'We media and Democracy'- Owen Robson

I get my news, mostly, from newspapers, such as the daily mirror and metro, and the BBC news app. The metro is an independent newspaper that is distributed Monday through Friday on public transportation; it leans towards the conservatives in terms of political stance and does not have many journalists and often relies on what others give them for their information. The daily mirror is owned by its parent company, trinity mirror, and is distributed Monday through Saturday with a sister paper, the Sunday mirror, on Sundays and is distributed in the conventional manner i.e. sold in post offices (or what few are left) and independent news agents and  is typically viewed as labour in its political stance. The BBC news app is clearly owned by the BBC and can be downloaded on virtually any device with internet access on a whim and, as it is the BBC, attempts to remain impartial in political matters, as well as the BBC TV news which is very mush the same as the BBC news app, with potential bias only coming from guests such as MPs being interviewed.

I believe that the BBC news app, launched in 2010, is a trusted source as they try to filter all forms of political bias from their articles to present the audience with the facts, staying as close to the undiluted truth as possible. The metro is actually relatively new, launched in 1999, and is owned by the same media group which owns the daily mail, DMG media. This media group is skewed towards the conservatives in terms of political stance and will almost certainly be skewed towards tory views, it is also free, however, and provides those who would not go out of their way to buy a paper with a source of, relatively, reliable information which, in the eyes of most, is enough to be considered a trustworthy news source.  The daily mirror is very old in comparison to the other news source I have talked about, it was launched in 1903, making it 113 years old at the time of this blog’s publication, and the fact it is still going should be an indication of how popular and trusted it is as a news source. It’s political stance, labour, guarantees that, at least some of the time, the facts and opinions stated will be those slightly biased towards labour, making it a favourite with the working class, and slightly less reliable than impartial news sources such as the BBC. The BBC TV news, however, is much older than its app counter-part and was launched in 1948 and, much like the daily mirror, has the benefit of trust that comes with age, its popularity with previous generations making the current generation trusting of its content.

In regard to the BBC News app, I have found that some of the most common news categories in Britain include Brexit and Education. I have found this from asking other members of my media studies group about which categories catch there interests the most.

The news stories included on the BBC News app, but are not limited to, consist of: US convoy attacked in Syria due to the abrupt end of the cease fire, preventing aid to Aleppo was a story that I read in depth, as well as other stories I glanced over or read the headline, such as seven arrests over a school brawl (which was shared via social media sites as well) and a solid gold public toilet in Germany, all of which were learned about reading a news website, also including Corbyn’s victory in the labour elections via big media i.e. BBC news.

 I also found out about various other news stories from those within the media group such as Theresa May’s controversial proposal to reopen grammar schools, Colombian referendum, Joey Barton out for several weeks, sport direct paying employees £200 million in bonuses, the PS4 Pro launch, brownlee brothers at the marathon, N.Korean rocket/firework test etc. Only several of which were read in any depth, Theresa May’s grammar school plan in particular, the problem being that grammar schools cherry pick students from other schools catchment radius’ worsening the comprehensive schools quality and quantity of students, skewing the Ofsted ratings for the worse for contemporary schools as well as giving some an unfair advantage over others as well as social class being a significant factor in the results of the tests required for admittance, however, most grammar schools have undeniably high a-level scores as well as some saying it “undermines” privilege as they aid the brightest children from poorer families. Ceasefire broken as UN convoy attacked, by CNN politics, the aid convey was hit when it was travelling east towards Aleppo from the west it is unclear who attacked the convoy but America is falling back on its blame the Russians strategy, yet again, what is clear is that around 20 were killed in the attack and they were killed via an airstrike. Russia denies involvement, which would likely be the case whether a country is guilty or not, and are blaming the Syrian rebels. The UN’s response is about as indecisive as you’d think: “Just when we think it cannot get any worse, the power of depravity sinks lower.” 18 out of the 31 trucks went down in the airstrike. Finally, N.Korea’s “successful” rocket engine/firework test was conducted in an underground nuclear test bunker with the US and China agreeing with the UN to address N.Korea’s fifth nuke test. North Korea repeatedly make claims about the “success and progress” of there nuclear and missile programmes with analysts saying that the claims are too numerous too independently verify and the UN declaring increased and toughened sanctions against Pyongyang. N.K claim the rocket is for a non-military related satellite, claiming that the test is of a purely scientific nature with the US, South Korea and China being inclined to disagree, there track record of non-violence related anything being quite bad. The test is almost universal considered as an indication that North Korea will soon launch another long range missile/rocket by the UN/ everyone who isn’t North Korean.

