There are numerous ways to gather one’s desired information these days. It is no secret that newspapers are struggling to maintain an audience and now news channels on television are losing viewers as well. I’d have to say the main reason I do not watch the news is because it is 100% depressing. After a long day, who wants to tune in and hear about all of the awful things happening around the world, particularly in our own back yard (sometimes literally in our own neighborhood.) I know there’s the occasional uplifting story, but its rare. While Facebook isn’t the ideal source for worldly events, I honestly read more uplifting stories on Facebook and wonder to myself, now why aren’t these do-gooders featured on the 6 o’clock news? I would personally tune in more if the news had a more positive tone. I honestly don’t want to look at mug shot after mug shot; I am aware our world can be a scary and bad place, but there is also a lot of good in the world that gets overshadowed by updates on say, the latest “Craigslist Killer.”
However, despite my general dislike for the news, I did tune in for this weeks natural disaster: Blizzard Nemo. The main reason I watched was because I’m from Massachusetts and was worried for my family as well as everyone else that was affected. I knew the news was going to be negative…no surprise there. My biggest surprise was that I realized these news channels owe US a big thank you for providing them with a significantly huge portion of their media coverage. What do I mean by this? Mostly every picture I saw was a personal picture sent in to the news by viewers. This also extends to video clips, tweets, posts, etc. I don’t think this is necessarily a bad thing, I am just noticing a shift from when it was the journalists job to go out and gather the information to present to the public themselves. Considering today viewers have some control over the content being put out there, perhaps this is a step in the right direction to revitalize televised news.