Everyone I am sure has different ways which they get their news daily, whether it’s Journal Star, USA Today, Daily Nebraska, Omaha World Harold, or Google News. Some even might get their news of off Facebook; I wouldn’t be surprised of that. One of the things that I come across is that not everyone gets their news from actual news source. It has nothing to do with not wanting to read the news but also with how busy our daily lives are with work, school, family and other responsibilities that we don’t necessarily have time to read about what is going on around our town, country or the world.
For example today, I was busy with school and work I hardly had time to even check my e-mail. So after coming home from class my husband said, “did you read about what happened at the Domodedovo International Airport in Moscow?” Of course I said no and asked what had happened. Now, some people also might not care to know about what had happened in Moscow Airport especially is they never traveled their or have family that live in Moscow. That is the airport I have been to at least 10 times if not more while traveling, I had sat in some of those chairs while waiting for my connecting flight.
The first week of class we touched on the subject of how fast news travels now versus decades ago where it would be months before we heard the news let alone have the list of people who are injured and dead the day the bombing took place. The reason I wanted to blog about news and how we get news and how fast was because it can be detrimental to how we react or perceive daily news. When the earthquake happened in Haiti, within hours there were monetary donations set up along with volunteers leaving their work or house to go over and help. News Media from newspaper to Anderson Cooper were their no shorter than a day to give us the latest of what the situation looked like from Haiti. Also, when the 9/11 happened I was in Lincoln East High school on a lock down within the hours of what happened in New York City, no one was to leave the school unless otherwise decided by the principal it was safe to leave.
The way we get our daily news today it’s much faster than anyone would want to get it. But it’s also beneficial for those who would want to make decisions based on what is going on around them. I am just glad that no family of mine was in Domodedovo Airport when the bombing took place, but I also know that a lot of Tajik people got hurt or died and my prayers go out to their families.
You are correct about the way that most people get their news. The majority of people hear about news through their network, not from news sources.
ReplyDeleteYour conclusion spoke to me: "The way we get our daily news today is much faster than anyone would want to get it. But it’s also beneficial for those who would want to make decisions based on what is going on around them."
ReplyDeleteAs a journalist, my immediate reaction was, "no, it's not faster than anyone would want." Many news and info sources provide info nearly immediately to audiences who want and need it that fast, if not faster (as you point out ... it's beneficial for people who need it to make decisions. People who tweet about an accident in Lincoln aren't helping out anyone who's seeing it two hours later but could've gotten home earlier had they known before they got in their cars).
Then, I realized, the speed of news and information is actually more complicated and more difficult for news organizations to provide than that. People want and need news and information exactly when they want it -- all the time. And it's been a huge adjustment for the industry, which spent many, many years setting the news schedule themselves and expecting consumers / audiences to adjust to their timetables.
Now when our audiences want news, we still are expected to anticipate and be ready to cover whatever that important news is -- whether it's a car accident or other breaking news event, or a national story, or a sporting event, or an in-depth analysis piece. Then we're expected to provide at least some information immediately for those getting it over their networks. Then we have to continue to report, write, edit and design it for our print readers, who are willing to wait to get their news product. But they expect more -- more analysis, maybe more pictures or layers to a story. And they certainly are less forgiving of incomplete information or typographical errors than readers of "breaking news" on websites tend to be.
And I agree with Chad: Networks have created a whole new giant dissemination method, and it's taken a long time for a lot of news sources to figure it out, catch up to it and figure out how best to use that to their advantage.