We Media and Democracy - Lewis Martin

I have learnt from the summer that there are a variety of ways to access news content. Examples of this include: TV, websites, newspapers, news apps and various social media. All of which are said to be bias in some way and I will try and look at different perspectives and different people’s views on accessing news content.

Examples of the TV programmes that broadcast news content are: BBC, Sky News, channel 4. However, each of these channels will broadcast the same news content but in different perspectives in order to portray their ideological views to the public. Sky news is a very right wing broadcasting channel as figures from a survey conducted by themediablog.co.uk shows that ‘nearly two-thirds of respondents (64 per cent) said Sky News displays a clear pro-Conservative bias in its reporting. In total, 34.5 per cent of respondents said Sky News displays a "strong Conservative" bias, while 29.3 said the channel shows "some Conservative" bias’. They may try and blur the lines of a news story in order for it to be viewed in one way rather than the intentional purpose. For example, during the build up to the EU referendum, Sky news constantly referred to the EU (European Union) as Europe implying that a vote to leave has damaging implications. This is just one example of how TV broadcasting channels can twist the news in order to present their ideological views and try and be unintentionally bias.

Personally I do not get my news from television as advances in technology and apps have allowed me to access news content through the BBC news app which I believe to be a reliable and trusted source to get my news. I also feel as it does not lean politically towards one side and tries to be as neutral as possible. Also, the app allows you to apply filters so it will only show you topics that you are interested in; I had chosen football, boxing and the Paralympics at that particular period of time. I was able to see news content such as Golovkin beating Brook and the build up to the Manchester derby and also that Ellie Simmonds captured Gold with a new world record. The app is very useful as now you can just view what interests you and not read pointless stories that have no appeal. However, with this filter, you will not be able to see important news stories so if there was a terrorist attack then you would be unaware and not be knowledgeable of that important/serious event.

Social media is constantly evolving and changing to a point where it is easy for regular people to become journalists, where they are able to post news that they see and it can be spread through sharing on Facebook or retweeting on twitter in order for it to go viral. However, you have to be careful with what you read on Facebook and other social media because you do not know if it is a reliable and trusted source. For example, I was scrolling down Facebook the other day and an article came up with a headline that read, ‘Jaden Smith dead after suicide’, I instantly clicked thinking that this was true and the article seemed to be serious and have a story about how it was believed to be true. Some people would use this source as a fact of information but I was not being lead along this easily, so I searched on google Jaden Smith suicide and it came up with articles about how it was a hoax. This just demonstrates on how Facebook can be a negative tool to use a source of journalism and stories like this reflect why it will never be a trusted source. However this does not damage the fact that it is still a great tool for people to voice their opinions on key issues that are ever present in today’s society. For example, if a trusted source like the BBC posted an article on a contradictory topic then people would be allowed to comment their opinions and challenge others views.

They can also create online blogs in which they can literally use this as platform to post their news and voice their own views and opinions on matters that they wouldn’t necessarily be able to do in a newspaper or on the television. Dan Gillmor suggests that media and news content is becoming more of a democracy where everyone is able to report on news and voice their opinions. This is a change from a concentrated choice of media and profits for an oligopoly of companies where they are the only people to have an opinion. Ownership and control of companies are usually in the hands of white males with a private school education. Gillmor sees the internet as a catalyst for a challenge against hegemony, as ordinary citizens can use blogs and other online communication tools to share their own views – ‘citizen journalism’.

