1-5 Blog: Influence of the Media

There are many forms of new media that I use daily. I use my phone, my computer, the Internet, and Facebook all daily. Because of that, social media has influenced my perspective of events because it has given me the ability to learn things so quickly. Things like Twitter have created a world where I can get information about events the minute that they are occurring, something that never could happen in the past (Baran, 2014). Newspapers used to report information days later, and now information can be posted minutes later (Baran, 2014; Kovach & Rosenstiel, 2010).

Is this a positive thing? I can honestly see both sides of this question. It is a positive thing in the fact that information can be spread so much faster (Baran, 2014; Bauder, 2011; Farhi, 2012). It has created a wider audience for information, which I think is good and important (Baran, 2014; Kovach & Rosenstiel, 2010). People should be able to be informed of things, and the vast majority of people are now able to get information (Kovach & Rosenstiel, 2010). All of that is a positive influence in how social media has influenced people’s perspective of events.

On the other hand, though, because information can spread so quickly now, it is hard to know what is true and what is not true (Baran, 2014; Weinberger, 2012). Furthermore, because people want to be the first to post new information, sometimes that information can be biased and the audience may not realize or even notice that (Baran, 2014). To me, that is a negative thing. When information was more controlled, although it may have reached a smaller audience, it was reported in a less biased manner and was also correct (Kovach & Rosenstiel, 2010). With all of the competition to be the first one to report information, sometimes what is reported is incorrect, and because of social media, that incorrect information can spread quickly to a wide audience (Baran, 2014; Bauder, 2011; Farhi, 2012). That is a major negative aspect of the influences of social media.

So overall does the positive outweigh the negative? In my opinion it does because people should be able to get information faster. Furthering that, the negative aspects that I mentioned could be fixed. None of those issues are things that have to occur, they are just a result of the need to be the first to announce information, and so they could be corrected (Baran, 2014; Bauder, 2011; Farhi, 2012). Will they be? The answer, unfortunately, is probably not because the competition for being the first to have information is only going to grow, but that does not mean that it cannot happen (Baran, 2014; Bauder, 2011; Farhi, 2012).

Reference:

Baran, S. J. (2014). Introduction to mass communication: Media literacy and culture. (8^th ed.) New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Bauder, D. (2011, January 9). Media outlets apologize after falsely reporting Giffords’ death. Associated Press. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/10/media-outlets-apologize-a_n_806603.html

Farhi, P. (2012, December 18). Media too quick to fill in the gaps in story of school shooting in Newtown, Conn. The Washington Post. Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/media-too-quick-to-fill-in-the-gaps-in-story-of-school-shooting-in-newtown-conn/2012/12/18/368ae690-4959-11e2-ad54-580638ede391_story.html

Kovach, B. & Rosenstiel, T. (2010). Blur: How to know what’s true in the age of information overload. New York: Bloomsbury, USA.

Weinberger, D. (2012, February 17). The changing nature of knowledge in the Internet age [Interview by B. Gladstone]. Retrieved from http://www.onthemedia.org/story/187775-changing-nature-knowledge-internet-age/transcript/