'We Media' and Democracy essay- Laura Knowles

In the summer holidays, I managed to collect four pieces of news that I had seen or heard about and recorded some details about them. These details included things such as where I got it from (i.e. TV, newspaper, online), what I did with it (meaning if I just read the headline or read more n the story), What I believed the dominant meaning of the story was and whether or not I trusted it to be accurate or not and why. I also noticed differences in how different people (especially when looking at differences in age) got news and where they got it from.

The first piece of news that I recorded was about NASA warning that next century an asteroid could hit the earth resulting in a lot of damage and death, as I was immediately drawn to a story that would affect our planet in the future (it was something that I was personally interested in). I heard this on Sky News, therefore suggesting that the way I use media is in more of a new approach (compared to getting news from a newspaper) which I something I found the same with regards to how I collected my other three stories (as well as how others seemed to who were around the same age as me). For this story I only read the headline and I recorded that I thought that the dominant meaning for this text was to warn people of something that could essentially affect their relatives in years to come. Personally, I didn’t choose to read beyond the headline with this story as I didn’t feel like I wanted to know more, therefore showing that I only sometimes read beyond the headline of a news story if I feel intrigued to know more about the specific thing (in this case I didn’t want to).

The next news story that I recorded was about a bus that was released in China that is able to drive over traffic, and I obtained this story from Facebook after somebody that I am friends with shared it. This therefore shows that my approach to obtaining news stories is a more of a new approach as I was announced to it by seeing it on a social media platform instead of reading it in a newspaper for example. This is a news story that I decided to share myself on Facebook as I just thought that it was such a good idea and I therefore wanted to share it with other people that I knew, therefore suggesting again that I am somebody who goes further than just reading the headline if the story is something that I really care about or something that really interests me. I think that the producer of this text intended to give out a positive message and wanted to show the world how technology is continuously progressing.

The third story that I found out about was a viral ongoing thing about a YouTuber called Marine Joyce who had allegations about her saying things such as she was being held hostage, she was a victim of domestic violence and that she was taking drugs etc. Basically, her fans were seeing a big change in her behavior and noticed things such as bruises on her arms and unusual things in her videos so decided to start the hashtag #SaveMarinaJoyce which went viral II found out about this story by seeing the hashtag trend on twitter. With this story I saw the news on twitter but then decided to go ahead and watch some videos and read more into the story so as I could understand it more and give my own opinion on what was happening. I believe that this hashtag was made by her fans due to the fact that they were obviously very concerned for her and wanted to make sure that she was okay even if at times it did feel like they could have just been over reacting. This is therefore an example of ‘we media’ as it shows how the audience are making the news by creating their own hashtag and then it going viral. Even though Marina herself and her Mum have spoken out and said that she is okay and that nothing is wrong I am still not sure whether to trust what I saw and heard about this story. This is due to obvious changes in her behavior and the way that she is speaking that still makes me think that there is still could be something going on with her.

The fourth and final news story that I recorded in the holidays was about athlete Adam Peaty winning Great Britain’s first gold medal in the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. I saw this news on an article on Facebook and I decided to only read the headline as that was the only part of it that I wanted to know. I believe that the dominant meaning that the producer wanted to give off from this was obviously to excite the UK and inform them of how their country was doing in the Olympics. I obviously trusted this piece of news as it came from the BBC and was talking about something really big that was happening at the time.

When asking other people about the news they had heard about quite recently, I noticed differences in how people got their news with regards to how old they were. For example, a lot of people my age seemed to get their news stories in the same way that I had, i.e. from social media and TV. However, when I asked people who were older than me they said that they got most of their news stories from newspapers etc. An example that I got from this was from a 51-year-old who told me that they obtained the majority of their news from radio, the news on TV and newspapers, therefore showing how their approach to receiving the news is in a more old-fashioned way to the people my age (17). I also used the BBC news app and selected to see news from certain categories. Some of the categories I chose to see my news from were world, technology, entertainment, and TV which was also quite different to some of the people I asked of other ages, for example, someone who is 41 said that on the BBC News app they chose to view some of the following categories which were education, family, schools, and Brexit. This therefore shows how there is a difference in what different types of people choose to listen to and act upon different types of news based on what they are interested in.

As somebody who gains quite a lot of my news knowledge from some newer media platforms such as YouTube, I have also been able to see how people especially my age don’t really use newspapers so much anymore and basically how the technology that we have now allows news to be spread by other people who don’t even work for news agencies (such as YouTubers). ‘We Media’ can also be shown by new technologies that we have now as people on the internet and who use their smartphones in everyday life are usually able to capture events as they are happening before the actual news agencies get to the scene and post them on the internet (on websites such as YouTube). YouTube also allows people on it (who are generally watched by a vast audience) to share specific news stories which they can give their own opinion on, therefore making it bias and only relatable to the stories that they decide to share with their audience (meaning it can have an effect on the people watching it). This therefore shows a disadvantage of the way that I receive some of my news and what getting news from the internet and YouTube can have on people.