1) What does Guardian journalist and academic Emily Bell say has happened to the print news industry?
In the 50s the popular British tabloid newspaper Daily Mirror’s circulation peaked at just below 5 million. Emily Bell in the Cudlipp’s lecture states that the Daily Mirror attained this status by a combination of three things: ‘a strong sense of what role journalism could play in the lives of its audience, great reporting and courageous independent editing, and a thorough knowledge of how to put contemporary technology to the service of journalism.’ Even when television came along to challenge the popular press, it still managed to maintain its dominance and popularity with audiences. Skip forward 60 years and new technologies and the web have changed this landscape beyond recognition and the Daily Mirror’s print circulation is under a million and other newspapers are struggling to survive and are no longer in control. The way news was done then is not the way news is being done now or will be in the future. The news industry was too slow to react to changes because they didn’t understand how these new technologies would affect their business models and under-estimated how much audiences would welcome the shift to finding out information more easily.
Facebook and other social media sites use a series of complicated formulae to decide which news stories rise to the top of your page or news feed and this algorithm contains editorial decisions, every piece of software design carries social implications. Gatekeepers no longer shape the news agenda and newsroom norms but shaped by algorithms which determine which promote popular stories. They dictate not only what we see but provide the foundation of the business model for social platforms. They are there to make the institutions money and therefore remain secret. They can also change without informing the news providers and they can alter what we see without us even noticing. This mathematical selection of what gets promoted and what does not is having profound impact on the kinds of news people are accessing and if as research is suggesting over 30% of Americans (and one must presume other countries too) are getting their news from Facebook, the kinds of stories that get prominence because they are simply based on popularity will be shaping the way that news institutions need to write their stories in order to attract audiences.
3) What is EdgeRank and how does it work?
EdgeRank is the Facebook algorithm that decides which stories appear in each user’s newsfeed. The algorithm hides stories which people aren’t interested in. So if your story doesn’t score well, no one will see it.
Facebook Ignored Ferguson's story. Facebook state they do not have any interest in editorialising news only in the amount of traffic they can generate to ensure their economic survival. According to Bell Facebook engineers state that; ‘we are ‘just a platform’, the ‘technology is neutral’; ‘we don’t make editorial decisions.’ Whatever they might say their algorithms do have unintentional unpredictable consequences. An academic and blogger Zeynep Tufekci, a commentator on sociology, media and technology, was following the social unrest in the St Louis suburb of Ferguson after the police shot an unarmed young black man Michael Brown. She noted that whilst her Twitter feed was full of reports from Ferguson, nothing appeared on Facebook and the Ice Bucket Challenge was all she saw. Overnight as the Facebook algorithm worked its filtering stories began to appear, but long after the first reports and discussions. Facebook’s algorithm had decided that ice bucket challenge was of more interest than the unrest in Ferguson.
5) How did the news of Osama Bin Laden's death break?
A full hour before the formal announcement of Bin-Laden’s death, Keith Urbahn posted a tweet; “So I’m told by a reputable person they have killed Osama Bin Laden. Hot damn.” At the time Urbahn has just over 1000 followers, respectable but nowhere near the amount required for immediate global interest, but yet this one tweet triggered a avalanche if reactions, tweets and conversations that beat the mainstream media and The White House to the announcement. But how and why did this happen? People in politics knew Keith Urbahn and his job as an advisor would make his tweet have authority, therefore people were likely to trust and be persuaded by it, but this alone does not explain the power of Twitter to spark massive viral ow in real time; people trusted within minutes and the news became more believable as people shared it. At Social Flow they analysed the effects of timing and topicality within social streams. In this study they looked at 14.8 million tweets and bitly links with the goal of reaching an understanding on how timing, along with other core dynamics can amplify the reach of a single tweet to a massive scale. Below is a visualization of the network graph showing the spread of Keith Urbahn’s single speculative tweet across users on Twitter.
6) How does news spread on Twitter?
Twitter relays news in real time and reverse chronological order that means that it’s up-to-date and that past tweets get buried. Academics like Tufekci argue that this is why it is so powerful because it can spread real time stories and allows for stories to emerge by chance and not be controlled by algorithms. However, twitter does control some of its news content. When Isis circulated the first videos of the beheading of American journalist James Foley earlier this year, they did it through Twitter. In a departure from established practice this led to Dick Costolo, the chief executive of the company, announcing that not only would the account distributing the video be closed, but also so would any account retweeting the video. An open and clear editorial decision, Costolo’s action was in direct conflict with the idea that this was a ‘free’ platform open to all.
Personally, I feel that although people have the right to express whatever this wish - this needs to be limited especially when it comes to highly offensive material. Tech giant should be able to remove content they feel is going against certain guidelines. This is because it allows the platform to be safer, more child-friendly, and less dangerous.
8) Spend some time exploring First Look Media. Is this a realistic future for quality journalism?
The minimal layout, animations, blog-style website are all synchronous with our modern use of the internet. It undeniably provides our news but in a form that many of the younger generation are more comofortable with in comparison to sites like the Guardian or the Independent.
9) Read the About page for First Look Media. What are they trying to achieve and do you think they will be successful?
"spirit defines everything we do at First Look Media – from journalism that holds the powerful accountable, to arts & entertainment that shapes our culture. Launched by eBay founder and philanthropist Pierre Omidyar, First Look Media is built on the belief that freedom of expression and of the press, and fiercely independent perspectives, are vital to a healthy democracy and a vibrant culture."
To me, it is clear that this website achieves what they aim to be doing - they provide news yet make it modern and bold.
10) Finally, take a good look at The Intercept. Explain how The Intercept started and list three interesting stories on there from the last 12 months.
After NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden came forward with revelations of mass surveillance in 2013, journalists Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras, and Jeremy Scahill decided to found a new media organisation dedicated to the kind of reporting those disclosures required: fearless, adversarial journalism. They called it The Intercept. Today, The Intercept is an award-winning news organization that covers national security, politics, civil liberties, the environment, international affairs, technology, criminal justice, the media, and more. The Intercept gives its journalists the editorial freedom and legal support they need to pursue investigations that expose corruption and injustice wherever they find it and hold the powerful accountable. Ebay founder and philanthropist Pierre Omidyar provided the funding to launch The Intercept and continues to support it through First Look Media Works, a nonprofit organisation.
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