Chapter 8 Links and Info  The following story comes from the Pew Research Center, which regularly does research on  different aspects of journalism. It considers the role of the Internet in the contemporary news  industry and audiences.     Here is the link if you would like to see the original story: http://www.journalism.org/  analysis_report/new_media_old_media    Understanding the Participatory News Consumer    How internet and cell phone users have turned news into a social experience    In the digital era, news has become omnipresent. Americans access it in multiple formats on  multiple platforms on myriad devices. The days of loyalty to a particular news organization on a  particular piece of technology in a particular form are gone. The overwhelming majority of   Americans (92%) use multiple platforms to get news on a typical day, including national TV, local  TV, the internet, local newspapers, radio, and national newspapers. Some 46% of Americans say  they get news from four to six media platforms on a typical day. Just 7% get their news from a  single media platform on a typical day.    The internet is at the center of the story of how people’s relationship to news is changing. Six in  ten Americans (59%) get news from a combination of online and offline sources on a typical day,  and the internet is now the third most popular news platform, behind local television news and  national television news.    The process Americans use to get news is based on foraging and opportunism. They seem to  access news when the spirit moves them or they have a chance to check up on headlines. At the  same time, gathering the news is not entirely an open‐ended exploration for consumers, even  online where there are limitless possibilities for exploring news. While online, most people say  they use between two and five online news sources and 65% say they do not have a single  favorite website for news. Some 21% say they routinely rely on just one site for their news and  information.    In this new multi‐platform media environment, people’s relationship to news is becoming  portable, personalized, and participatory. These new metrics stand out:  • Portable: 33% of cell phone owners now access news on their cell phones.  • Personalized: 28% of internet users have customized their home page to include news  from sources and on topics that particularly interest them.  • Participatory: 37% of internet users have contributed to the creation of news,  commented about it, or disseminated it via postings on social media sites like Facebook  or Twitter.    To a great extent, people’s experience of news, especially on the internet, is becoming a shared  social experience as people swap links in emails, post news stories on their social networking  site feeds, highlight news stories in their Tweets, and haggle over the meaning of events in  discussion threads. For instance, more than 8 in 10 online news consumers get or share links in  emails.    Chap.

1. Chapter 8 Links and Info
The following story comes from the Pew Research Center, whic
h regularly does research on
different aspects of journalism. It considers the role of the Inter
net in the contemporary news
industry and audiences.
Here is the link if you would like to see the original story: http:/
/www.journalism.org/
analysis_report/new_media_old_media
Understanding the Participatory News Consumer
How internet and cell phone users have turned news into a socia
l experience
In the digital era, news has become omnipresent. Americans acc
ess it in multiple formats on
multiple platforms on myriad devices. The days of loyalty to a p
articular news organization on a
particular piece of technology in a particular form are gone. The
overwhelming majority of
Americans (92%) use multiple platforms to get news on a typica
l day, including national TV, local
TV, the internet, local newspapers, radio, and national newspap
ers. Some 46% of Americans say
they get news from four to six media platforms on a typical day.
Just 7% get their news from a
single media platform on a typical day.
The internet is at the center of the story of how people’s relatio

2. nship to news is changing. Six in
ten Americans (59%) get news from a combination of online and
offline sources on a typical day,
and the internet is now the third most popular news platform, be
hind local television news and
national television news.
The process Americans use to get news is based on foraging and
opportunism. They seem to
access news when the spirit moves them or they have a chance t
o check up on headlines. At the
same time, gathering the news is not entirely an open‐ended exp
loration for consumers, even
online where there are limitless possibilities for exploring news.
While online, most people say
they use between two and five online news sources and 65% say
they do not have a single
favorite website for news. Some 21% say they routinely rely on
just one site for their news and
information.
In this new multi‐platform media environment, people’s relation
ship to news is becoming
portable, personalized, and participatory. These new metrics sta
nd out:
•
Portable: 33% of cell phone owners now access news on their ce
ll phones.
•
Personalized: 28% of internet users have customized their home
page to include news
from sources and on topics that particularly interest them.
•
Participatory: 37% of internet users have contributed to the crea

