The Social Media Journalist Handbook

Yumi Wilson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781351002608
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Communication Studies
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

The Social Media Journalist Handbook teaches readers how to be a real-world social media journalist, tracing the evolution of the field to its current-day practice. This book establishes social media journalism as the latest and one of the most effective ways to practice journalism in the 21st century. It features insights from top recruiters, editors, and senior producers working in the field, as well exercises that aid readers in developing the practical skills necessary to work successfully with social media. Readers will come away from the book with the knowledge to build strong social media strategies across different budgets, employing evergreen principles that work for different, ever-changing platforms. They'll learn how to reach and engage with the maximum number of people, as well as find sources, raise one's profile, conduct research, and produce stories.

Part I

History and Overview of the Evolution of Social Media in Journalism

1 A Theoretical Framework for Understanding the Impact and Role of Social Media in Journalism

In the Information Age, communication, defined as the act of exchanging information by speaking, writing, or using some other medium,¹ has exploded. People from all over the world – no longer confined by geography, economics, or even language – are discussing politics, sharing selfies, and even starting movements.

The most basic communication theory states that communication consists of a sender, a message, a channel where the message travels, noise or interference, and a receiver.²

In the very early years of American history, the primary channel through which information traveled was the newspaper, the owners of newspapers – “wealthy administrators of the English crown”³ – were the “senders” and the subscribers or readers were the “receivers.”

Under the Four Theories of the Press model,⁴ the type of journalism practiced by the wealthy administrators is perhaps best described as falling under the Authoritarian Theory, which meant that the mass media had as much freedom as the leadership would permit.⁵

As colonists sought their independence from Great Britain, newsletters and papers such as Thomas Paine’s Common Sense proliferated, becoming a key method of galvanizing the masses in the years leading up to the American Revolution. After winning independence, American news entities began to practice journalism under the Libertarian Theory, which stated that interference from kings or governors should be restrained.⁶ The Libertarian Theory also stated that the mass media was to be privately owned and the theory prioritized freedom of thought and individualism.

After independence, newspapers that fell along party lines grew quickly – thanks to the U.S. Constitution guaranteeing freedom of the press and subsidies from the U.S. Postal Service.

In the 1830s, newspapers became less partisan and cheaper, selling for as little as a penny. This allowed people from different political leanings and economic levels to enjoy the same publications – and it allowed publishers to reach a mass audience. But most of the owners, publishers, and editors at these newspapers were often white, wealthy men, and this limited group decided what the news was for the mass audience.

Under the Gatekeeping Theory, these owners were considered the gatekeepers of news and information for the general public.

The gatekeeper decides “what information should move to group or individual and what information should not. Here, the gatekeeper are the decision makers who letting the whole social system. The gatekeeper is having its own influence like social, cultural, ethical and political. Based on personal or social influences they let the information to the group.”⁷

Even after the arrival of radio in 1920 and television in 1940, the news media largely dictated what was most important. Station and network owners, reporters and producers were again mostly white, generally affluent, and college educated. They decided what information the majority of Americans was exposed to.

“With the rise of the Internet era, traditional news faced many challenges in transmitting the messages to their audiences,” according to Cheney Thomas’ 2013 thesis for the University of Gothenburg in Sweden. “This change in delivering news to certain target groups brought about a transformation from the top-down model of journalism, with writers as gatekeepers of information, to a decentralized system where users have a more active role in the formation of news.”⁸

The people who owned or worked at these newspapers and broadcast stations were considered the gatekeepers of news and other information vital to the public. As news companies began to conglomerate – buy up multiple newspapers, magazines, TV, and/or radio stations – the public began to question whether all the news “fit to print” was meant for the public or a select few.

“There is another sector of the media, the elite media, sometimes called the agenda-setting media because they are the ones with the big resources, they set the framework in which everyone else operates,” wrote Noam Chomsky in his 1997 article, “What Makes Mainstream Media Mainstream.” “The New York Times and CBS, that kind of thing. Their audience is mostly privileged people. The people who read the New York Times—people who are wealthy or part of what is sometimes called the political class—they are actually involved in the political system in an ongoing fashion.”⁹

The Agenda-Setting Theory states that in “choosing and displaying news, editors, newsroom staff, and broadcasters play an important part in shaping political reality. Readers learn not only about a given issue, but also how much importance to attach to that issue from the amount of information in a news story and its position. In reflecting what candidates are saying during a campaign, the mass media may well determine the important issues—that is, the media may set the ‘agenda’ of the campaign.”¹⁰

Even though the role of the news media was considered vital to public discourse, many in the news business did not shy away from racy headlines, revealing photos, and other sensationalized news stories as a way to gain audience share. As publishers fought to attract more readers and broadcasters sought to steal listeners and viewers away from other stations, sensationalism, defined as “the act of foregoing accuracy or dignity in order to capture headlines or public attention,”¹¹ skyrocketed.

By World War II, public outcry over elitism, sensationalism, and media conglomeration prompted a small group of powerful journalist and educators to form the Hutchins Commission. Worried that the freedom of the press was in danger, the commission came up with five recommendations¹² to address the public’s concerns:

(1) truthful, comprehensive, and intelligent account of the day’s events;

(2) a forum for the exchange of comment and criticism;

(3) the projection of a representative picture of the constituent groups in the society;

(4) the presentation and clarification of the goals and values of the society;

(5) full access to the day’s intelligence.

These recommendations initially met with resistance within the media industry, but over time many companies and individuals embraced these principles, adopting ethical guidelines and policies that are relied upon by journalists and journalism schools to this day.

Through self-regulation, media companies were able to avoid more public outcry and possible government interference, preserving the freedom of the press, which had been wri...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• List of Illustrations
• Introduction
• Part I History and Overview of the Evolution of Social Media in Journalism
• Part II The Practice of Social Media Journalism
• Glossary
• Index