In my opinion, I believe that the internet is a great tool for people to voice their opinion and beliefs on real life events. Also, if people are at a scene where there is news being reported then they can use camera phone to record the lie events that are happening. Citizens do not take out any footage that they record whereas broadcasters will edit their footage so it only shows footage that reflects their ideological views in a positive light. For example, on 9/11, TV broadcasters did not show a particular camera angle when the towers got attacked and there is some conspiracy as to why. Everyday people will show everything that they record as they do not have a reputation to keep up and do not have an issue with looking bad and do not have to cover their backs. This is just a few reasons why I think that some programmes hide news from us in order to not reflect them in a negative light.

Lewis Martin

We Media and Democracy - Ben Locking

'We Media' is a term used today to describe the news and content that is created by the audience (usually the general public) rather than the main hosts, or Big Media, such as Channel 4, BBC, etc. 

We Media is changing society in the way that media is actually distributed and is becoming a democratic approach to sharing the news around the world and whatever news is wished to be shown without the Big Media limiting to what is heard, when it is heard, and how it is heard. This has come around through pressure groups wanting to change the way media was received and working within the public to voice their own opinion. Eventually a large popularity caught on and have been working further since to see the change that is now being achieved with a more (as I would say) 'community-based' approach. 


David Gauntlett devised a theory of Media 2.0 to help explain how quickly We Media has come along. He explained that we are currently in a world where there are rapid changes in technology, how media is produced and how we choose to receive it – and it's down to us how we share it. However, technology has moved even further now to satisfy us and the news we like to hear. Internet 3.0. This is the use of cookies on our computers which tracks our commonly visited sites, what we watch, texts we expand and so much more. It then finds other data similar to the ones that have caught our attention and displays it to us for more usage. It's essentially a way of tailoring our very own internet to fit us like a perfect suit and this new advance can very much affect the way in which we see media. 


Over the holidays I've not really been open to much news since I live in my bedroom and rarely come out unless it's something like eating. Anyway, despite the anti-social behaviour I have still managed to hear about a few mishaps and achievements around the world in various different ways. 


The first story was about the Italy earthquake with a magnitude of 6.2 that sadly destroyed Amatrice. I had heard this from a news organisation of BBC News and had only really been caught by the headline and then listened to a slight more information for a few minutes about the casualties, and how people were trying to be rescued before they moved onto another story. This is one of the stories I actually tried to keep up on as I was intrigued on how the reformation and saviour of the trapped people would go but coverage has slowly dropped off on the story. However, with this being breaking news at the time, it brought plenty of attention to the matter and could've indicated a potential cry for help to gain support from others to rescue the people in need or danger. Through receiving this news I see it to be accurate and trustworthy with it being broadcasted over national television to the country and publicised in various newspapers. 


A second story was during the Olympics, showing that England had done their best ever whilst overseas winning 67 medals. I took an in depth look into this story with sport being a strong passion of mine; mainly football, but sport in general. The team had only targeted to achieve around 48 this year but managed to smash that goal and come 2^nd place overall, putting China out of the chase by day 15. I believe that the dominant meaning of the story was to bring pride to the country and help to strengthen the image of the country as a whole and to gain support for a country so small compared to others to do so well and succeed together. The story had been broadcasted everywhere – radio, TV, newspapers, you name it. So I have lots of reasoning to trust the sources as multiple places have had the same story. It was also shows over a long period of time meaning that the information had to be consistently accurate to be trustworthy.


The third story I found was different to the other two and involved a boy getting 28 months to prison for sexting girls as young as 13. However, as a change to other ways like TV or popular news I accessed this through the use of We Media. I first discovered the news of friends talking about this on social media (Twitter in particular) but was unsure of where they got the information from. I then proceeded to share this with people on social media and target shared it with friends on various platforms – creating my very own form of We Media. I then later discovered the information to be reliable once the Big Media came into contact with it such at the Daily Mail releasing a news report on the subject. I believe it was provided to show child pornography in such a negative light and degrade others.


