Research Progress

My initial research project topic: Digital Transformation Efforts from the New York Times to attract young generation readers 

Technology has affected many spheres of human lives, and it has also affected people's news consumption behavior. Gone are the days of grey-scale newspapers, when people held papers on their hands during their commute.

Those bulky newspapers that often bothered people sitting next to you have now been replaced by mobile phones that are light and easy to carry around. People look at their phones while waiting for trains, scroll down Facebook news feeds and might click on interesting news articles shared by their friends. 

So, it's not just the medium (from print to mobile) that has changed but also sources (newspapers produced by the media companies to social media posts shared by friends) - social media plays a more powerful role in distributing news than the mobile apps or webpages that are directly managed by the news companies. Indeed, Jim Roberts, the Executive Editor and Chief Content Officer at Mashable, makes an interesting comment in the video, "Has Mobile Consumption Changed The News Industry?" created by the Wall Street Journals: "News organizations have to be prepared that their homepages are less important. People are using Facebook as their homepage, using Twitter as their own homepage. Those news streams are their portals into the world of information" (00:30). 

For my research project, I was planning on examining the digital transformation efforts adopted by the New York Times to attract young generation readers. I wanted to learn how quintessential media companies such as the New York Times have kept up with the emergence of new technology that has triggered the unprecedented news consumption pattern. But after watching this video, I am considering phrasing the topic slightly differently - instead of saying "how the media company is catering to the new group of audience," maybe phrase it to "how the media company is leveraging social media to drive user traffic?" 

The video made me think that social media necessarily is not an arch-nemesis to news companies but rather can be a tool, which can connect them to a broader audience. I want to spend this week reading more articles related to this topic and be more specific about the angle I want to take.