In American sports, the conclusion of a contest typically crowns a team as being a "World Champion". Champagne flies across the locker room of the victors. Victory parades are scheduled. Unfortunately, another aspect of a team winning a championship is the inevitable "disturbances" which occur as ignorant fans in the city of the newly crowned champions choose to celebrate by looting and rioting. Last night's World Series win by the San Francisco Giants is no different here.
What was interesting, however, was the lack of coverage of these disturbances via traditional news media outlets. Even local San Francisco media had little coverage of these events as they broke. Where news of the "San Francisco Riots" was breaking, however, was the internet. This made me think of the discussions which we had in class and about what consumers want to see as news items versus what traditional news media outlets choose to present as news.
Given this disconnect between traditional and "new" media outlets, do you think that the traditional news channels are in danger of losing touch with reality, so to speak? This reminds me of the death of Neda Agha-Soltan during last year's Iranian election protests. Although Iran's news media outlets didn't mention it, her death was transmitted around the world thanks to the internet and Twitter. I think we'll see more and more of this dual news phenomenon, at least until traditional news media sources wake up.
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