The way many people get their news today would be unrecognisable to broadsheet devotees of decades past. You may read email newsletters, scroll headlines on social media, or go directly to the BBC’s own TikTok account to find out what’s happening in the world.
New data from the nonpartisan American thinktank Pew Research Centre shows that a large number of Americans – one in five – get their news from social media “news influencers”. The figure jumps to almost one in four for under-30s.
In the UK, 43% of news consumers say they get their news online from non-traditional sources, including influencers.
Pew defines news influencers as people with more than 100,000 followers who consistently post news-related content on platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X and YouTube. These influencers are trusted by their followers as primary sources of information.
Some influencers are journalists affiliated (or formerly affiliated) with media organisations, but speaking directly to their audiences via their own social media channels or podcasts.
A digital news report from the University of Oxford’s Reuters Institute highlights the most influential voices in the US and UK, and found that both lists were dominated by radio, television and podcast hosts like Joe Rogan.
Kevin Twomey, senior vice-president of marketing at NewsWhip, called news influencers “the new New York Times”. This assessment, however, is about their impact – not their reporting.
The work of many news influencers does not reflect the kind of work any traditional reporter would recognise. While trained journalists do the work of actually producing news content, influencers mostly talk about the content or provide their own (often partisan) analysis.
Dylan Page, the young UK-based creator behind News Daddy on TikTok, describes his work as an effort to “revolutionise the way news is consumed”.
The “consumed” is key. Page is not making the news, but he is changing the way audiences consume it, by packaging complex stories into short-form videos. He’s expressive and casual and works hard to make current affairs feel engaging and conversational.
It’s clearly a winning combination. So far, he has attracted an audience of 13.7 million on TikTok with a staggering total of 1.1 billion likes all told. Legacy news organisations can only dream of that kind of reach.
Facts v followers
Influencers are trusted by their audiences because of the seemingly personal relationship they have. They feel like your friend, and appear authentic and more accessible than a suited-up newsreader behind a desk. But getting the news from influencers comes with risks.
A recent Unesco survey found that two-thirds of digital content creators failed to perform even basic fact-checking before sharing information. And the majority are unfamiliar with regulatory frameworks and international standards relating to digital communications.
About three-quarters of the news influencers (77%) Pew looked at have no past or present affiliation with a news organisation, while just 23% have been employed in the news industry in some way.
Without the training and resources of a traditional newsroom, or the accountability to the media regulator Ofcom, there are few safeguards when influencers share misinformation.
Some influencers, like V Spehar who discusses the news on TikTok as Under the Desk, are trusted enough to serve as ambassadors to the Poynter foundation’s Mediawise initiative in the US. But Spehar is probably an outlier. As the Unesco report highlighted, most social media influencers are only sharing news incidentally, not dedicating their time to fact-checking, seeking out sources and reporting stories.
Journalism has long defined itself by a series of norms and routines, not least objectivity. Many social media influencers don’t consider themselves journalists – they’re sharing information about current events as part of building their online identity and engaging with their community.
They typically offer commentary and opinion on politics while presenting themselves as an alternative to mainstream media, which, they may claim, “suppresses the truth”.
There are also concerns about the lack of diversity in the influencer space. In the US, 63% of the influencers Pew examined are male, and more express a right-leaning political view than left-leaning.
More questions than answers
While new technology has historically disrupted traditional media, today’s social platforms are fundamentally altering the dynamics of reach and influence in ways that are still unknown.
As more people get their news from influencers, the amount of content circulating that potentially hasn’t been fact-checked will grow.
Ryan Broderick, journalist and author of the Garbage Day newsletter and host of the Panic World podcast, told me that this will make it even more difficult for people to access good-quality information.
In the past you may have read two or three complete news stories from different outlets about topic X and then watched a few TV segments on it. You’re now bombarded with hundreds, if not thousands, of posts and videos about the same topic. Which I do think creates a certain paranoia in people. You feel overwhelmed, but you’re also never really getting a complete narrative about it.
A lesson for us all would be to continue supporting traditional media organisations and local newsrooms – influencers may be engaging, but they can’t necessarily replicate the rigour of trained journalists.
The post “‘News influencers’ are racking up billions of views – and not checking their facts” by Kelly Fincham, Lecturer in Journalism and Communications, University of Galway was published on 12/10/2024 by theconversation.com