We media and democracy- Hyleana Anthony

‘Reflecting on your research from the summer: what have you learned about your own media use and how you access news content’.

We-media describes any media that is home grown and produced by the audience rather than by an established media institution. Dan Gillmor, the author of the book called ‘We the Media’ 2004, put forward the theory that because of internet advances in technology, the media is becoming more democratic. This is because we no longer have to get our news from the ‘Big Media’ so the internet is allowing for more perspectives to be heard. Democracy is defined to be a ‘community in which everyone and anyone can participate and contribute’, therefore this argument that the media is becoming democratic is backed up by the definition of democracy.

Rapid changes in technology have changed media production, consumption, and the way in which content is distributed. David Gauntlett’s theory of Media 2.0 suggests that we are living in an era known as Internet 3.0, where our computers know our likes and dislikes. This may prove that the media is becoming less democratic because you may only see what you want to see/agree with. For example if you take a very right winged view, you may only see that side of a debate on social media, instead of being shown the whole debate because the computer knows you disagree with left winged views. However, it can be argued that the internet makes the media more democratic, because social media is used to organised political protests. In Syria, for example, news of an individual protest in a small town was quickly carried via Facebook across the country, resulting in lots of copy-cat protests, riots, and eventually to the downfall of the King. In the past, any such individual protests would have been prevented from appearing on Syrian state television, and therefore prevented from spreading. However, the rise of social networking meant that democratic forces such as access to information and freedom of speech.

The emerging citizen’s journalists has been a recent outcome of changes in technology. These people do not see themselves as, or want to be journalists, but either start a campaign about an issue they believe in, or become an eyewitness to. They often get there before the news crews when something dramatic occur. The 24 hours rolling news stations need images and news quickly so those images often become the ones people associate with as being ‘iconic’. This also has a plus side of going hand in hand with technology becoming cheaper and more profitable. An example of citizen’s journalists would be the first footage from the 2001 September 11^th attacks were captured by people on their cameras. They could also look at the London riots of 2011, BBC and Sky media crews were attacked so pulled their camera crews out, meaning that the only source of news available was through eyewitnesses recording the events on their phone and sending them to news channels. So we see ‘Big Media’ now actively using ‘We Media’ or citizens journalists as their sources where previously it would have been a reporter or a news crew. A problem that may occur with this is that, the person who holds the news footage whether it’s a news channel or a citizen’s journalist has the power of being the editor. They may choose to portray the story in a certain way so it suits their chosen narrative, which may be bias in a way.

It can be argued that in ‘Big Media’ there is a lot of power at the hands of the few, this is because private media corporations are often owned by the same person. This is certainly true as Rupert Murdoch owns News Corp which is one of the main global news agencies who collect news and report it quickly; along with ‘Sky’, ‘The Sun’, ‘The Times, and the ‘Press Association’. Although all of the separate titles and channels have their own style, Murdoch makes no attempt to hide his political views. For example, Murdoch believes in privatisation of public services organisations like the NHS should be run by private companies who profit from it, so this is obviously a right wing view. There are other alternatives to the individual, which is to not buy or listen to news from these companies, there are other options such as the Guardian newspaper which has a different set of beliefs. However, if we can all accept that all newspapers and TV stations have an ‘agenda’ or a bias then we can be more informed when watching and reading them. The problem is that people don’t know which news source to trust and it varies from person to person, meaning that people make their own news, or comment on news through sites such as You-tube or live broadcasts on Facebook so that a bias doesn’t get put into it by somebody else.  

Statistics show that 75% of adults get their main source of news from TV, whether that is BBC, Sky, or even Channel 4 news. However, 90% of people over 55 get their news from TV compared to 59% of 16-24 year olds. This is because Media 2.0 shows that technology is changing, so the fact that the younger generation has been brought up around this changing technology, it would make sense for us to use social media more for our source of news. This is also supported by 19% of 16-24 saying that the only use the internet and apps for their news, whereas only 1% of over 55’s use internet/apps. This is a huge contrast because the older generation are more accustomed to having their main source of news from TV, radio, or even newspapers, as they are less familiar with new technology such as smart phones.

Before I started this course, I did not watch or really read any news at all. The only times I would ever read some news is if it came up on Facebook through a link for example, the Lad Bible. Or if something went viral on You-tube, or if a story on Snap-chat interested me for example buzzfeed, or the daily mail. I was then asked to download the BBC news app, which has to a certain extent changed my perspective on the news. The app has the function of selecting ‘my news’, there are certain categories you can choose from so related articles from these come up on your feed. This can be seen as a negative though, because you’re only choosing the news you want to see, not necessarily what is important. However, for example, the categories I chose was: Education and Family, Animals, University, and Media. There were plenty of stories to choose from but I was asked to choose 3 stories from ‘my news’. The first story I found was called ‘Escaped Ipswich Pig Pog’, this came under the animal category, the story was about a pig who escaped because it wanted to meet new people. The second story I found that stood out to me was ‘British school students stole Auschwitz artefacts’, this came under the education category. Two British teenagers stole items including buttons and a rusted hair clipper. The third story I found was called ‘Harambe McHarambe face’, under the animal category. A new born gorilla at a Chinese zoo has been named this because of a public vote of what to name the gorilla. It received a 93% vote, people think it’s because of trolls but the death of Harambe the gorilla generally caused an uproar on sites such as Facebook, however people have turned the death into a meme (a joke), on the internet.

Through asking other people mainly in class, I saw a pattern occur with news habits and who people trust as their main source of news. It is clear that only older generations read newspapers, as the people I asked did not mention anything about newspapers, it is thought that they will go extinct by 2040. Every student in my class is 17, so the topics we picked for ‘my news’ on the BBC news app were all pretty similar, for example most people chose social media as it plays such a big role in all of our lives. The stories were relatable, there was nothing abstract that people found in relation to news. People mainly did only sometimes read past the headline, perhaps the headline summed up the story, or maybe they aren’t just that bothered, I personally often read past the headline because I am interested. There was also an obvious trend of where 17 year olds get their main news sources from, this is mainly: Facebook, Snap-chat, and Twitter, so mainly all forms of social media. However a 41 year old said one of their main sources of news is from the Radio, which is controversial because it is quite old fashioned, but statistics say that men are more likely to listen to a radio for news than women. There were mixed views about which news organisations people believed to be the most trustworthy. Mainly it was said to be the BBC, perhaps because it is funded by taxpayers, therefore it shouldn’t be bias, but there was a mixture of Channel 4 and Sky news.

In conclusion, TV news still dominates, but its share of the market is slowly decreasing, especially amongst the 16-24 bracket, news apps and social media are an area of rapid growth, but are still small in comparison.