While logged into Twitter and inundated with up-to-the-second news of the Mumbai terrorist attack, I was reminded how powerful social media can be.
It made me wonder if social media is impacting traditional news journalism circulated by agencies like CNN and BBC and prompted me to write an article for SiteProNews about the subject. Here’s an extract:
“More and more people are ditching their newspaper subscription, switching off the TV and turning to the Internet for their daily news fix. And why wouldn’t they? It’s faster, cheaper and interactive. They can subscribe to the feeds of digital journalists and bloggers they like, they can search news by region, category or timeline and thanks to social networking, can be informed the very instant news happens in the world. So could the advent of social media signal the end of traditional news journalism? Yes, I think it could.”
I was thrilled to see SiteProNews run my piece as their lead story today. If you’re not a subscriber to SPN, here’s the link: How Social Media is Killing CNN.
So what’s your take on the impact of social media. Do you agree with me? Discuss via comments
Congrats on the mention and yes, if traditional media outlets don’t wake up and smell the coffee - then yes, it will be end of traditional media.
The “problem” with “traditional” media is that most of the time, they are each saying the exact same thing! When I flip through the stations, every news channel is saying the same thing with people who look like clones of each other!
From a social media perspective, if you were following 10 different people on twitter and if each tweet from each of those people were on the exact same subject, in the exact same voice a.k.a. retweeting- well, you’d stop following oh - say 9 of those “folks”.
Unfortunately, I can’t “unsubscribe” from CNN and the way I quit following them is to turn off the TV.
Yes I agree with your article, but I am a social net worker also, nice to be able to follow you on twitter as your blog was of interest to me, a kiwi.
Looking forward to reading more of your stories.
[…] social media is killing traditional media, my response is “good riddance! Don’t let the media bleating affect your destiny. […]
I hope that a newspaper is never totally replaced by social media. A newspaper has so mch more in it that the breaking news. Yes, it will change with the times, but a cup of coffee, a comfortable chair, the family sharing the newspaper can’t be beat. Social networking can’t hold a candle to that.
@Kathy - great point about not being able to unsubscribe from CNN or from particular journalists. Also you are spot on re the Twitter clones - apart from my SEO homies, I tend to only follow one or two people who have a particulary niche and I switch them out quite often. The beauty of using Twitter for news information is the unique voices and range of perspective you get. There is no single brand affiliation or company line being touted.
@Elsie - hi there, thanks for dropping in and following me on Twitter. I feel privileged to be able to live in your beautiful country
@Tony - thanks for your feedback. I don’t think social media will ever completely replace offline newspapers either, but I do think it’s going to have a major impact on how news is reported. The field of journalism is shifting already! I think there will always be a demand for in-depth articles and features that require experienced writers and a deeper level of research. But in terms of daily news coverage, social media is making huge inroads.
And for the skeptics? Ahem… : http://venturebeat.com/2009/01/15/twitter-and-the-iphone-on-the-scene-of-the-us-airways-hudson-river-crash/