As we have all heard, Osama Bin Laden has been deemed dead by the United States of America and many other countries. Whether or not he is actually dead is irrelevant at this point because before 10 pm last night, America, or at least all my facebook friends were in celebration of Osama Bin Laden's death. I question who actually acquired this information from credible sources like the nightly news or through internet news broadcasting networks as opposed to the social networking sites themselves before they began posting comments and tweeting in a frenzy. I am guilty of finding out through facebook, although I thoroughly researched it after seeing many posts
I read an article about a man who lived in Abbottabad, Pakistan who was tweeting as the events of Osama's death began to unfold. Twitter and facebook have become the people's main means of acquiring information and is seems this has gotten a bit dangerous. This man who was simply tweeting an simple annoyance of noise has become a celebrity over night. Many people forget about the real situation at hand, neglect to do any research of their own, and rely on each other for such delicate information. It is interesting that news broadcasting networks have shed great light to an individual innocently tweeting about outside interruptions that were related to the actual death of Osama Bin Laden, but had absolutely nothing to do with the actual killing of Osama. The fact that any miniscule, seemingly meaningless piece of information that one posts on social media networks can be related to such an important event and can become known by the world in depth is definitely an effect of the new media. This normal man is now known internationally for tweeting the death of a United States enemy as it happened and without knowning.
What does this mean for future situations similar to this? I wonder if reporters will look to social media networks for information, perhaps not for first hand, hard news, but maybe for some type of idea or direction toward a certain topic. Facebook and Twitter are easily accessible to everyone, they are structured in a very simple form; people's statuses and tweets are usually to-the-point making it faster to obtain the main idea of whatever the topic may be. I don't think that this is too far fetched of an idea seeing how most of the people in our generation get big news from their facebook friends although I do find it a bit problematic.
The prominence of social networking sites could also potentially have a negative effect on the career of journalism. If over time people choose to neglect watching the news or buying newspapers because they feel anything important/big enough will be posted by at least one of their facebook friends. People's reliance on reporters may go down because there is "citizen reporting" going on in the world wide web.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/05/02/135913093/raid-on-bin-laden-was-live-blogged-though-the-blogger-didnt-know-it
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/05/02/135905185/osama-bin-laden-is-dead-officials-say
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/03/world/asia/osama-bin-laden-dead.html?hp
Monday, May 2, 2011
Friday, April 1, 2011
Facebook is in
Facebook, Google, and Microsoft are hiring many employees who worked in Washington as an attempt to create and maintain a friendly relationship with those who have the authority to question the private policies that these websites have. Facebook is not being particular about which party or which administration their employees once worked for, they're simply looking to get in. Regardless of what qualities these people have to work within the confines of a social networking site, they are hired to save facebook's ass if ever in a private policy jam (NOW). Among the people working for facebook that were and still are closely connected to Washington are: Sheryl Sandberg , Ted Ullyot, Robert Gibbs.
I can't help but to think that the relationship that is being created between Facebook and Washington is similar to the relationship that newspapers and television news broadcasting networks have with the government. There are journalists within the government, and the closer that they are with government officials, their access to information increases. On the other hand if the Washington keeps a close relationship with reporters and news broadcasting companies, make appearances, have their own thirty minute shows etc., they have the ability to set the agenda. It seems to be a win-win situation for everyone except for the consumers. Although Facebook is not a news broadcasting network by any means, information, news (hard and soft) makes its way through. Media evolves over time, the death of the hard print newspapers has opened up a door for the internet world. Just as more people prefer to watch prime television than the evening news, more people browse through Facebook than an online news media outlet. Just as some people rely on Facebook to get important information, some feel responsible for delivering the news themselves.
In a Seattle Times Article, the author wrote about the privacy concerns the FTC expressed about Facebook’s applications and how some of them (like the “like” application) are used in marketing schemes to see consumer preferences and trends. If the private information we provide to Facebook is being used for marketing tactics, I can only imagine how it can be used or has been used for elections.
As media has evolved over so have elections; they went from word of mouth, to newspapers, to television news broadcasting networks, to entertainment talk shows, blogs, and even social networking sites. It is possible that the politicians will learn to use a website like Facebook, which has faults in its private policy and use these faults to their advantages to advertise their campaign in the correct way. If they are able to use the “like” application on the site to see who their supporters are and what they are consuming, politicians will be able to target their audiences more directly. This would make it easier for them to influence the public in a more precise way; using personal information that is deemed private.
Building a false relationship with followers would be easier for politicians because information about their audience is easily accessible to them (whether or not it’s against the right to privacy). The 2004 Dean campaign was successful at building a façade for their audience by the use of their blog. The Dean campaign set a precedent for future campaigns. It emphasized the importance of a relationship between the politicians, their audience, and new means of communication (internet/blogs). With Facebook representatives lobbying in Washington, and with Washington interested in following their personal agendas, there is really no hope for the promised privacy we anticipate when setting up our Faceboooks.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2011/03/29/134953714/facebook-google-battle-for-obama-washington-supremacy
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/29/technology/29facebook.html?pagewanted=1&src=un&feedurl=http://json8.nytimes.com/pages/politics/index.jsonp
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Public Broadcasting in Danger?
There is a national understanding that in order to create an adequate budget for the United States, cuts have to be made, but where? It is unbelievable that in order to decrease federal spending, Congress is willing to cut funding for the National Public Radio and other federally funded news broadcasting agencies. Although those in favor of cuts for the funding of NPR argue that these broadcasting networks do not elicit many viewers and would therefore not have significant effects on Americans, they would. The reality of the situation is that there are viewers who depend on the National Public Radio for a relatively neutral, objective perspective on politics and hard news. National Public Radio has a website with a clear structure and content meant to deliver the facts. People who depend on public broadcasting should not be denied the opportunity to get a hold of such a medium.
The implications of the federal government's proposed cut on these federal broadcasting networks are negative and send mixed signals to the public. It gives the illusion that Congress is indifferent about the public's means of acquiring news; it would give the public a misconception that hard news is dispensable. If this proposed cut passes the budget, the members of Congress' disinterest in these news broadcasting networks will eventually trickle down to the public and create a nation that cares less about the hard news than ever before (if even possible).
Perhaps Congress' disinterest in public broadcasting stems from the resignation of Ronald Schiller, the vice president of fundraising for NPR. He resigned shortly after being secretly recorded making comments regarding the need for NPR to acquire more outside funding in hopes of becoming more independent from the government and making negative comments about the Republican Party and members of the Tea Party.
NPR and PBS differ from other news broadcasting networks because big corporations, which make the news homogenous on many levels, do not own them. By cutting NPR and other nationally funded broadcasting networks the government would be allowing the audience to focus only on news/broadcasting networks that are applicable to themselves and their own beliefs. Congress is paving the way for more fragmentation to occur.
Hirschorn writes in the article "End Times" that along with financial struggles come mass lay offs and a decrease in the amount of funding The New York Times is able to give reporters for specific stories. This parallels the outcome of public broadcasting networks if federal funding is cut. If there is no money to send journalists to obtain first hand information across the country and abroad, then the national broadcasting networks cannot fulfill their role as unbiased news reporters because they would be forced to obtain their information through other privately owned broadcasting networks. This would defeat the purpose of having a National Public Radio or any federal broadcasting network because they would become dependent upon other news agencies; thus giving the American public fewer options.
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