Impact of Social Media on Political Campaigns and News Media

Running head: CREATING SOCIAL MEDIA
CREATING SOCIAL MEDIA
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1CREATING SOCIAL MEDIA
1. What changes has Facebook and other forms of social media brought to political
campaigns? What can campaigns do differently today than they did 20 years ago? Or 4 years
ago?
Answer- Facebook and other forms of social media like Twitter have changed the way the
candidates communicate with their respective constituencies (Columbia Journalism Review.
2018). Ten years ago, there was hardly any sort of social media. Ten years ago, candidates
did not speak directly to the common public by means of social channels and each day,
people did not have outlets like today to share and debate upon their political views (Somaiya
2018). In present days, social media has given the candidates a direct line of communication
and it is indeed a positive change. With the same, at the time of elections, the candidates are
constantly under the microscope and the new technological changes allows the media to have
a close view of them. Social media platforms runs in real time and that too, with large range
of channels, right from YouTube to Twitter, the words of the candidates are dissected and
replayed again. Such a continuous monitoring of the activities has brought in more
transparency for the elections.
2. What changes has Facebook and other forms of social media brought to the news media?
How is the news presented differently to readers and viewers than it was 10 or 20 years ago?
Answer- Social media has changed the entire landscape of consumption of news. People no
longer turned to radio, television and radio for the news (Buzzfeednews.com 2018). In
present days, people get them through social media instantly. They are getting their news
either from Facebook, Twitter or YouTube instead of turning on their television or going
through the headlines of newspapers. Also, people today barely pay for newspaper.
3. What are the benefits of these changes in news media? How the different ways news as it
is presented, benefited consumers? How has is benefited journalism?