I believe that this is a strong example of We Media as the news had originally came from a social circle within Twitter with people that I shared similar interests with, in this case music, following each other and the boy in the report was well known within the social group and to see that he had been convicted was quickly shared around on Twitter meaning that the few thousand of the social circle were some of the very first to know and so beat the Big News to share it around. The fact of people following each other with shared interests on Twitter can additionally be an example of Internet 3.0 but with us manually adapting it, essentially without the use of cookies but us doing that part ourselves. We had managed to suit the internet, or webpage (Twitter), to ourselves by following what we see relevant within a social circle and with who we want to interact with.


In conclusion, I believe that the most important information or the big headlines are still dominated by the Big Media with We Media just following behind; despite there being personal footage and such sent into the Big Media to aid them in getting out the news as quickly as possible. However I feel that with much smaller stories within groups or pages created by Internet 3.0 that We Media thrives to produce a more personal story within a shorter space of time. Unfortunately I still feel that there is some sort of mistrust towards the accuracy of We Media due to the number of internet ‘trolls’ that often make up stories just for drama or people may accidentally get information incorrect which links back to my third story of me being sceptical at first until the Daily Mail mentioned it. Overall, I believe that We Media can grow into a much more dominant way to receive media and news over time – just not yet.

We media assessment

Over the summer we had to research the media and democracy within the media. This is so we could reflect on the ways that we access and look at news. Also it was for us to think about was whether the ways we were accessing media were trusted. We have since then looked at the sub types of news myself and others tend to be more interested in and how others access news, additionally how often they look at it. These are the results of research I carried out and conclusions we can draw from them.

In the ‘my news’ section of the BBC News app it allows you to pick which news categories you want to read and hear about first. In this section I chose to look at; Derby, football, cricket, music, television and media. This shows a quite wide variety of topics.  However I think it also portrays that I do not pay much attention or interest to political or international matters. However as I have the Derby section within my categories, this could show that I take an interest in local matters and news. I tend to check the news about once a day on average. It is also important to make sure the news that you are reading is legitimate. So the ways you access media is from trustworthy source. For example the institutes I trust are BBC, ITV and official Facebook pages.

My results are different to others however. For example in my research into other people’s media I found that one person finds their news from social media, newspapers, radio and online. This shows some more traditional methods of viewing news stories. As not as many people will read newspapers to read about the news, especially the younger generation who are more technologically gifted. One of the people was 41 years of age, their chosen categories to read about were Education, Brexit, Syrian Civil War and migrant crisis. 5 of the stories he knew about were; grammar schools being put into place in the UK, Donald Trump vs Hilary Clinton and also the Colombian peace deal. Another thing that was different to my results were than this person checked the news 5/6 times a day. They also read more than the headline often as opposed to me only sometimes reading more than the headline. Compared to me they also collected their news from a range of different places, these were; BBC, Radio 4 (generally not a radio station that younger people listen to), channel 4 and also The Guardian. This person also said that they trust all of these institutions and also trust The Financial Times. I think that these results are very different because of the age difference between me and the other person I asked for their opinions. As they were essentially looking at more important world topics. If you compare two, one was about Theresa May wanting to introduce more grammar schools into Britain. Whereas one of the stories I read was about Ryan Sidebottom signing a new 1 year contract at Yorkshire County Cricket Club. This shows that the other person is older and has more of an opinion of world and national matters.

