The Confessions of Journalists
Using social media as a tool.
The first thing people say when talking about journalism is, “Traditional journalism is outdated. Social media is the newest and easiest way for people to get the news.” After repeatedly reading and hearing this comment on journalism, I decided it was time to do what journalists were meant to do and get the facts. What better way to learn about journalism than asking the journalists themselves.
In the Social Media Impact survey, journalists confess about using social media as a tool. The survey reported that at least half of the journalists admitted to using social media as their main source of information, but only one-third of the journalists claim that the information on social media is accurate. Although it is part of a journalist’s job to report nothing but the truth from an objective perspective, only 20 percent of journalists reported that they check their facts for accuracy before making their articles public. Half of the journalists admit to publishing before they check for accuracy, and 60 percent of journalists feel that they can be more of themselves when writing on social media, rather than publishing traditional printed articles. With these findings in mind, there are a few points to be made about journalists and their use of social media:
1. Sources of information: In traditional journalism, it is up to the journalist to arrive on the scene of the story and ask questions. This should still be the case, even if traditional journalism is dead. Social media should only be used as a secondary source of information, not a primary source.
2. Reliable information: While some posts and articles on social media, like Twitter and Facebook, may be factual, it is often difficult to tell which are reliable. Anybody can post stories and articles on social media, whether fact or fiction.
3. Lack of integrity: The goal of traditional journalism is to discover and report only the facts. Today’s journalists are more interested in publishing, then getting the facts straight. It’s all about who can get the story first, not who can get the true story.
4. Opinionated: While all journalists probably have an opinion about the story they post, traditional journalism does not allow for those opinions to affect the journalists’ writings. Now, journalists want to use social media to write the story one-sided. Journalists no longer want to be objective, which goes against the rules of traditional journalism.
So, is traditional journalism old news? Yes, but it shouldn’t be. Traditional journalism was inspired by those who wanted to inform people of actual events and issues taking place in the world. We could rely on the journalists’ reports because they did the work and kept it honest and objective. Use of social media should not serve as an outlet for journalists to express their own opinions. Instead, social media should be used to quickly spread the facts to the community.
Has social media completely replaced traditional journalism? Sort of. While journalists may have confessed to using social media as their number one source for gathering information, they haven’t stopped writing themselves. Social media is killing traditional journalism, in the sense that printed reports are becoming obsolete. However, there is more to traditional journalism than having articles printed, such as publishing the facts the first time and keeping the personal opinion out of the article.
Can traditional journalism be revived? Perhaps. While the traditional printing of articles is dead, journalists can practice objectivity and integrity, even if they use social media. Social media is not the issue; it is the way journalists use it.
