Social Media News Plague!

Social Media is nowadays how many people get their news. This media is spread across many platforms; TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, etc. Why is this the new source? Many users on any of these apps repost news from various sources, typically what is in line with their bias towards news. According to Pew Research, the leading social media for news is Facebook. Only 16% use Instagram, and 14% use TikTok as of 2022. In a more recent article, Pew Research also stated "Those who get news on social media name a variety of things that they like about it, including convenience, speed and the element of social interaction.". I find this to be true even with myself. Let's take a closer look at the 2 of these apps. TikTok is an app filled with videos that can be 15 seconds and up to about 3 minutes. With this limit, users can post virtually anything. How is this relevant to the news? Since this platform has become more popular, creators take this opportunity to use their platform and put out information regarding politics, crime cases, reports, etc. The content creators want to spread awareness of a topic, so they will typically make some sort of click-bait caption that will make you stay. They want you to hear what they have to say but because these are relatively short videos, some people just scroll past without paying attention. On the other hand, we have Instagram. Instagram creators can also post videos but the difference between TikTok and this app is that news is typically posted as an extremely eye-catching picture. The reason why this works better is because you see what the post is about and if it is intriguing enough, you'll read the caption. Both apps will use visual rhetoric to grab the consumer's attention but they approach these differently. We are more inclined to read something that provides more of a shocking visual or pleasant visual rather than not seeing one at all. [1 image, 2 links, 1 quote, 333 words]