I do not think that it is a bad thing that the more traditional ways of accessing news such as newspapers are becoming less popular compared to online news apps and websites. I think this because you are essentially reading yesterday’s news with newspapers as they get printed and dispatched mostly throughout the night. Where as with apps and websites you can be kept right up to date with news as it happens and lets you see breaking news. Which I think is better as you are better and more quickly informed. This is another reason why the media now is more democratic than it used to be. This backs up Dan Gilmor’s theory on we the media

I also think that the media has changed in a different way through advancements in technology. In the sense that before it would be a journalist who would get the first story on a case. Nowadays it could be any random person who is passing by where a story could potentially occur. I think that this is also a good development in media as stories will be less farfetched and fantasize cases. This is another point to back up Dan Gilmors theories in we the media.

Overall I think that the media on the whole has become more democratic. I think this because people have made ways to make news more accessible. Whether this be by blogs, apps, websites or social media. It is also now easier to make your own news, by videoing or commenting on a certain event. So it is not just the big media companies that can be the first source of the news headlines, it can now be any person. I also think that it is younger people who are accessing the more modern ways to view the news such as online newspapers, apps and websites. Where as older people who still use the more traditional ways to access the news that they want to, such as newspapers, news channels, radios etc. This could be the because they are more set in their ways and do not want to change the way they view the news themselves.

We media and Democracy- Brooke

What have you learnt about your own media use and how you access news content?

I haven’t always kept up to date with the news, other than what I’d occasionally hear via the radio when I’m sat in the car etc. But I never seemed to take much more interest than that. Until more recently when I started watching ITV news at 6(pm), the good thing about watching news via the TV, is the stories are air the same day they take place, which enables the world to become more aware and similarly more democratic. Even more recently I downloaded the BBC News App, which has actually proven very useful as it sends me constant daily updates on news stories. I was able to filter these by choosing topics I am interested in (my chosen 3 were: UK, World and US Election) which is what the BBC App notifies me with, however I am also able to view all the other news stories once on the app, sometimes only reading the headline, however very often reading beyond and getting the full story which the BBC have portrayed to us. It is now been found that we have become a society which filters the information we get, due to how much the media cover. In many ways this is good as we are able to pay more interest into the stories and events which interest us, however there are also negative aspects of these features as it limits our knowledge of much more that is happening around the world.

Thinking about it there are also many other way where I get my news from, but I just don’t fully realise it, this is through the format of social media, e.g. Facebook, Snapchat and Twitter. Facebook for example uses cookies to filter the news which is shown on people feed, by what people look at whilst online. Also people online share news stories, or stories which seem to be from the news, without actually checking if the web address which they get the information from is genuine, therefore untrue stories and biased opinions on certain issues are escalated and spread throughout social media. This always makes me question the reliability of some people’s information.  Snapchat on the other hand also have begun providing news on their app, however more often than not the information which they provide is information you would read from a magazine, or in that category of new, which again you can never be sure if the source is reliable. With these type of media distributors I have learnt that they don’t create the information, they just find their material from others and copy it.

However looking at the positive aspects of social media news is that the situations are open for debate and opinions from a huge audience, which is where conspiracy theories begin. We are also given information from citizens that big/traditional media companies aren’t obligated to post. Citizens also point out inaccuracies in news reporting which tends to make people in general more optimistic about what they believe.

More recently I have realised how much the way we access media has changed over generations, the way I access media is certainly very different to the way my grandparents would access media. For example when my grandparents were my age the most popular form of news access was newspaper format, the news which people read on their was news from the day before, and the news wasn’t open to debate as much as is it now, so people’s views on different situations were limited. Also not everyone in those days could read so the rich wrote what other rich people read, which meant that people who were illiterate weren’t as up to date on the issues around the world. Which meant in those days it was less democratic. When looking at the ways my parent’s accessed media the variety had advanced slightly, for example TV news was then developed which meant that Newspapers and TV were the most popular formats of receiving media, and the thing with TV is that the news is reported the same day, and you don’t have to be literate to listen to the news, making the world more democratic as a whole. In comparison to now there are so many formats where we can access media, social media networks are now the biggest distributors of news, however they aren’t the producers of it, so what sites like BBC first write is then copied and then changed with the opinions of others involved. This has caused the demand for things such as newspapers to decrease, with mainly older generations purchasing them. 

