Examining Journalists’ Adoption of Social Media Tools in Contexts of Precarity

Abstract

Digital technologies have changed journalists’ work practices and their roles with far-reaching effects for news production. While many studies focus on the ways social media transforms editorial processes, much of this research examines fully democratic Western countries. We examine how journalists in Turkey, who occupy particularly precarious social positions, incorporate social media tools into their routines, and the effects of these tools on journalistic role conceptions. To understand this, we analyzed 10 interviews with Turkish editors and reporters from popular Turkish news outlets. These journalists say their roles are shifting from active news formation to passive information relay — they are becoming aggregators rather than reporters. And while social networking sites increase the volume of newsworthy ideas that journalists encounter, they also increase the pressure on editors and reporters to compete with other news outlets. The organizations we studied did not employ separate fact-checking teams or software for news verification, leading to workflow challenges around verifying large quantities of information collected from social media. Our findings suggest that journalists in precarious positions might be especially reliant on social media logics in their daily work since they lack the social, political, and occupational security to improvise or resist new practices and values.

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