{"id":2136,"date":"2016-01-06T10:03:35","date_gmt":"2016-01-06T15:03:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/felicity\/old\/?p=2136"},"modified":"2018-05-15T11:15:47","modified_gmt":"2018-05-15T15:15:47","slug":"from-news-fiend-to-newsfeed-and-back-again-in-2016-my-resolution-for-the-news-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/felicitypr.com\/from-news-fiend-to-newsfeed-and-back-again-in-2016-my-resolution-for-the-news-year\/","title":{"rendered":"From \u201cnews fiend\u201d to \u201cnewsfeed\u201d…and back again in 2016: My resolution for the \u201cnews\u201d year"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/a><\/p>\n I\u2019ve been a news junkie for as long as I can remember. While some parents practically had to force their kids to pick up a newspaper or book, mine actually had to force me to take my nose out of them every so often. I guess that\u2019s why PR is my kismet career. Being attuned to what is taking place in the world and building upon it to achieve business goals is my passion.<\/p>\n What\u2019s changed over the years, isn\u2019t my interest or passion, but the way I consume news and learn about what\u2019s going on in the world. As we kicked off the new year, I began reflecting on the habits I\u2019ve formed and the changes I\u2019d like to make. One of my 2016 resolutions involves a commitment to consume news in a more well-balanced way. Perhaps you\u2019ll join me!<\/p>\n A media landscape with well-defined borders<\/b><\/p>\n When I started in PR, we were still in the world of news release fax blasts and counting agat lines to calculate the \u201cad equivalency\u201d of our \u201chits\u201d in newspapers and magazines. As a diligent PR professional, I would begin my day by reading three major Canadian dailies, and as technology evolved, scanning the internet for other global, breaking news. I\u2019d end my day by watching the late news on one or two different channels, just to see the angle from which each outlet covered a given story. As a business leader in that environment, you only had a few hours\u2014maybe even 24\u2014to plan your reaction and manage your brand\u2019s reputation if a crisis broke. Those were the days!<\/p>\n Around the time I left agency and was working corporate-side, social media happened. Back then, it was possible to say things like: \u201cI have so many messages coming at me; between email, phone\/voicemail and meetings, how can I add social media to the mix?\u201d I couldn\u2019t imagine adding another stream vying for my attention. As long as I understood how<\/i> social media worked, I could still work with our agencies to execute it, without being involved in it myself. But I couldn\u2019t stand on the sidelines for long.<\/p>\n Social-ization<\/b><\/p>\n It got to a point where, as a professional communicator and business leader, first-hand relationships with media alone wouldn\u2019t cut it anymore. In order to provide the best counsel to my clients and frankly, to keep personal pace with the world around me, I had to have first-hand experience with social media. I had to practice what I preached.<\/p>\n So, I dove in. I had long been on LinkedIn, but thanks to a friend who showed me the ropes, I joined Facebook and Twitter. I found it fascinating, not to mention fun. I was hooked. The ripple effect of how news and information spreads via social media was awe-inspiring. In business school, we had waxed poetic about a \u201cfuture\u201d in which e-commerce sites could have the ability to personalize our homepages based on our preferred clothing size and style. Suddenly, this customization was becoming a reality, not only for online shopping, but for the entire online information-sharing ecosystem.<\/p>\n A rose-coloured world<\/b><\/p>\n In the years since, I\u2019ve kept abreast of the world around me, but in a different way, through a different lens. While the amount of time I spend consuming media overall has likely increased by at least 20%, my time spent consuming \u201ctraditional\u201d media has declined, markedly. The numbers<\/a> indicate I\u2019m not the only one. The average time Canadians spend reading physical newspapers has fallen 25.6% between 2010 and 2014, with an annual shrinkage of 4.7% expected through 2017. But online media consumption is on the rise. People spent an average of 429 minutes a day consuming media in 2015, a 1.4% increase from 485 minutes in 2014.<\/p>\n Because I\u2019d started to consume so much of my news via my social feeds, I realized that the lens through which I was seeing the world is tainted by my \u201cfriends\u201d and my preferences. I was missing out on many points-of-view as a result.<\/p>\n As 2015 drew to a close, I felt the need to know more of what\u2019s \u201creally\u201d going on out there, not just what an algorithm and the people in my network have decided I ought to know. As we talked about back in business school, just because I may be accustomed to a certain style of jeans, doesn\u2019t mean that is the only style to which I should be exposed. And when it comes to news, this customized exposure may actually be dangerous.<\/p>\n Social influence<\/b><\/p>\n While some of the news I\u2019ve been consuming come directly from traditional sources or shared with me through my social channels, other stories are told by those writers and bloggers deemed \u201csocial influencers.\u201d Often highly talented and with a nose to what\u2019s happening in their areas of focus, these writers share their opinions on issues, brands, and products based on personal preference\/inclination and\/or some sort of compensation model. Influencers have earned loyal followings based on their unique points-of-view and the compelling ways in which they express them. And they have absolutely thus \u201cearned\u201d the right to be paid for the content they create. But both sides of the proverbial coin benefit from a policy of full disclosure to the reader or viewer of this payment. In the US it is mandated<\/a>, but in Canada, it\u2019s not<\/a>. For consumers, now more than ever, it\u2019s caveat emptor, <\/i>buyer beware.<\/p>\n