I found an article on mashable.com called “Social Networks Dominate Online News Distribution”. To sum up the article, it says that 43% of online news sharing occurs through social networking. Then it goes on to say how the average person shares 13 news stories a week. I found this intriguing because I usually get my news via my facebook wall feed. I’ve found that I’ve begun to rely on my newsfeed to keep me current on ongoing topics. I’ve been liking more and more fan pages that generate daily news just to get the most up to date news possible. I’ve even been trying to log in to twitter daily, just to check the trending topics to see if there is anything going on that I haven’t heard about.
When a breaking news event happens, the way I hear about it is someone sharing the story via facebook. If it wasn’t for social networks, I’d probably turn towards another sources, but with the instant updates through social networks, there is no need to go to other sources, especially when I am already on a page like facebook; it’s like killing two birds with one stone!
I feel what I read and what I experience are very accurate. The next highest source of news sharing is email, which I also feel is accurate, because I definitely share and receive current event updates through my email. What’s great about news sharing via social networks is that privacy setting don’t matter. As long as you’re friends with a person, you can see their current newsfeed. Also, once a link is posted, it’s just a click away to read the story if one chooses to. Instant news, with little effort, why would anyone want to get their news any other way?!
The Progression of Sharing News on Facebook
ReplyDeleteI liked the article that Tracy referenced (http://mashable.com/2010/10/07/cnn-news-study/) and I liked her blog. I identify with it so much because I spend about 60% of my time on facebook just sharing local news and talking about what’s going on with friends. I’m glad to see an article that shows that there are people out there like me.
I was introduced to sharing the news when I added an old high school buddy about two years ago. After adding him, my wall was flooded with what’s going on in Georgia (the nation). He had been abroad. Some friends had complained that he posted these articles too frequently and even threatened to delete him if he didn’t relax with the Georgia posts. While he thought it was funny, he did get the message and limited his updates.
While he chose to edit himself, now facebook helps edit streams for you. I’ve heard that facebook has an algorithm where you see more posts from the people that you interact with rather than seeing every single posting from every single friend that you have. So if I did not interact with my high school buddy, I wouldn’t see as many Georgia updates as someone who interacted with him every day.
Now facebook is introducing “Groups”. Here is an article about them: http://gigaom.com/2010/10/11/why-facebook-groups-is-a-big-deal/
I will use groups to change how I share my news. On facebook, I am friends with the local news channels in Philadelphia, Baltimore/DC, and Hampton Roads, Virginia. I consider all of these places home. So if something is going on at “home” that is interesting to me, and I think the people at “home” would like to know, now I just blindly share it with everyone. With the adoption of facebook groups, I can share the news with the people who will care about it the most. Too bad my old high school buddy didn’t have this option two years ago.