News 2.0. Ahmed Al-Rawi

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News 2.0

      Journalists, Audiences, and News on Social Media

       Ahmed Al‐Rawi

This edition first published 2020 © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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       Library of Congress Cataloging‐in‐Publication Data

      Names: Al‐Rawi, Ahmed K., author.

      Title: News 2.0 : journalists, audiences, and news on social media / Ahmed Al‐Rawi.

      Description: Hoboken, NJ : Wiley‐Blackwell, 2020. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

      Identifiers: LCCN 2020001719 (print) | LCCN 2020001720 (ebook) | ISBN 9781119569664 (paperback) | ISBN 9781119569640 (adobe pdf) | ISBN 9781119569626 (epub)

      Subjects: LCSH: Social media and journalism. | Mass media–Audiences. | Journalism–Technological innovations. | Journalists–Effect of technological innovations on.

      Classification: LCC PN4766 .A4 2020 (print) | LCC PN4766 (ebook) | DDC 302.23–dc23

      LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020001719 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020001720

      Cover Design: Wiley

      Cover Images: Social Network © Ani_Ka/Getty Images, Media concept © Vertigo3d/Getty Images

To Nawal Namuq with my love and gratitude

About the Author

      Ahmed Al‐Rawi is Assistant Professor in News, Social Media, and Public Communication at the School of Communication at Simon Fraser University, Canada. He is the Director of the Disinformation Project, which empirically examines fake news discourses in Canada on social media and in mainstream media. His research expertise is related to global communication, news, social media, and the Middle East, with emphasis on critical theory. He has authored three books and over 50 peer‐reviewed book chapters and articles, published in journals like Information, Communication & Society, Online Information Review, Social Science Computer Review, Social Media + Society, Journalism, Journalism Practice, Digital Journalism, International Journal of Communication, International Communication Gazette, and Public Relations Review.

Preface

      This book provides an analytical assessment of recent developments, debates, and research on news, social media, and 2.0 news organizations. The main argument, which is drawn from empirical evidence, is that news production is largely biased, while news consumers are now mostly confined to their filter bubbles despite the widespread proliferation of news on social media. From the news‐consumers side, this often leads to the dissemination of disinformation as well as misinformation, phenomena related to the term “fake news”: a phrase deployed with divergent meanings and intentions. This is an important field of research due to its direct impact on democracy and politics, especially with the increasing popularity of clickbait and the influence of bots on Social Networking Sites (SNS).

      The book focuses on three main areas, with emphasis on non‐Western media outlets: content (news), audiences or “prosumers” (networked audiences), and producers (news organizations and journalists). Prosumers are not only consumers of news but also producers of data (posts and comments) and metadata (clicks) who exhibit their engagement with news organizations and their news productions in different ways. Chapter 1 provides an introduction to the meaning of News 2.0 and the advent of new technologies that are shaping the way news is produced and packaged, while Chapter 8 discusses mobile news: the future of news consumption.

I would like to acknowledge the generous assistance of Simon Fraser University's Rapid Response Fund, which provided the financial means to cover the costs of the copy editor. I would also like to thank Derrick O'Keefe, a graduate student at SFU, for his editorial assistance. Finally, versions of most of this book's materials have been previously published as journal articles, as indicated in each relevant chapter. What motivated me to produce this book is the thematic nature of the previous studies that I conducted using, primarily, computational journalism methods and cross‐national comparative research with emphasis on news values theory. This combination of quantitative and qualitative analysis, with a focus on media produced and consumed outside of Europe and North America, remains all too rare. It is my hope that this humble contribution will encourage other researchers, especially from the global south, to pursue similar projects in the study of international news flows and journalism. Finally, this book is dedicated to my mother as a way to express my gratitude for her love, generosity, and tremendous sacrifices.

1 News 2.0 and New Technologies