Journalism and New media

In the information age, not a single news website features in America's ten most visited websites. Leading the news organizations is CNN.com, ranked 16^th in terms of traffic, followed by Newyorktimes.com at 23 and BBC.co.uk at a distant 43. In fact, CNN.com (placed 16^th) has less traffic than social networking sites, MySpace.com (ranked 3^rd) and facebook.com (ranked 7^th); blogger.com (ranked 12^th) and another blogging portal with image hosting, Photobucket.com (ranked 15^th).

In the book Here Comes Everybody, Clay Shirky brings to light just how innately social human beings are, and how prone humans are to forming groups and/or categories of people. According to Shirky, an impact of technology is to enable "new kind of group-forming." It is not surprising then that most of the most popular websites in America today, work primarily on user-generated content and social interaction. For instance, MySpace.com is ranked 3^rd most popular. Youtube.com is 4^th and facebook.com is 5^th. Ebay.com (ranked 8^th) and craigslist.org (ranked 11^th), are both sites that work primarily of buyer-seller interaction; auctions and/or bargaining. These two shopping sites are ranked higher than amazon.com (13^th).

But in the news media, it's a little more difficult to analyze the situation. User generated content is indeed popular. When it comes to opinions, on a daily basis, a smaller community website seems much preferred. Blogs find an online community of people that share the same locality, opinions and/or concern.

However, when it comes to major events, such as McCain's announcement of his vice presidential candidate, people will first turn to legacy media like The Washington Post and The New York Times, just to know the raw facts. They will get their information here, and this information will prove to be a building block to forming individualized opinions of the event. These opinions will be expressed on blogs and other such new media which have an active, loyal online audience. Most of the blogs agree, disagree or simply draw upon a mainstream news organization like MSNBC, New York Times or CNN.

As a critical consumer of news, I may not be convinced of a news story development until I see it in the legacy media. It will be unreliable to trust user-generated content. For instance, with the recent warnings of Hurricane Gustav and an ongoing evacuation, the official words will only be provided by legacy media and there would be utter chaos if everyone individually chose to trust the word of a different blog.

Analyzing McCain's choice of a running-mate, it was clear that blogs were generally very clear of their stand, and were far from neutral. For instance, looking at the archives of mudflats.com, a popular blogging site concerning Alaskan politics; every blog entry concerning Senator Palin was strongly in opposition to her. The Huffington Post's headline was published on the main page of the website in a large red font. "2 Top Alaska Newspapers Question Palin's Fitness," followed by the headline of the abovementioned two 'top' papers: "Most People Would Acknowledge...Palin Is Not Ready For The Top Job" and "It's Stunning That Someone With So Little National And International Experience Might Be Heartbeat Away From The Presidency"

Buying in to Shirky's theory of socialization, The Washington Post attempts to serve its print audience with opinions in the form of a discussion. But they do it very differently than the blogs. The Op-Ed page is complemented with what they call: "Plan A." it's an "occasional feature where The Post asks for first impressions on a hot topic."

The "hot topic" they found worthy of this occasional feature is "Assessing Sarah Palin." The topic has contributions from 8 people, ranging from a former Republican speaker of the House to a Senior Advisor to Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. The paper's stance is not particularly evident. The mainstream press appears to preserve a certain element of neutrality, which may in fact be the primary reason that legacy media are still considered 'credible' and trusted and especially turned back to on major developments.

However, big news like Hurricane Gustav or John McCain's choice of Vice President cannot be generated every day. On the other hand, there is never a shortage of opinions. People like to be heard and the chances of being heard by a common online community are higher in a smaller blog website than in a mainstream site like the newyorktimes.com. This is illustrated in comparing the coverage of Palin's appointment. Mudflats.com, a blog site unranked due to minimal traffic received 659 comments to the story. Washingtonpost.com, a website ranked the 74^th most popular in America, received 833 comments, a mere 174 additional responses to mudflats.com. Evidently, an interactive audience is more loyal than a spectator audience. And on a daily basis, this is where the new media impacts journalism.