My Social Media Habits
To start off the week I realized that my go to poison is almost always Facebook to check the biggest story of the day. A lot of what I see on a day to day basis is sports related. I try to immerse myself in the sports news as a sports editor that is important to me. I often use this media during the work day at my desk and in between classes on the average day. I find myself constantly on social media trying to create and promote my brand as a journalist so whether it be at home, in school, at work, I’m on social media promoting my work. As a journalist, I am constantly looking for news to create an informed opinion that can be evident in my work every week.
I use everything from Facebook to Twitter to Instagram to Snapchat and even Linkden but for the most part I’m on these platforms making sure I am informed and often, entertained. In the middle of the week last week, the story that most entertained me was the reaction of the Bears and the showdown against the Green Bay Packers and all that would go into another installment of their storied rivalry. Mostly I would check lineups and potential developments leading up to the game such as injuries and the impact of Aaron Rodgers on the game. For the most part I follow the mainstream sports pages to get the national outlook on various sports topics and how it affects the larger landscape. I also have some local outlets such as WGN News to follow and the Chicago Cubs page to get the insiders look into the team. While there is an inherent bias in these pages you allow it as long as the access increases along with it.
I often try to rebuttal with something intelligent and informed on the topic being posted with things such as football, baseball, and various management decisions that go along with it. The Bears deciding to start Mitchell Trubisky this week against the Vikings this week is the one thing I’m extremely excited to talk about. The texting only goes so far. The vast majority of my interactions occur on social media among friends, family and occasionally colleagues. These interactions coincided with the American work day in that I was on this talking about larger talking points such as the outcry for President Trump to take action on the tragedy that occurred in Puerto Rico this past week. I was on Facebook and Twitter a lot during my work hours to ensure that what I posted and shared would be one of the first things people see on their timelines/feeds after work.
Saturday perhaps is the most fun for me as a consumer of social media being that I am an enormous college football fan and love to watch all the football games I possibly can. Waking up to a hot cup of coffee from my french press and turning on game day, I immediately head to my Facebook and Twitter pages. I like to comment on the pageantry and urgency of the college football landscape as well as the status of my beloved Florida Gators. More often than not I can be found live tweeting the game every week to either gloat about the talent of the team that year or too vent and rationalize the teams abysmal play that game. However this week in particular was different in that my interest was also in the potential clincher for the Cubs in their pennant race coming to a close with the Milwaukee Brewers. Being a devout baseball fan my eyes were also glued to the live updates on my At Bat app as well as the updates I would get from my Twitter feed. For the most part my posting is pretty insular and related to sports when you look at it from a far.
When I woke up Monday, I did not expect to hear the news that I heard. I had checked my Facebook feed to find that over 50 people were killed in an act of violence in Las Vegas. As someone who has been exposed to social media for most of my life it was tough to process the situation but also not wanting to post #PrayFor……. I had decided to make a post that would say that I’m sick of pretentiously posting on things that haven’t been fixed for a long time and the we shouldn’t have to keep coming to these every time people are killed #PrayForChange. Tom Petty also died which made that day that absolute freaking worst.
I often find myself on social media in a reactionary nature and a part of me wants to stop it and allow myself to process instead of interjecting my opinion into everything prematurely. Perhaps this is the nature I’ve created for myself as a sports journalist, to constantly have an opinion on things rather than just letting it play out and reporting. I would like to think that I don’t post that much but in reality I realize that I post too much through the course of a day.
