New Media

The “New Media”

News can be circulated using many different communication mediums, such as word of mouth, print, broadcasts, or the Internet. The main forms of news reporting used to be through newspapers, the radio, and television. When it first started, news gathering was ancient compared to today's standards. For newspapers, the story had to be brought directly into the newsroom or called in. After that, the story was then written and either sent out over wire services or edited and put together along with other news stories for that edition of the paper. Today, the term "breaking news" is not out of the ordinary and has become a routine part of the news. Broadcast and cable news services use television and the Internet to bring current events into consumer homes live as they happen. Stories that used to take hours or even days to become common knowledge can now be heard instantaneously across the world.

The main form through which news is evolving is through the Internet. You can go on the Internet and access different newspapers and news television networks websites for updates on what is happening locally and nationally. There are also many different sources for online news, such as blogs and chat rooms. Many of these blogs and chat rooms are run by someone out of their basement who is not necessarily an expert on the topic. While the evolution of information sources from professional media outlets to the “new media,” comprised of blogs, chat rooms, and online news sources, has ushered in many positive changes, there are still credibility issues and risks.

Today someone has a variety of choices when seeking news. With the amount of alternative news sources growing, someone has to choose between personal blogs, media blogs, online news, and print newspaper. A personal blog can be started by anyone with internet access and a little knowledge of the Web. These personal blogs most commonly resemble a traditional diary. However, these types of...