What have you learned about your own media use and how you access
news content?
The BBC news app and
the summer work we had to research and complete in the summer holidays has enticed
me to look more thoroughly into the news as it has given me a stronger interest
towards it and a better insight to why I should show more passion towards it . It
has induced me to realise that the media is becoming more democratic. The easy access and simple use of social media
has given audiences the opportunity to share ideas globally and connect all
over. This clearly can create competition and develops conflict with the mainstream
media. The media is becoming democratized over time because ideas and opinions
are being vastly shared globally with no guidance of the mainstream media.
An ascertainable
point of the media becoming more and more democratic is audiences being able to
do things with content . For example : create Youtube videos, share tweets,
edit Instagram photos and consume. People in today’s generation now tend to
broadcast live on networks such as Instagram and Facebook and many different
other networks . Applications and social networking sites such as Facebook,
Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat and Youtube are all being used to share and send all different types of content virally
and globally, this can be viewed as both a positive and negative thing. The author
Morozov who wrote about ‘The Net Delusion’ claims that in reality people use
the internet for ‘Sex, shopping and entertainment’. Some individuals will agree
with Morozov that sharing content globally can be a negative thing as ‘extremist
groups find it easier to spy’ and that is why there is so much trouble in the
world. However, the available technology enables individuals to broadcast their
views and opinions without it being edited and misinterpreted by someone else.
This can be viewed as a more positive thing.
In addition to that,
over the years the rise of citizen journalists has rapidly increased. Citizen
journalists are people that often won’t see themselves as journalists, however
what they are doing is a broadcasting thing. These are the people that are eyewitnesses
at the scene and decide to film/record video footage or take photographs. The
eyewitnesses often get there much more quickly before the news crews so this is
why you usually see Iphone quality video footage featured on news headlines. An
example of when this happened was the London riots of 2011. The video went
viral, posted and shared on a variety of
different social media networks such as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube etc. Citizen
Journalism clearly shows that media is becoming more democratic, as people are
able to record and provide the information themselves.
In my opinion, my
media use has drastically changed overtime and is continuing to do so. For
example in today’s society, I only watch the 10pm news occasionally when I’m
sat with my parents before we go to bed
on the TV, but this is usually around once a month, sometimes not even that . I usually keep up to date
with the news via Snapchat which is a social networking app that is used to keep
you up to date with the news off websites and newspaper companies such as the ‘Daily
Mail’, the ‘Sun’, ‘Cosmopolitan’, The ‘Economist’, Sky News ‘ and the ‘Telegraph’.
I also usually get access to the news by seeing threads of millions of tweets
about the latest shocking and eye-opening news that has happened within the
past 24 hours . Videos are usually uploaded onto all of the social networks by
Citizen Journalists, the BBC news and SKY news twitter page. Sometimes when I’m
travelling to school by car in a morning, the radio can sometimes be on in the
background and that’s where I usually find out the latest, up to date news
globally. However, when I was younger, I always used to find out about the
latest news of celebrities and the new fashion tips via magazines like ‘OK’, ‘HI!’,
‘Girl talk’ and many more. I always read the ‘Daily mail’ and the ‘SUN’ which
kept me up to date with important news around me . I never watch the news in
the morning anymore , however when I was younger, it became a daily routine to
sit and have my breakfast watching the news such as ‘GMTV’ on ITV. It is
evident that the world has immensely and strikingly changed in such a short
space of time . The globe has gone from a world revolving and relying on
newspapers to now relying on the world wide web!
This comment is excellent, Maddie! Useful for your exam answer I would say:
ReplyDelete'The easy access and simple use of social media has given audiences the opportunity to share ideas globally and connect all over. This clearly can create competition and develops conflict with the mainstream media. The media is becoming democratized over time because ideas and opinions are being vastly shared globally with no guidance of the mainstream media.'
Overall, a very good answer which considers many aspects of your own media use and the fast-changing environment in which this is moving in. It's interesting that you say you don't often watch the news or GMTV etc anymore - do you find that you are less likely to talk about something on the news with anyone else - is it becoming more of an individualised news diet and is that a potential problem?
You appear to have a wide range of information sources which is good and one of the key benefits of the internet age.
What responsibility do you think people such as 'citizen journalists' and the likes of YouTubers have to provide us with reliable news? Which platforms or organisations would you say you trust?