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Internet now dominant source of news

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Can you hear that?  It’s the sound of Walter Cronkite letting out a disappointed sigh.

A new survey by Zogby Interactive says that the internet now beats TV, radio and newspaper as the preferred news source.  And that’s certainly understandable.  With our immediate need for news and information we have become extremely dependant on our computers, iPhones, WiFi, Blackberrys, etc.  Some would even say we are TOO dependent on these gadgets.  But that’s another opinion for another time.

The most shocking part of this study is that nearly 40 percent of those surveyed think that the Internet is the most reliable news outlet.  What?!  The Internet is filled with every Tom, Dick and Harry with an opinion, that can operate a simple blog site (yours truly included).  Most just working on knee jerk reactions to stories without checking the validity of facts.  For most of the second half of the 20th Century, TV and newspapers were the dominant source of news.  People like Kronkite, Huntley, Brinkley, and Brokaw were the people we trusted to bring us the news of the day,  oftentimes taking on a father figure status because we trusted them so.  Today, it’s “YankeeHater123” or “ObamaFan09”–nameless, faceless people behind a computer who bring us our “news”. 

Just today in fact, ESPN was reporting that Minnesota Timberwolves Head Coach Kevin McHale was fired.  Their source for this story?  A players Twitter post.  Ughh.  I don’t want to sound like some old curmudgeon here, I do that enough in “real life”, but it makes my skin crawl when I see Twitter as a source for a serious news story. 

But the fact is that the world is changing…how we communicate is changing…where we get our news from is changing.  The question is, how will your company adapt to these changing times? 

I guess it’s not all bad, if it wasn’t for the internet and blogs we would have never had this.

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