Local News in a Digital Age
In-depth case studies in three disparate cities (Denver, Macon and Sioux City) show that local news still matters, with nearly nine-in-ten city residents following it closely.
In-depth case studies in three disparate cities (Denver, Macon and Sioux City) show that local news still matters, with nearly nine-in-ten city residents following it closely.
Our new report on local news in a digital age looks at both the organizations providing the news and the residents consuming it.
Direct visitors to 26 top news sites—those who type in the news outlet’s URL or have the address bookmarked—are far more engaged with that news than users who arrive from Facebook or a search engine, according to a new analysis of online traffic data.
In many ways, 2013 and early 2014 brought a level of energy to the news industry not seen for a long time. Even as challenges of the past several years continue and new ones emerge, the activities this year have created a new sense of optimism – or perhaps hope – for the future of American journalism.
During what may prove a key period in the race for president, the candidates received very different treatment on Twitter, Facebook and blogs than in the mainstream media, a new PEJ study finds. The candidates each enjoyed a bounce in mainstream media treatment during their conventions. By contrast, social media showed little change, and the discourse was highly negative.
Depending on the local news topic, urban residents are more likely to use mobile and online sources, while suburbanites are most heavily into social media and rural residents are more inclined to word of mouth sources. A joint PEJ-Pew Internet report offers more about how people get local news in specific communities.
News is becoming a major part of what Americans watch on YouTube. In the last 15 months, a third of the most searched terms on the video sharing site were news related. A new study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism explores the character of news on YouTube.
Perhaps no topic in technology attracted more attention in 2011 than the rise of social media and its potential impact on news. “If searching for news was the most important development of the last decade, sharing news may be among the most important of the next,” we wrote in a May 2011 report analyzing online news behavior called Navigating News Online.
The migration of audiences toward digital news advanced to a new level in 2011 and early 2012, the era of mobile and multidigital devices. More than three-quarters of U.S. adults own laptop or desktop computers, a number that has been stable for some years.1 Now, in addition, 44% of adults own a smartphone, and the number of tablet owners grew by about 50% since the summer of 2011, to 18% of Americans over age 18.
How do people get news and information about the community where they live? Traditional research has suggested that Americans watch local TV news more than any other local information source. But a new report by the PEJ and the Pew Internet and American Life Project, in association with the Knight Foundation offers a deeper and more comprehensive understanding of the ecosystem of community information.
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