Social media plays a central role in how many people access news. Existing networks like Facebook and Twitter have significantly evolved both in terms of function as well as usage by different generations; newer platforms like Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok have gained traction among younger ones. Each platform offers different features and algorithms which determine which kinds of content appear in users’ feeds; yet they all share one trait: news comes in from many sources on users’ feeds.
Social media news can take many forms – ranging from trending hashtags and celebrity drama, viral videos and events being showcased across platforms to algorithmically generated feeds curated for all networks by algorithms. Though social media can provide invaluable access to information, its accuracy remains in question.
Misinformation has long been an issue on social media platforms like Snapchat and TikTok that emphasize visual content over text articles; misinforming consumers with clickbait headlines or misleading details has become a pressing problem in their feeds. This trend has increased further due to newer platforms focusing more heavily on visuals rather than words when scrolling their feeds.
Additionally, users’ ability to edit photos and videos makes it increasingly easy to misrepresent an event or image on social media platforms, potentially leading to any number of problems such as spreading fake medical news or falsely suggesting 5G networks are cancer-causing. As a result, it’s crucial that individuals remain critical when reading news from these platforms and be wary about its accuracy. This is why critical reading must remain a hallmark of online news platforms.
Another factor is the diverging conversation leaders across major social networks. Whereas users on Facebook and Twitter tend to pay more attention to mainstream journalists, those on YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok tend to focus more on personalities such as celebrities or influencers.
While this could be caused by cultural or topical considerations on each platform, or simply different user interests on each network (for instance Instagram users tend to favor more entertaining or humorous posts than TikTok users), so when creating news-related content it is crucial to understand who your target audience is on each platform before publishing anything that might not resonate as easily with readers in newsfeeds. Doing this allows brands to produce relevant and engaging articles that stand out on newsfeeds.
