Social Media Breaking the Fourth Estate
Posted by Anthony LaFauce on January 21st, 2008 11:05 AMI was reading a post on Coranate written by Kevin Anderson where Kevin waxes poetically about social media breaking down the barriers of the Fourth Estate by creating community. For those of you who don’t know the ‘Fourth Estate’ is how journalist see themselves in relation to the government.
I think Kevin hit the nail on the head when he instantly begins associating journalist with selling ad space. Something the public doesn’t know is that media doesn’t make money from subscriptions, it makes the bulk of its revenue through ads.
This means, news stories are just vehicles used to sell ad space. Regardless if a story is newsworthy or not, if the story will not sell papers (i.e. ads) the story will not run. I think consumers of the media have begun to recognize this and that is the real reason they have started turning away from the media.
Kevin insinuates the reason blogging is such a viable news source for so many is because it connects with its readers. This is true, readers of blogs have a direct connection with the people writing. Being someone who has traveled to the Press Club more than a few times I have to agree that bloggers are much easier to talk to than journalists.
I think bloggers take the connection one step further than Kevin discusses. People tend to read bloggers who cover things they are interested in. People also tend to read a blogger that shares a common opinion . Social media allows readers, listeners, what ever to consume media that reinforces their values.
I could be wrong with this, maybe bloggers offer news that is a complete juxtaposition to traditional media, but I can say from personal experiences that I read news that shares my views and most of my friends do the same. What do you think?
I would like to know your opinion on the idea that bloggers and social media are breaking down the barriers of the fourth estate. Do you think they offer new channels or are they segmenting the media even more? Can social media save traditional media or will it be the nail in the coffin? Let me know.
January 21st, 2008 at 11:12 am
I recently spoke at Media Future Now here in DC and my talk focused on how Social Media is effecting the publishing business. On that panel with me was Jim Brady of the Washingtonpost.com - a pub that definitely ‘gets it’ with regard to using social media to engage an audience more deeply (and yes, sell more ads). A video of my introduction to the panel is posted to the Facebook Power Users group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=7854726274) and is titled “The Rise of Social Media”.
I’ll post a viddler link here shortly.
Peter
http://www.twitter.com/corbett3000
January 21st, 2008 at 3:39 pm
I don’t know if that’s going to happen. I really believe there will be a comfortable balance. I recently wrote a social media manifesto on the topic called, “Welcome to the Fifth Estate.” Check it out:
http://www.livingstonbuzz.com/blog/2008/01/06/welcome-to-the-fifth-estate/