Facebook Changes the Newsroom Forever

Facebook has evolved and significantly changed the way news organizations communicate. For all intensive purposes, social media (starting with Facebook) in general has turned the media industry upside down. For example, back in 2004, users could only interact with textual posts. Users can now submit photographs, movies, live material, virtual reality, and 360-degree videos, among other things (Pires Luciano, October 2019). 

Phones and cameras allow everyone to be a reporter and social media platforms give everyone a venue to share. For the last 15 years, news organizations have been forced to embrace the use of online news platforms. More than eight-in-ten U.S. adults (86%) say they get news from a smartphone, computer, or tablet “often” or “sometimes,” including 60% who say they do so often (Shearer, January 2021). Traditional news organizations have had no choice but to adopt and embrace social media, with the push first coming from Facebook back in the early 2000s primarily because of how popular Facebook became (and so quickly). 

Based on the data, Facebook continues to dominate the online social media platform landscape in terms of engaged users. Here are a few ways (and benefits for the most part) Facebook has changed the way news organizations communicate (Matter, November 2020): • Ability to deliver real-time content, especially breaking news, on a platform that reaches billions around the world. • Facebook facilitates two-way communication and engagement. This was not possible with traditional media—newspaper, radio, TV—prior to platforms such as Facebook. Message boards existed but functioned in a more limited way. 

• 24/7 engagement—Facebook never “sleeps.” • Citizens become journalists—media outlets can deliver real-time content via Facebook (and, other platforms) with the help of people. Journalists can’t be everywhere. On the downside: • Accuracy is always in jeopardy. 

• Reporting the news on Facebook runs the risk of becoming a game of telephone, along with consumers using media outlets’ Facebook pages to “hijack” and sometimes completely alter the news. 

 • Based on the rich data that is available in terms of Facebook readers' beliefs, etc.—the media has become a niche (i.e., Fox, CNN). This takes away from the journalist’s pledge to be fair and balanced. Now the media is giving people what they want vs. the truth in some cases. • Facebook has forced the media to be entertaining.

 • Local Boston media offer paid/sponsored content opportunities using their Facebook pages (and, other social platforms). This includes all traditional media—every local TV station, the Boston Globe, and every local radio station. On the brand/company and PR/advertising side, interactions with media have also changed in the following ways: • Brands can bypass the media by becoming their own media. Content is king these days and brands are using platforms such as Facebook to share their “side of the story” and what they want their target audience to know. 

 • Facebook allows brands to buy their own media and it’s much cheaper than placing ads in traditional media outlets. 

• Traditional media has been forced to offer sponsored content opportunities to make up for advertising revenue. This means content found on traditional media sites is not unbiased. And, it’s often hard for the reader to distinguish between paid and non-paid content. As part of buying paid content opportunities, media “create more value” by sharing stories on Facebook and other platforms. This increases the consumption of the content exponentially and allows content to reach the brand’s target audiences specifically based on Facebook’s (and other platforms) ability to use data to identify the right audience. 

 • The downside of paid content is that it poses a host of ethical questions (Weinberger, August 2014). One great example of how a brand uses Facebook and other platforms to tell its story is through employee brand ambassadors. This is becoming more and more common. It used to be that brands tried to control employees’ use of social media, but now they are paying employees to use social media to talk about their brand. Employees have become reporters. Dunkin adopted this strategy two years ago and many brands have followed (Whateley, October 2020). PR and advertising agencies are driving these strategies as they have had to get more creative about using social media to tell the brand’s story and share company messaging. 

Based on everything I’ve outlined above, delivering fair, accurate and unbiased content to consumers of news has become a slippery slope because of the dependence of consumers on Facebook and other social platforms to get their news. 

Sources: 

Shearer, E. (2021, January 12). More than eight-in-ten Americans get news from Digital Devices. Pew Research Center. Retrieved April 25, 2022, from https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/01/12/more-than-eight-in-ten-americans-get-news-from-digital-devices/ Three ways social media has changed public relations. 

Matter. (2020, November 10). Retrieved April 25, 2022, from https://www.matternow.com/blog/3-ways-social-media-has-changed-public relations/#:~:text=By%20Matter,consumer%20inquiries%20quickly%20and%20effectively Wacc. (2019, February 28). 

28 Feb 2019 New Digital Technology and Global Communication Ethics. WACC. Retrieved April 3, 2022, from https://waccglobal.org/new-digital-technology-and-global-communication-ethics/ Weinberger, D. W. (2014, August 7). The ethics of using paid content in journalism. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved April 25, 2022, from https://hbr.org/2013/07/the-ethics-of-using-paid-content-in-journalism 

Whateley, D. (2020, October 20). Dunkin's TikTok marketing strategy includes paying employees to post videos at work and it's part of a growing trend. Business Insider. Retrieved April 25, 2022, from https://www.businessinsider.com/brands-like-dunkin-hire-workers-post-tiktok-videos-marketing-2020-10