"As the week went on, bin Laden's demise actually played to, and paid off for, old-school news operators, far more than you might have expected after hearing so much about social media's role in recent news events. Twitter averaged 3,000 posts per second during peak activity late May 1 and into last Monday, May 2, its highest sustained rate of tweets ever. But TV won Sunday night as President Barack Obama's speech averaged 56.5 million viewers over about nine minutes, Nielsen said."
According to this adage article, the killing of Osama bin Laden revitalized "old" forms of social media. Throughout this semester, we have been discussing the best form of social media..Twitter? Facebook? Blogs? However when it came to breaking news, not only were "new" forms of media flooded with traffic, so was the "old" media. The lesson to be learnt from this article is that during an age where information is so accessible, we still must cater to all types of audience, since there were people following "old" and "new" media. Without satisfying all forms of media, candidates in the upcoming presidential elections are likely to fall behind!
That's very true. This lesson goes both ways. We're so stuck in thinking that the only way to reach the masses is through new media, such as Twitter and Facebook, but what about the generation that preceded these phenomena? They still turn to newspapers, TV, and radio as sources for news. At the same time, it's important to remember not to live in the past, and keep up with the times. That was McCain's problem in the 2008 campaign. He didn't know how to reach out to the younger generation, as opposed to Obama, who managed to rally the support of thousands of young adults in the country. This lesson should be learned in the upcoming 2012 elections.
ReplyDeleteI concur... It will be interesting to see what happens during the 2012 elections. Especially because a lot of the online newspapers can not afford to provide information without charging their readers anymore.... Once information is less accessible, we'll see if people stay involved.
ReplyDeleteI agree, but I think specifically in the Osama case, a couple of things were happening.
ReplyDeleteI don't have any numbers on this, but I know that the way a lot of my friends found out about his death was through headline updates from an online newspaper, or even through text messaging (new media).
While the new media was integral in getting the message out quickly after the news broke, it is important to note that they did not yet have all the details.
Obama's speech garnered so many viewers because he was the one
person who had those details to give out. People watched his speech because they wanted to see what he had to say about it, how he said it, and what he felt about it.
Like you said, they worked hand in hand, but ultimately the power is with the president who had the information we wanted to know.
ya i agree that alot of viewers tuned in to hear details on Osama. However, few actual details were given out, rather it was used as a platform for Obama to render support....
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