'We Media and Democracy' - Olivia Needham

As the ever-changing world of technology continues to evolve, we move along with it, navigating our way through the media maze, but we all have our unique ways of accessing the news in today’s society. Whether it be a large earthquake, an EU referendum or Kim and Kanye's wedding, most people take interest in finding out about the world around them and the current events making headlines, and seek out this news in different ways.

Personally, I am extremely interested in keeping up to date with the news of the world, as I feel it is vital to know what is happening to other people in other areas of the world, and to be able to learn from, and be involved with events happening elsewhere; in my opinion it would be ignorant to not keep updated with current events. I like to know about the serious things such as politics, tragedies and crime, however, I also enjoy hearing about pop culture, celebrity gossip and music and fashion related news.

I access my news in many different ways, one of these ways being the television. In the morning when I’m having breakfast, sometimes I might flick over to the news to see what has been happening in the world. Other times I might pass a newspaper in a shop and have a gaze over the biggest headlines. Another way I access news is through the internet, where I might see a news story on a website or in the advert section. However the main source of news for me is Twitter. Every day when I wake up, the first thing I do is check my phone for notifications, after doing that I go onto Twitter and open up the trending section and see what the most tweeted events of the day are. I find this to be extremely useful and reliable, because I know if millions of people are talking about it then there must be truth to it. This is an example of Dan Gilmor’s idea of the consumer becoming the creators from his book ‘We the Media’.

The idea that millions of people come together to spread awareness of a story turns us into the journalists in a way, because it gives us a voice, an opinion, and an ability to spread the word. With 313 million users active on Twitter monthly, word can spread incredibly fast. I have found out about many of the top news stories via Twitter, for example, I heard the news about the death of certain celebrities such as David Bowie, Prince and Alan Rickman through Twitter, however one thing Twitter is common for is creating false death stories, so I always have to validate them online when I see one on the app.

One experiment my class conducted was where we all downloaded the BBC News app on our smartphones, chose topics that interested us, and reported back a week later on our news consumption. I wrote down the findings of 5 other students and two teachers. The information I gathered was in a table that featured sections asking about their age, what categories they picked, how often they checked the app and what stories they learned about. My findings were that the older test subjects (teachers) tended to check the app many more times a day/week than the member of my class who are between 17 and 18 years of age. Also I found that the teachers had chosen more categories than the class, and included more serious topics such as Politics and Education, whereas the people my age had chosen things such as Entertainment and Music. Furthermore, most of the males that I took information on had chosen Sports as a category.

This experiment has helped me to learn a lot about our news consumption. The first thing I realised is that the older people taking part in the experiment would check the app a lot more frequently than the younger ones, but I believe this to mainly be down to the fact that the younger generation are a lot more active on social media, so come across news this way, and feel less of a need to check the BBC app. The next thing I learnt was that boys and girls had different interests, for example the boys I took notes on all had some type of sport as a category, whereas the girls had more of the celebrity news as a focus. However a lot of people still had a lot of the same big news stories remembered, such as the Olympics in Rio and Brexit, which says to me that even though we all have separate interests, we all hear about the main stories and care about them to an extent.

In today’s society, we are becoming curators of our own media; we can create, and view news as we please. We are the media. As part of the young generation today, I can support the fact that we have grown up in a world where news is easily accessible on many formats, and through the use of social media, we can stay updated, as well as make others aware of our own stories, however big or small. Older generations may be able to do exactly the same, however, having not grown up in the same way as we have, are still adapting to these changes and are not quite as accustomed to things like social media as the younger generation, many still read newspapers, which a younger person with a smart phone might never do, as it is simply at the tip of their fingers and a google search away. Overall, I have learnt that we are all collectively significant in the media and have to power to control and consume it in whatever way available to us.

'We media' and Democracy - Kieran Lukas

We media and democracy from kieranlukas