My Newsroom Selection

Lauren Cornell
Sep 6, 2018 · 4 min read

The newsroom that I chose to analyze over the course of this semester is News 12 Long Island. While I live in Massachusetts, my entire family is from Long Island and New York City. My family on Long Island regularly tunes into News 12 Long Island and trusts them the most for their local news. A lot of this has to do with the fact that although Long Island is in New York City’s Designated Market Area (DMA), there is so much news for the stations to cover in the New York DMA that they aren’t able to get as local as many viewers on Long Island would like. Another reason why I chose News 12 Long Island is due to the fact that I am interested in applying for an internship there. Personally, I think that it’s a really interesting area to cover, especially due to the fact that many times in the summer, there are pop-up thunderstorms that form over the Long Island Sound. Although I’ve always said that my dream job would be working at The Weather Channel as a broadcast meteorologist, my dream has slightly shifted, and I’d love to have a job in Long Island or New York City at one point in my life.

I have been following News 12 Long Island’s Facebook page for over a year now, and I have noticed that they have been making some changes in how they utilize Facebook. What I haven’t paid close attention to in the past is how they run their Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat accounts (which I had no idea that they have a Snapchat until doing some searching myself). What I’ve noticed with their Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter is that many times, there is some overlap with the way they relay the news. On their Instagram account, I’ve noticed that they don’t always post over the weekend. I also noticed that there are a few instances where they have posted the same content multiple times, or post slightly different variations of the same story on the same day. I like how they “regram” some of the posts that their reporters and meteorologists post on their accounts, but sometimes I found it unnecessary and inconsistent. I was excited to see them utilizing Instagram stories, as well as IGTV. However, if you’re going to put something on your story, you don’t have to put it on IGTV and vice versa.

As for their Facebook page, I think they have that down fairly well. As someone who has been following their page, I think that they have definitely made some improvements over the past year. They have become more engaging and have more videos, which is many times a more efficient way for viewers to get their news. People would prefer to watch a video than read an article about something. However, they have not completely done away with news articles. On Twitter, their presence is similar to how it is on Facebook. I’ve noticed that there were a few instances where they tweeted something on their account and then retweeted the same thing from one of their news reporters. The problem I’m seeing with Twitter is that the majority of their tweets are written news stories from the station. Something that I think they could do to improve their presence on Twitter is retweet some of their reporters more (especially if there is a significant breaking news event), share more videos as opposed to articles, and maybe liven up their captions a little bit. Sometimes, I felt as though their captions were so bland that they didn’t seem as though a person had written them.

Something that I am interested in learning more about as this semester progresses is how the news station utilizes Snapchat. As of the time of submission, there were no Snapchat stories posted for the day. I am also curious about how the station adapts to updates and new features on social media. I’m also curious about how some of their news reporters and meteorologists utilize social media as well. I hope that by analyzing News 12 Long Island’s social media presence, I can learn what works best on social media, and how they adapt to constant changes on social media.

Check out News 12 Long Island’s Social Media Presence Here:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=%40news12li

Twitter: https://twitter.com/News12LI

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/news12li/

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