Out Of The Mind.

Social Networking as News – Facebook

aeplatt — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 19:56:30 +0000

Facebook, as one of the leading powers in social networking sites at the moment, is essentially the definition of a news source. It provides up to date information from users of their personal lives, actions, stories, and interests.

Facebook’s About page gives more specific information about how they allow users to “[Give] people the power to share and make the world more open and connected.” The About page gives a blog style resource for users to have constant updates on changes to the platform from the engineers themselves. In an early entry from Mark Zuckerberg, the creater of Facebook, he maintains that, “It’s our goal to provide a tool that helps people understand what’s going on with the people around them.”

Facebook acknowledges its role as a news source, if non-traditional. This video, while poking fun of the functions of Facebook proves that everyone understands how Facebook can be used to communicate between peers.

“Non-Traditional” News Gathering – Social Networks

aeplatt — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 18:16:11 +0000

According to media professionals, news is not limited to the sites listed in the previous post alone. The official definition of news, according to www.merriam-webster.com is:

Main Entry: news

Pronunciation: \ˈnüz, ˈnyüz\

Function: noun plural but singular in construction

Usage: often attributive

Date: 15th century

1 a : a report of recent events b : previously unknown information c : something having a specified influence or effect
2 a : material reported in a newspaper or news periodical or on a newscast b : matter that is newsworthy
3 : newscast

From this definition, news is not simply hard-hitting stories that we read in The New York Times, or international coverage of the Iraq War on CNN, it can be anything.

Let’s examine news from another perspective. What about social networking sites? Can they count as news?

Here are some of the most popular social networking sites that are in fact being used to gather potential story ideas, and provide information on a less formal scale, but still new and valuable news information nonetheless.

What is news?

aeplatt — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:52:09 +0000

What is news? For some this question is easy to answer. They can provide specific “trustworthy” news sites that they turn to when gathering news information.

Here are a few examples of these “traditional” sites.

But, what happens if someone gathers their news outside of these sources? Are they valid news pieces, or does that make them a different kind of information?