Behind the Social Networks

According to the survey, people are no longer interested in these topics and turn to social media instead. They do this because it's more comfortable. What they need is to access Facebook, Instagram or TikTok on their phones, tablets or laptops and get the information they need, even if that piece of information is not verified and the sources not mentioned. Raluca Radu professor PhD at the Faculty of Journalism and Sciences of Communication with the Bucharest University - the Romanian partner of Reuters Institute in the world's biggest survey on information consumption and opinion of digital viewers has given an interview to Radio Romania about the aspects of this year's report. 

Raluca Radu: "There was a watershed moment during the pandemic, when the traditional media ceded its place to the social media in terms of news access. A problem was that some of these social networks aren't those redirecting people either to certain sites or to the traditional media but keep them there, as is the case of TikTok and Instagram. These are two networks mainly used by the young people at the global level, but also in Romania. And one of the surprises we have been seeing for the past couple of years is that TikTok is on the rise as it is very popular with the young generation and of course, year after year the young population comes with its new habits and replaces the aging population, in our survey. TikTok has a very small market share in some countries; these are the countries in Western Europe, more developed from the economic point of view with more stable democracies. In other countries, in South America or the Middle East, TikTok has a very strong presence, just like in Romania. And if we are to compare Romania with the rest of Europe, the Romanians are getting most of their information from TikTok as compared to the rest of the European countries included in the Digital News Report."

The surveyalso highlights the issues facing the press - distrust, the lack of interest and misinformation pointing out that the people's trust in the Romanian press continues to diminish. For the second year in a row, trust has been at the lowest level in the past 7 years: out of 10 interviewees, 7 are avoiding press information. The crises coming one after another after the pandemic, which forced people indoors, the war in Ukraine, the over-information and what could be described as information fatigue have led to a diminished interest in news and the classical information sources, says Raluca Radu.

"The report shows that journalists aren't the first information source for the people accessing social media platforms. These are actually common people and this all of a sudden is a major problem. So, I get my information from the people in the street, some John Does who have no contact with the press", says Antonia Matei PhD lecturer at the Faculty of Journalism and Communication Sciences.

Antonia Matei: "Eventually we have to admit that journalists have many problems too. Now, to be sure that you have given a correct piece of news, it takes you much more time to verify it than it did ten years ago, let's say, when we were not coping with this phenomenon of fake news. Journalists' entire work has changed a lot and they are faced with lots of pressures. The newsrooms in Romania still do not have fact-checkers, all this work is additional effort by journalists, and it is not easy at all. All the research and documentation work in writing an article, in making a simple news story, which used to take you very little time before, now it takes much longer."

The X-ray of the media in the world, starting from the results of the Digital News Report, shows that there is tremendous pressure on journalists at global level, and Raluca Radu also confirms it.

Raluca Radu: "Practically, the situation of the media is deteriorating and it's not just the fact that the public is going to social networks. The pressure of the states on journalists is increasing. This year, for the first time, the colleagues from Oxford thought to add a very important detail to the two pages of the report: where the respective country is in the Reporters Without Borders ranking, which is a ranking of the freedom of information, and which has questions like - Are journalists beaten? Are you afraid to talk about your political views on social media? Do you need state approval when you open a website? There are some countries in which the answer was 'yes' to these questions, which are terrible. All over the world it is basically a battle between autocracies that are trying to gain more and more power and democracy, journalists, who are obliged to defend democracy for the whole community".

And sometimes they do that in spite of the community, which would rather watch cute videos with little animals on TikTok, Raluca Radu added. (bill&LS)