Redefining News in the Age of Internet: The Second form of News
Abstract
The traditional definition of news has changed with time, territory, trends and technology. News is now anywhere and everywhere. For the citizens of the digital highway, it's just a click away. But what is news in today's context, especially when information travels nearly at the speed of light? Is it just the actual happenings that affect our lives? Or has it taken a more generalized turn, laced with trivialities that may or may not affect audiences?
Traditionally news has been broadly classified into hard and soft news (with subcategories like an article, feature etc.). However, this classification was based on the news values attached with an event and generally follows a one-way communication pattern; in a medium like the internet, it follows a dynamic two-way communication pattern.
This paper suggests that in the broad categorization of news, due to changing times and overly used mediums like the internet, one more category should be added, namely "Reaction". "Reaction" in the news defines the opinions generated by celebrities, politicians or commoners surrounding an event that already became news. Reaction caters to both hard and soft news. It follows a two-way communication pattern that is highly participatory. Reactions keep building up to the original news and recede when it loses significance. The Reactions are always personal, direct and opinionated and become news themselves when it follows specific news values. This structure of Reaction dominating the event and becoming news itself strengthens stereotypes and opinions. Thereby it results in opinionated news stories rather than focusing on the occasion of the story itself. This paper will attempt to analyze how Reaction makes and becomes news. What news values does Reaction follow? How does it stereotype public opinion?
Top news, five national & international news websites and five Indian news apps have been studied to identify and categorize News and Reactions. The findings brought forth a new news category called "Reactions" and defined its characteristics. This paper seeks to understand how Reaction gradually became mainstream news and gained prominence because of specific news values.