3. tion of news,
commented about it, or disseminated it via postings on social m
edia sites like Facebook
or Twitter.
To a great extent, people’s experience of news, especially on th
e internet, is becoming a shared
social experience as people swap links in emails, post news stor
ies on their social networking
site feeds, highlight news stories in their Tweets, and haggle ov
er the meaning of events in
discussion threads. For instance, more than 8 in 10 online news
consumers get or share links in
emails.
Chapter 8 Links and Info
The rise of the internet as a news platform has been an integral
part of these changes. This
report discusses two significant technological trends that have i
nfluences news consumption
behavior: First, the advent of social media like social networkin
g sites and blogs has helped the
news become a social experience in fresh ways for consumers. P
eople use their social networks
and social networking technology to filter, assess, and react to n
ews. Second, the ascent of
mobile connectivity via smart phones has turned news gathering
and news awareness into an
anytime, anywhere affair for a segment of avid news watchers.

4. These are some of the key findings to come out of a new survey
by the Pew Internet & American
Life Project and the Project for Excellence in Journalism aimed
at understanding the new news
landscape. Below are some of the other key findings:
The internet has surpassed newspapers and radio in popularity a
s a news platform on a typical
day and now ranks just behind TV.
More than half of American adults (56%) say they follow the ne
ws “all or most of the time,” and
another quarter (25%) follow the news at least “some of the tim
e.” Asked specifically about
their news habits on “a typical day,” the results are striking: 99
% of American adults say that on
a typical day, they get news from at least one of these media pla
tforms: a local or national print
newspaper, a local or national television news broadcast, radio,
or the internet.
Only local and national TV news, the latter if you combine cabl
e and network, are more popular
platforms than the internet for news. And most Americans use a
combination of both online and
offline sources. On a typical day:
• 78% of Americans say they get news from a local TV station
•
73% say they get news from a national network such as CBS or
cable TV station such as
CNN or FoxNews
• 61% say they get some kind of news online
•
54% say they listen to a radio news program at home or in the c

5. ar
• 50% say they read news in a local newspaper
•
17% say they read news in a national newspaper such as the Ne
w York Times or USA
Today.
Americans today routinely get their news from multiple sources
and a mix of platforms. Nine in
ten American adults (92%) get news from multiple platforms on
a typical day, with half of those
using four to six platforms daily. Fully 59% get news from a co
mbination of online and offline
sources on a typical day. Just over a third (38%) rely solely on
offline sources, and 2% rely
exclusively on the internet for their daily news.
The average online consumer regularly turns to only a few webs
ites.
Most news consumers utilize multiple platforms for news, but o
nline their range of specific
outlets is limited. The majority of online news consumers (57%)
say they routinely rely on just
two to five websites for their news. Only 11% say they get their
news from more than five
websites, and 21% regularly rely on just one site.
Chapter 8 Links and Info
Moreover, many do not have strong loyalty to particular online
sources. When asked whether

6. they have a favorite online news source, the majority of online
news users (65%) say they do
not. Among those who do, the most popular sites are those of m
ajor news organizations such as
such as CNN and Fox.
Internet users use the web for a range of news, but local is not n
ear the top of the list.
The most popular online news subjects are the weather (followe
d by 81% of internet news
users), national events (73%), health and medicine (66%), busin
ess and the economy (64%),
international events (62%), and science and technology (60%).
Asked what subjects they would like to receive more coverage,
44% said scientific news and
discoveries, 41% said religion and spirituality, 39% said health
and medicine, 39% said their state
government, and 38% said their neighborhood or local communi
ty.
News consumption is a socially‐engaging and socially‐driven ac
tivity, especially online. The
public is clearly part of the news process now. Participation co
mes more through sharing than
through contributing news themselves.
Getting news is often an important social act. Some 72% of Am
erican news consumers say they
follow the news because they enjoy talking with others about w
hat is happening in the world
and 69% say keeping up with the news is a social or civic obliga
tion. And 50% of American news
consumers say they rely to some degree on people around them t
o tell them the news they

