Social Media & Quality of news and information

- Priyangan Antony

Social Media has changed the quality of news and information we receive each and every day, in positive and in some cases; negative ways.

These are some of the ways that social media has changed the quality of news in today’s

society:

1. Crucial news and information is being rushed in today’s society.

2. Countless journalists are being created due to social media.3. Opinions are being mixed with actual facts and sometimes

news is being fabricated.4. People rely on social media too much that they believe they

can get accurate news from social media sites.5. Social media can make any small gossip go viral and make the

gossip into news.

1. Crucial news and information is being rushed in today’s society

• In today’s world news is being rushed through social media. This action has a huge impact on the quality of the news people needs to hear. When something is being rushed, their quality will be greatly reduced.

• People tend to release news that is both inaccurate and sometimes false through social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ blogs. Their need to release the news first before their competition is causing the quality of news that the general public receive to go down.

• At the same time, sometimes people need crucial information as soon as they can receive, and social media is a great way to obtain such information. There are thousands of social media journalists releasing news on the internet for people that need information in a hurried manner.

2. Countless journalists are being created due to social media:

• Social media has given the social media users to become authors and journalists. In some cases this can be seen as opportunity for those who are talented in journalism to emerge and provide us with good quality news.

• Sometimes when regular social media users are made into journalists, they tend to go overboard and forget the basic rule of news and information, which is to stay true to the story. These social media journalists often rush and lose sight of the actual story when they publish their news. This can be very misleading because people will get confused when they see different news is being combined into one big story.

3. Opinions are being mixed with actual facts and sometimes news is being fabricated:

• The social media has given everyone the opportunity to become a journalist. This has both positive and negative impacts on the quality of news and information.

• Social media users are constantly mixing their opinions with the actual news and are releasing them on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+. When opinions are mixed with actual facts, they become lies and false news.

• Everyone has the right to share their opinion but sometimes people fail to mention that it is their opinion rather than fact, and this can be very misleading. When someone reads a opinion mixed news, they would most likely think it is the actual news. That is why it is important to make sure your opinions are stated as opinions and not facts.

4. People rely on social media too much that they believe they can get accurate news from social media sites:

• It is true people rely too much on social media. We often think that everything we see and hear from social media is true, and that is not entirely true in many cases.

• Social media plays a big part in our everyday life and because of that we tend to rely on it too much. We look at Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ for news status rather than watching the actual news, because social media has made it easier for us to access information and news, but it does not exactly mean that the news is true.

• There are false stories all over the social media; we have to be able to differentiate between actual facts and false gossips.

5. Social media can make any small gossip go viral and make the gossip into news

• Gossips are another reason why the quality of news and information we receive each day to go down.

• Social media users tend to gossip about everything such as celebrities, crucial news, weather, politics, and economics. Not only they gossip but they tend to release these gossips onto the world by posting them in social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google+. Not only they post these gossips on the social media sites but they encourage people to share them and this is how gossips go viral on internet and impact the quality of news.

• All in all Social media had a major impact on the quality of news we receive each and every day in our life. Sometimes positive impacts and sometimes negative, it all depend on us to trust the right news source. Social media has made it easier for us to receive news, although it seems the cost of quick information is the quality of information itself.