Tag Archives: Facebook

Five years later: “If the news is that important, it will find me.”

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I asked my communication class, made up of primarily freshmen and sophomores, what their news and information sources are.

The top three answers were Facebook, Twitter and “people I know.” (The New York Times, which is distributed free in the communications building, was the first mainstream news source listed.)

This isn’t surprising to many journalists who have been paying attention.  From the New York Times in March 2007: Ms. Buckingham recalled conducting a focus group where one of her subjects, a college student, said, “If the news is that important, it will find me.”

Problem is, I get the idea that enough journalists aren’t paying attention.

Five years later, many editors and publishers aren’t on Facebook or Twitter. Of those who are, many don’t engage with people beyond promoting stories in their own publications. I should also include television here, too. Only a few of the 33 students mentioned getting news or information from broadcast news. (Their websites got decent numbers, though.)

Though they didn’t use this language, the students essentially described Facebook and Twitter as their own personal news sources — news sources they designed comprised of people they knew and trusted giving them information about both their personal lives  and the broader world.

The point? If journalists want to survive — to say nothing of flourish today — they must be part of the conversation of this generation of budding thinkers and news creators and consumers. They need to evaluate all the tools that Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc. offer and figure out what works for them.

 

We or them?

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A couple days after I left the News & Record, I asked this question on Facebook: At what point, when talking about the newspaper, do I switch pronouns from “we” to “they”?

The answers came quickly and in abundance. They were all over the place, ranging from now to never. Some classics:

Dan Conover: From my experience, when the paper does something you like, it’s “we.” When the paper does something you don’t like, it’s “they.” When it’s something that makes you want to to grab a flame thrower and go torch the place, it’s “the media.”

Mike Orren: After the last piece of copy you touched runs.

Robyn Tomlin: Being a journalist is like being an alcoholic. You can be “in recovery,” but you live with the disease for the rest of you life, even if you never take another drink (or write another story). You will always be part of the collective — whether you like it or not.

And Teresa Prout, who is currently interim editor, left my favorite: It should always be “we,” John. You’re grandfathered in.

I think it will be “we” as long as I can’t pass an open rack of newspapers at the Harris Teeter without making sure it is filled. As long as I feel a pang of regret when I pass a house at 11 a.m. and see the paper still in the driveway. As long as I defend the paper when an ignoramus takes a cheap shot at it having a liberal bias. As long as I see a blog post that is so insightful that I want to call the writer and congratulate him or her.

It will be “we” so long as I read a story that I wish never ends, see a photo that takes my breath away or get dazzled by a design that makes me proud to be a subscriber. Given who is there now, I think it will be “we” for a long time.