7. need to know. Online, the social experience is widespread:
•
75% of online news consumers say they get news forwarded thr
ough email or posts on
social networking sites and 52% say they share links to news wi
th others via those
means.
•
51% of social networking site (e.g. Facebook) users who are als
o online news consumers
say that on a typical day they get news items from people they f
ollow. Another 23% of
this cohort follow news organizations or individual journalists o
n social networking sites.
Some 37% of internet users have contributed to the creation of n
ews, commentary about it, or
dissemination of news via social media. They have done at least
one of the following:
commenting on a news story (25%); posting a link on a social n
etworking site (17%); tagging
content (11%), creating their own original news material or opin
ion piece (9%), or Tweeting
about news (3%).
News is pocket‐sized.
Some 80% of American adults have cell phones today, and 37%
of them go online from their
phones. The impact of this new mobile technology on news gath
ering is unmistakable. One
quarter (26%) of all Americans say they get some form of news
via cell phone today–that

8. amounts to 33% of cell phone owners.
Wireless news consumers have fitted this “on‐the‐go” access to
news into their already
voracious news‐gathering habits. They use multiple news media
platforms on a typical day,
forage widely on news topics, and browse the web for a host of
subjects.
Chapter 8 Links and Info
News is personalized: The “Daily Me” takes shape.
Some 28% of internet users have customized their home page to
include news from their
favorite source or topics and 40% of internet users say an impor
tant feature of a news website
to them is the ability to customize the news they get from the sit
e. Moreover, 36% of internet
users say an important part of a news website to them is the abil
ity to manipulate content
themselves such as graphics, maps, and quizzes.
News is easier to follow now, but overwhelming. And most topi
cs get plenty of coverage, in
Americans’ eyes.
Americans send mixed messages in the survey about how they f
eel in a world where news is
updated constantly and they can access news all the time. We as
ked respondents about how
the volume of news might play into this: “Compared with five y
ears ago, do you think it is easier

9. or harder to keep up with news and information today?” Some 5
5% say it is easier, only 18% say
it is harder. One quarter of adults (25%) say there is no differen
ce between now and five years
ago.
Yet even as they say it is easier to keep up with the news, Amer
icans still feel overwhelmed.
Fully 70% agreed with that statement: “The amount of news and
information available from
different sources today is overwhelming.” Some 25% “complete
ly agreed” with that statement
and 45% “mostly agreed.”
Good news, bad news about media performance.
When it comes to the quality of coverage itself, respondents giv
e correspondingly mixed signals.
Just under two‐thirds (63%) agree with statement that “major ne
ws organizations do a good job
covering all of the important news stories and subjects that matt
er to me.” Yet 72% also back
the idea that “most news sources today are biased in their cover
age.” Some of the explanation
for this dichotomy seems to be rooted in the views of partisans.
Liberals and Democrats are
more likely to say the big news organizations do a good job on s
ubjects that matter to them,
while conservatives and Republicans are the ones most likely to
see coverage as biased.
Questions
1.
How does news become a “social experience,” according to this
article?
2.

10. What are the different ways in which people access news? What
is the most popular way?
The least popular way? Where does the Internet fall in that rang
e?
3. How do people personalize their news?
Chapter 8 Summary
The Evolution of American Newspapers
American newspapers can trace their colonial roots back almost
a century before the American
Revolution. One of the best papers of the colonial era was the P
ennsylvania Gazette, run by
Benjamin Franklin starting in 1729. Newspapers of this era tend
ed to develop along one of two
lines, the partisan press, which generally represented the views
of one political party, and the
commercial press, which reported things like shipping news. Up
until the 1830s, these papers
were sold by yearly subscriptions and were read by more affluen
t people. But in 1833, the
penny paper was born when Benjamin Day dropped the price of
the New York Sun to a penny
and started focusing on human–
interest stories to appeal to a mass audience that included
lower– and middle–
class readers. As the number of newspapers grew, six New York
papers
founded the Associated Press, the first of the wire services. Co
mpetition and the growing
popularity of penny papers brought about the era of yellow jour

