GYoung Digital Blog

A little while ago, last week probably, I noticed a very interesting reaction that I had to one of the news notifications that popped up on my phone one day.

I think it was last Saturday, during the election that took place in South Carolina. The election was called for Joe Biden immediately, and every news outlet was super excited to share the news, that my phone lit up, sending me notification, after notification, letting me know that Joe Biden won.

I think I was driving through town, probably on my way to get some coffee, or food, and I felt my phone vibrate, sending me a new notification. Sure enough, it was about Joe Biden, but it was the 30th notification I got, and I remember my immediate reaction was, “You’re too slow on this story, I already know about this. Get out of here!”

I also remember my reaction being unironic.

The role of social media and it’s relation to journalism is a bit of a controversial subject. Some people might say that social media is harming journalism, and others might find reason why it’s good. Any way someone chooses to look at it, there’s no denying that social media is essential in any kind of communication, whether it’s journalism, or inviting your drinking buddy to Jimmy’s party next weekend. (That party was boring, btw.)

It seems that social media has changed the way that some of us engage with news stories; in my case, it seems that i’m prepared to disregard some publications if they don’t get the news out to me soon enough. And the publication in question is a reputable one, so there was no reason why I would disregard them for any other reason, except that they didn’t get the story out to me first.

And some of the publications that did get the story out to me, they might be some publications that I might think less-of. However, they got the story out to me sooner, that’s in line with all the others, so I accept it.

That’s likely some of the pressure that publications get when it comes to the matter of who gets the story out first. We all probably sit around and wax social-concern about how terrible it is that publications have to put up with that kind of pressure, but here we are, engaging in the very things that we criticism.

So, unfortunately, that might be one way that journalism is forever changed – trying to get the story out first. That probably won’t change unless we have a massive cultural change in how we engage with the news.