Twitter as a News Source

How Dutch and British newspapers used tweets in their news coverage, 2007–2011

Bibliographic Data

ID12908779
AuthorsMarcel Broersma (0000-0002-7342-3472, Broughton Hospital, corresponding author), Todd Graham (0000-0002-5634-7623)
Year2013
Volume7
Issue4
Pages446-464
Publication date2013-05-30
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournalism Practice (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1751-2786 • E-ISSN: 1751-2794
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/17512786.2013.802481
OpenAlexW1541661015
LanguageEN
Citations received146
References cited31

Twitter has become a convenient, cheap and effective beat for journalists in search of news and information. Reporters today increasingly aggregate information online and embed it in journalism discourse. In this paper, we analyse how tweets have increasingly been included as quotes in newspaper reporting during the rise of Twitter from 2007 to 2011. The paper compares four Dutch and four British national tabloids and broadsheets, asking if tabloid journalists are relying more on this second-hand coverage than their colleagues from quality papers. Moreover, we investigate in which sections of the paper tweets are included and what kinds of sources are quoted. Consequently, we present a typology of the functions tweets have in news reports. Reporters do include these utterances as either newsworthy or to support or illustrate a story. In some cases, individual tweets or interaction between various agents on Twitter even triggers news coverage. We argue that this new discursive practice alters the balance of power between journalists and sources

Journalism · Media studies · News media · News values · Newspaper · Political science · Power (physics · Public relations · Sociology · Typology · Media Studies and Communication · Radio, Podcasts, and Digital Media · Social Media and Politics

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Open DOISci-HubOpen Access