
Print media used to be a dynasty akin to some of the world’s grandest Empires – back in the 1970s and 1980s, millions of newspapers were sold globally daily. It has created some of the world’s richest and most powerful men. Some publications shifted millions of copies daily for huge publications in the United States and the United Kingdom.
However, these gigantic business models quickly became antiquated as the world became a predominantly digital landscape. Many failed to adapt to the online world that was fast approaching behind them. Between the early 2000s and the mid-2010s, digital news outlets started to overtake some print media companies that had been in business for over 150 years.
Some media tycoons will have learned valuable lessons from this seismic power shift. Although not all media conglomerates suffered, this is mainly because they used their vast wealth to diversify into other sectors. Their business models would have been eviscerated if they had been all in on print media.
The most vital lesson will have been to embrace technology rather than compete against it. The casino industry is arguably the best example of utilizing technology instead of fighting it. Land-based casinos accepted that digital casinos would soon challenge them.
Therefore, many opened their versions of gambling that accommodate this change, whether it is a live roulette casino game or poker tournaments you can enter online. As a result, these gambling industries now operate successfully simultaneously instead of stifling each other, embracing that a market for both has resulted in expansive growth for digital casinos and steady profits for land-based ones.
Why People Use Twitter for News
In 2019, figures showed that over half of Americans get their news directly from social media. In a world where more people than ever are obsessed with their mobile devices and each new generation that comes along becomes more immersed in their phones and social media than the last, these numbers are projected to expand to much higher levels.
In 2002, the internet overtook traditional sources as the place where citizens would consume their media. Take it forward to 2016; newspapers were bleeding out to $150 million annually. This number has accelerated as internet media is better in every conceivable fashion, such as
- Cheaper – news articles are often free online, or the monthly subscription is exceptionally affordable.
- Instant – print newspapers, at best, operate a few hours behind real-time.
- More variety – although this can be considered a negative, people will obtain media from commentators they trust and respect, leading to verification issues and polarizing political campaigns. Still, it’s much more reliable to obtain news this way.
- More accessible – you don’t need to walk to the local store. You can connect to Wi-Fi and channel the latest news instantly.
Why Twitter and Not Other Social Media?
For all its faults, Twitter doesn’t have the same reputation for spreading misinformation as Facebook does. Instagram is not a place people go to for news. It is a social sphere where people share images and videos. However, the live, scrolling, ever-updating conveyer belt design of the Twitter home page makes it ideal for news.
We imagine Elon Musk weighed this during his titanic bidding litigation to take over the San Francisco-based social media company with over 300 million global users. This instantaneous fix of immediate news headlines and videos related to these topics makes it a formidable foundation for people to post. In addition, verifying individuals allows them to immediately convey thoughts to people directly, completely ruling out the middleman of the traditional media.
Over the last twenty years, distrust in the media has grown right across the West. So, although the world’s richest man owning Twitter isn’t exactly a reason to throw a party, Musk finds himself in the enviable position of having hundreds of millions of people at his fingertips.
Will Twitter Actually Take Over?
If Twitter does become the world’s global news source, it won’t happen overnight. Many people use other forms of internet-based media to receive their daily fix of what’s going on in the world, and just because the news on social media is instant and cheap doesn’t make it more reliable. If anything, it is a strong argument for why Twitter shouldn’t become the sole news outlet.
Spending hours a day staring at your phone is not a good idea, and these numbers could drop as more people become aware of the harm social media can cause. The long-term adverse health effects are yet to be fully understood because it is such a new technology. If smartphone over-reliance becomes a big talking point, the pendulum could easily swing back the other way, harming any possibility of Twitter becoming the number one global news source.
If it ever happens, we’re far from watching this play out in real-time. It’ll take several other mitigating factors to bring this possibility into contention, but it isn’t outside the realms of possibility. Elon Musk isn’t an individual that anybody should write off.
0 Comments