News, devices, and signal-to-noise ratio
Spanish journalist Gerard Mateo, from Crónica Global, called me yesterday to talk about the growing consumption of news via smartphones and the way many people use it for such purposes in private moments such as in bed, or on public transport, etc. (link and pdf in Spanish).
It’s not so much that we read news in bed, as that we can read it from anywhere. The world is increasingly divided between those who get their first dose of news in bed via their smartphone and those who do so elsewhere. Either way, our days are now increasingly punctuated by moments when we reach for the smartphone to find out what’s going on.
The smartphone has changed our lives, as well as the information is prepared, with all that this entails for both users and the media.
Asked where they get their information from, a significant number of people will now answer, “the social networks.” The traditional media send alerts, which can be very useful, but still apply no real criteria to them. The media’s lack of interest in understanding the needs of users and providing alerts based on their interests reflects the inability of an entire industry to respond to a changing the environment: instead of providing personalized information, the media just chugs along on the same one-size fits all basis as it always has.
We shape our information portfolio through alerts from whatever media, along with monitoring certain profiles on the social networks. It is only when we consider information critical that we take steps toward greater specialization, such as setting up alert systems or feed readers. In practice, the social networks have become feed readers, with the obvious difference of not being dependent on particular sources, but instead on the quality of content curators choose for them. The reality is that, in general, our information diet is based on a good signal-to-noise ratio, a series of channels that keep us in touch with what interests us without recourse to irrelevant information. Readers like myself who monitor a series of media are a minority, and are usually looking for information related to our work.
The decision to access Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn depends fundamentally on the form of consumption and the signal-to-noise ratio that each offers. For the majority of us, the social networks mix personal information with important headlines. Few people bother to specialize network based on professional interest, and when they do, they tend to choose LinkedIn, for its focus in this area and are design that, after the acquisition of Pulse a few years ago, took it from being a simple archive of contacts and resumes to becoming a manager of FOMO, Fear Of Missing Out. But LinkedIn is not the most appropriate place for breaking news, meaning it needs to be supplemented with other sources.
Twitter, despite its relative decline, remains the king of signal to noise ratio: its 140 characters plus links, videos or images are an ideal format for keeping informed through the smartphone: it’s enough to follow a few people or media to have the feeling of being reasonably well informed, with the second level of information, more detailed and for a closer reading, a click away. In this mix of channels, traditional media, depending on the different generations of users, strive either to find a place for themselves or to at least try to hold on to their market share.
Basically, we have gone from a few channels to many, and from shortage to abundance. In some cases people make a conscious choice to be well informed; in others we just take what we are given with blind faith, through the channels we find more convenient. Where you read, and whether it’s on a smartphone or a tablet, and whether in bed or in a quiet moment, seems no longer relevant. What is your experience? How much have your information habits changed in recent times?
(En español, aquí)
