To Be in the News, You Must be in Touch With the News
Like the forty or so other aspiring journalists in this class, I began tracking my media consumption for 48 hours beginning on Martin Luther King Day. By doing so, I realized that I consume a lot more media than I thought I did, even on “off days” like Monday.
I am an aspiring broadcaster. Typically my days start and end with television. On Monday morning, the first thing I did after waking up was flip on the television. I watched KTLA 5’s Morning News at 7, which caught me up on all the big events happening in Los Angeles that day. As I was watching KTLA 5 and eating breakfast, I was also skimming through emails and Facebook, both of which lead to me interesting “clickbait,” where I consumed even more news.
After KTLA 5’s Morning News, I switched the channel to my favorite station — ESPN. A solid 45 minutes of SportsCenter caught me up on all of the nations sporting news. Since it was Monday morning, the main theme on SportsCenter was football. Aside from a few NBA highlights, the NFL playoffs dominated their telecast. Watching ESPN inspired me to look at ESPN’s website, amongst other sports sites, where I consumed even more news.
Although I had only been awake for a little more than an hour, I had already consumed a boatload of local and national news.
Monday’s holiday allowed me to do something I haven’t done in a very long time. I was able to hit the gym! While at the gym I was able to consume even more news. Although it was not through any platform like web, tv, or radio, I learned some new sporting news through talking with my friend and colleague, Ty Hawkins.
MLK day also allowed me ample time to watch NBA basketball. Ty and I watched the entire Warriors-Cavaliers game on TNT. The Warriors dominated the Cavs, which started a conversation about if the Warriors will beat the Bulls record of 72–10. That conversation lead to more research on sites like ESPN.com, NBA.com, and Bleacher Report amongst others.
My Monday ended just as it began: with TV news. A half an hour of KTLA 5’s News at 11 and another half an hour of ESPN’s SportsCenter wrapped up my Monday news consumption.
Tuesday began with more TV news. I watched the Today Show on NBC from 8AM-9AM to start my day. Today caught me up on plenty of national (and trending) news. While watching Today, I was also skimming through numerous political news sites such as Politico, The Daily Caller, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. I did not use any apps for these sites, I manually went to their webpage and browsed across their pages.
From there, I visited sites like CNN, Business Insider, the LA Times, and Vice.
After about an hour of Today and an hour of browsing various sites, it was time for class. Being a journalism student increases the amount of media I consume a day. While in class, I was required to read sites like the LA Times, Vice Sports, FTW USA Today, and Gawker. After a couple of (rather long) 3-hour classes, I swung by the Annenberg Media center to grab a copy of the Daily Trojan on my way home. At home, I felt like an old man as I flipped through the leaflets of the Daily Trojan.
Nightfall brought more time for NBA basketball, SportsCenter and evening news on KTLA. It also brought time for more “clickbait” reads before bed.
My media consumption patterns definitely indicate that I am a millennial who is interested in broadcast. Nearly all of the media I consumed was through the web or through television. For most of the “fast facts” I consumed, I used Google search. For more long-form stories I went to sites such as ESPN, Vice, Politico, etc. My main realization in this whole process was that I LOVE broadcast. I like stories that are told in pictures and videos. I noticed that I was more likely to consume an online story that had a video at the top or multiple interesting pictures. I also realized how much I love local news. Although I enjoyed watching the Today Show on Tuesday morning, I was much more interested in KTLA’s morning and evening newscasts. I like the quick re-cap style summaries and I am more concerned with news that is happening around me as opposed to across the country.
Most importantly of all, this exercise made me realize how important it is to BE IN TOUCH WITH THE NEWS! You literally can’t be in this business without knowing what is going on across the world ALL THE TIME. To be a producer of news you must be a consumer of news. Otherwise you will be out of touch with what is going on in the world thus making you an unreliable journalist.
