.
With 77% of NZ's adult population having readily available access to the internet there also seems to be less need to have print newspapers. I know when I walk into my local supermarket the first thing I see if the daily NZ Herald, I have quick look at the front page headline and if it's interesting then I'll keep a mental note of it. Keeping a mental note of it allows me to go home and search it online. It saves about 3dollars, that isn't much when I have so much else going on in my life, the last thing I have time for is to sit down and read a newspaper.
Also with social networking, you can get text message alerts when it comes to news. This is very handy, especially if I'm on the go all the time but still want to keep up to date with the news.
One thing I will say about having print newspapers is that you get a sense of connectedness (if that makes sense). Online news is very impersonal and I do believe that it's harder to read online than it is in print form. But hey, our technologically advanced world is changing rapidly and no-one has a choice but to move with it. It will leave you behind but you have to catch up at some point.
There are currently around 600million people worlwide on Facebook and 200million on Twitter, so by creating fan pages for news websites you can effectively reach 800million people. That is of course if they join your fan page.
You see it on TV now. TV shows tell you how you can contact them or find out their latest news and almost every single TV show tells us we can reach them on Twitter and Facebook. With so many people signed up to social networking sites isn't this the best media to reach people? Especially young people. Generation Y have grown up with technology and Generation X have very quickly adapted to using it. So this to me seems like the best form of media to get news through to people - other than the 6o'clock news of course.
Not only that but if you buy a newspaper, you get so much information that you don't even want to read. You have to flick through until you reach the section you're interested in or you flick through until a headline catches your eye. With social networking and even just going to a news website such as the New Zealand Herald website, you can filter which news you want to read. I know that I'm interested in national news, world news and sports news, therefore I can join the Facebook groups for Stuff.co.nz but instead of getting everything I only get national, world and sports news. This makes it a lot easier and faster for me to see what is happening. I don't have to scroll through hundereds of pages to reach what I want to read about.
With 77% of NZ's adult population having readily available access to the internet there also seems to be less need to have print newspapers. I know when I walk into my local supermarket the first thing I see if the daily NZ Herald, I have quick look at the front page headline and if it's interesting then I'll keep a mental note of it. Keeping a mental note of it allows me to go home and search it online. It saves about 3dollars, that isn't much when I have so much else going on in my life, the last thing I have time for is to sit down and read a newspaper.
Also with social networking, you can get text message alerts when it comes to news. This is very handy, especially if I'm on the go all the time but still want to keep up to date with the news.
One thing I will say about having print newspapers is that you get a sense of connectedness (if that makes sense). Online news is very impersonal and I do believe that it's harder to read online than it is in print form. But hey, our technologically advanced world is changing rapidly and no-one has a choice but to move with it. It will leave you behind but you have to catch up at some point.
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Facebook and Twitter are good for reaching a wide audience and getting information out to users at a really fast pace. However, news reports on Facebook and Twitter are often uncomfirmed, which means they are not necessarily true and therefore making it an unreliable source. You often do not get to hear the full story, as facts or information can be mistakenly or deliberately left out. On the other hand, people often post news items on these social media sites to let family and friends know what is occurring in their country, it is not necessarily dense information. There are often news stories that don’t have all the information or facts are excluded. I would not recommend that people should log on to Facebook and Twitter to retrieve information or facts about news stories. However, I would recommend that people view their Facebook and Twitter pages to find out which topics or news stories are current. In this manner, Facebook and Twitter act as a spring board in which people often find out what is the hottest breaking news topic, then they can go to more reliable sources to retrieve the full news story.
The immediacy of Twitter and Facebook should not go unmentioned, as it is often minutes after an event has occurred, that people tweet or update their status on Facebook. Sometimes news stories will appear on Facebook and Twitter before appearing on trusted news sites, such as Scoop or on live television. I have had a personal experience, where I viewed the news about the tornado in Albany on Facebook, as I was on the site and people were updating their statuses. I then searched for “Tornado in Albany” in Google to check if it was in fact true and to gain more information on a trusted site.
With the positive element, immediacy on these social media sites, there must be a downfall. When searching for a news item on Twitter, it is difficult to retrieve information about events that have occurred in the past; thus making Twitter not an effective storage for news items.
Facebook and Twitter are user friendly, allowing people to easily post images, articles and opinions and update their status. This has both positive and negative impacts. The positive is that others can quickly gain access to these news stories. The negative, that people can easily create their own news stories with much opinion, where others may read stories that are often one sided. Facebook also gives people an opportunity to post their personal account of an event, with the reader receiving several different angles of the event or news story. To access a social media site is not costly, people can either view it from their mobile while they are on the go, or from their personal computer at home. This means that these sites are easily accessible for people to view anytime, anywhere.
The accessibility and user friendly nature of social media sites allows any citizen to be a news reporter. They may not be a trusted, reliable news reporter but social media sites enables everyone to deliver and report news, wherever they might be and whatever time of day.
The immediacy of Twitter and Facebook should not go unmentioned, as it is often minutes after an event has occurred, that people tweet or update their status on Facebook. Sometimes news stories will appear on Facebook and Twitter before appearing on trusted news sites, such as Scoop or on live television. I have had a personal experience, where I viewed the news about the tornado in Albany on Facebook, as I was on the site and people were updating their statuses. I then searched for “Tornado in Albany” in Google to check if it was in fact true and to gain more information on a trusted site.
With the positive element, immediacy on these social media sites, there must be a downfall. When searching for a news item on Twitter, it is difficult to retrieve information about events that have occurred in the past; thus making Twitter not an effective storage for news items.
Facebook and Twitter are user friendly, allowing people to easily post images, articles and opinions and update their status. This has both positive and negative impacts. The positive is that others can quickly gain access to these news stories. The negative, that people can easily create their own news stories with much opinion, where others may read stories that are often one sided. Facebook also gives people an opportunity to post their personal account of an event, with the reader receiving several different angles of the event or news story. To access a social media site is not costly, people can either view it from their mobile while they are on the go, or from their personal computer at home. This means that these sites are easily accessible for people to view anytime, anywhere.
The accessibility and user friendly nature of social media sites allows any citizen to be a news reporter. They may not be a trusted, reliable news reporter but social media sites enables everyone to deliver and report news, wherever they might be and whatever time of day.
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