11. nalism. The two newspaper
owners most associated with this brand of journalism were Jose
ph Pulitzer and William
Randolph Hearst. Yellow journalism ended up being something
of a contradiction. On the one
hand it sensationalized stories that focused on scandals, crime, a
nd disasters or just made up
stories to sell papers. On the other hand, the same papers would
become powerful instruments
for social reform and pioneered investigative journalism.
Competing Models of Modern Print Journalism
Just before the start of the twentieth century, Adolph Ochs cham
pioned the idea of an
informative and impartial newspaper with the New York Times.
This could be seen as the start
of objective journalism becoming the ideal for modern journalis
ts. Often using the inverted–
pyramid style of reporting, this style of journalism drew a line b
etween reports and opinion
columns, and dictated a neutral stance by reporters.
Despite the dominance of “just–the–
facts” reporting, by the 1920s it was also apparent to some
critics that the approach wasn’t always effective at explaining a
complex and increasingly
interconnected world. Some of this need for greater explanation,
context, and analysis was met
by interpretive journalism. This reaction against the objective a
pproach to modern reporting
also found a home in the tradition of literary journalism, which
used fictional storytelling
techniques within nonfiction material. In the last decades of the
twentieth century, journalism
found itself deeply affected by the visual and storytelling style

12. of television news, and then the
Internet.
Two developments in the 1980s changed the landscape of moder
n journalism. USA Today
arrived in 1982, bringing TV–
inspired color to newspapers, and newspapers began to publish
online, starting with the Columbus Dispatch in 1980. Online jou
rnalism is completely changing
the industry. Readers are getting their news from a variety of on
line sources, online news has
sped up the news cycle, and nontraditional online news has begu
n to influence the types of
stories reported by traditional news sources.
The Business and Ownership of Newspapers
There are several kinds of newspapers in the industry today, and
they serve many different
roles. Smaller nondaily papers that typically carry information o
n local schools, social events,
and items of community interest are focused on consensus–
oriented journalism. Papers that
Chapter 8 Summary
tend to cover more of the events or issues that deviate from the
accepted standard (usually
larger dailies) practice conflict–
oriented journalism. In addition to those categories, there are
smaller weekly and monthly papers that serve specific minority
groups in the United States such
as Spanish–
speaking immigrants, retired workers, and the gay and lesbian c

13. ommunities. In the
1960s, there was a sudden increase of alternative papers, or the
underground press, that
questioned mainstream politics and conventional values by voici
ng radical opinions.
Despite their differences, all newspapers tend to operate in som
e similar ways. They have staff,
including editors and reporters, who work to fill the newshole, t
he space in a paper that isn’t
taken up by advertising. Sometimes these papers use feature syn
dicates to help fill the
newshole. However, recent consolidation and cutbacks, especial
ly in large papers owned as part
of financially troubled newspaper chains, have led to layoffs an
d the closing of bureaus outside
of a paper’s city limits. In order to stay in business, some paper
s have entered into joint
operating agreements (JOAs) to partially combine operations wi
th other papers.
Challenges Facing Newspapers Today
The newspaper industry has suffered several devastating setback
s in the last thirty years.
Readership has been declining for a century, but with more and
more news consumers going
online, the drop has been accelerating. At the same time, the rec
ent recession has caused
advertisers to cut their ad budgets, simultaneously threatening t
he two traditional ways
newspapers make money –
subscriptions and advertising. However, as seems to be typical
of
mass media industries, newspapers are attempting to adapt and l
ook for ways to improve their

14. economic outlook. Many small–
town papers are actually doing better than their big–city
counterparts, partly because of their smaller debt load and their
extremely local focus, which
doesn’t have the same kinds of competition from other media.
Newspapers are also struggling to find ways to make their onlin
e versions profitable after
essentially giving away their content for free online. At the sam
e time, nonprofessional bloggers
are challenging newspapers’ authority and leading the new phen
omenon of citizen journalism—
a movement where concerned citizens and activist amateurs diss
eminate news and information,
typically online through blogs. The lines between blogging and
journalism continue to blur, as
established journalists leave traditional news agencies for the bl
ogosphere, and traditional news
agencies hire journalists to blog for their Web sites.
Some concerned journalism critics are suggesting different busi
ness models and ideas to combat
newspapers’ decline, including having wealthy universities supp
ort newspapers or to have them
operate as nonprofits.
Newspapers and Democracy
Despite all the turmoil in the newspaper industry, newspapers h
ave the longest and strongest
role in sustaining democracy. As a result, media observers are v
ery worried about the short–
and long–
term impact of newspapers closing or drastically cutting their ne
ws staffs.