Seven in ten adult internet users (69%) have used the internet to watch or download video. That represents 52% of all adults in the United States.
Driven by the popularity of online video among 18-29 year-olds, there have been dramatic increases since 2007 in the number of American adults watching:
Comedy or humorous videos, rising in viewership from 31% of adult internet users in 2007 to 50% of adult internet users in the current survey
Educational videos, rising in viewership from 22% to 38% of adult internet users
Movies or TV show videos, rising in viewership from 16% to 32% of adult internet users
Political videos, rising in viewership from 15% to 30% of adult internet users
On the other side of the camera, video creation has now become a notable feature of online life. One in seven adult internet users (14%) have uploaded a video to the internet, almost double the 8% who were uploading video in 2007. Home video is far and away the most popular content posted online, shared by 62% of video uploaders. And uploaders are just as likely to share video on social networking sites like Facebook (52% do this) as they are on more specialized video-sharing sites like YouTube (49% do this).
Yet, while video-sharing is growing in popularity, adult internet users have mixed feelings about how broadly they want to share their own creations. While 31% of uploaders say they “always” place restrictions on who can access their videos, 50% say they “never” restrict access. The remaining 19% fall somewhere in the middle. And while there is almost universal appreciation for the ease with which video-sharing sites allow uploaders to share video with family and friends, a considerable number (35%) also feel they should be more careful about what they post.
The Pew Internet study finds the link between young adults, reputation management and social media.
More than half (57%) of adult internet users say they have used a search engine to look up their name and see what information was available about them online, up from 47% who did so in 2006.
Young adults, far from being indifferent about their digital footprints, are the most active online reputation managers in several dimensions. For example, more than two-thirds (71%) of social networking users ages 18-29 have changed the privacy settings on their profile to limit what they share with others online.
Reputation management has now become a defining feature of online life for many internet users, especially the young. While some internet users are careful to project themselves online in a way that suits specific audiences, other internet users embrace an open approach to sharing information about themselves and do not take steps to restrict what they share.
“Search engines and social media sites now play a central role in building one’s identity online,” said Mary Madden, Senior Research Specialist and lead author of the report, “Many users are learning and refining their approach as they go–changing privacy settings on profiles, customizing who can see certain updates and deleting unwanted information about them that appears online.”
When compared with older users, young adults are more likely to restrict what they share and whom they share it with. “Contrary to the popular perception that younger users embrace a laissez-faire attitude about their online reputations, young adults are often more vigilant than older adults when it comes to managing their online identities,” said Madden.
Digital content will continue to transform traditional media. How old and new media make money during and after this transformation, however, remains uncertain – even as more and more content comes online, from traditional sources, independent producers and users themselves. Which business models are working now and what will work in the future? How will emerging distribution models and new platforms affect the ways that new content is created?
Join the Commonwealth Club as a panel of experts examines the new business models for content creation, distribution and monetization.
PBM MediaShift informs about the website OurBlook.com, that gathers opinions from today’s top leaders in the hopes of collaboratively finding tomorrow’s solutions. Future of journalism interview series (@ourblook) has collected over 100 interviews with well known journalists and new media experts. From the series it’s clear that newspapers do have lot of catching up to do but journalism will survive in one form or another and trained journalists cannot be replaced.
Future of Journalism Interview Series Findings
Newspapers are still searching for business and editorial models that are sustainable in this new world of media. Outlets that cling on to their old methods of doing things will die.
The idea of newspapers charging for their websites was once looked down upon, but is now becoming an accepted strategy. Additionally, as online advertising changes, and banner ads are quickly becoming passé, experts are urging newspapers to explore non-traditional revenue streams such as online games or web apps.
Hyper-local is gaining acceptance. As a result, harnessing the power of citizen journalism has become a key goal for many media outlets.
The role of journalists and the skills necessary to succeed have changed. This has caused many industry insiders to ponder the future of journalism’s culture and ethics.
One-way storytelling has given way to a two-way (or multiple) conversation between the journalist and the audience. Tools like Twitter and Facebook have become incredibly important in this new context.
TV news is beginning to experience the same changes and chaos as print journalism, causing many to panic.
A panel of journalists at Logan Symposium by Berkley Graduate School of Journalism discusses the benefits of collaboration in investigative journalism. They discuss their experiences collaborating with other news organizations, and explore what makes a partnership work, and what can potentially kill a working relationship.
Google and Facebook almost hint the death of the privacy dead, but is it really and if it is dead then why are they talking about is. Bruce Schneier on Forbes talks about this Google And Facebook’s Privacy Illusion:
In January Facebook Chief Executive, Mark Zuckerberg, declared the age of privacy to be over. A month earlier, Google Chief Eric Schmidt expressed a similar sentiment. Add Scott McNealy’s and Larry Ellison’s comments from a few years earlier, and you’ve got a whole lot of tech CEOs proclaiming the death of privacy–especially when it comes to young people.
It’s just not true. People, including the younger generation, still care about privacy. Yes, they’re far more public on the Internet than their parents: writing personal details on Facebook, posting embarrassing photos on Flickr and having intimate conversations on Twitter. But they take steps to protect their privacy and vociferously complain when they feel it violated. They’re not technically sophisticated about privacy and make mistakes all the time, but that’s mostly the fault of companies and Web sites that try to manipulate them for financial gain.
Bruce Schneier is a security technologist and the Chief Security Technology Officer of BT. You can read more of his writing at www.schneier.com. Recently he gave a talk on on "Security, Privacy, and the Generation Gap", the video of which is available here.
As we learn more about both web economics and consumer behavior, the unbundling of news seems increasingly central to journalism’s future.
The future of New and Old Media are more tied together than some may think
The notion that the news media are shrinking is mistaken.
Technology is further shifting power to newsmakers, and the newest way is through their ability to control the initial accounts of events
The ranks of self-interested information providers are now growing rapidly and news organizations must define their relationship to them
When it comes to audience numbers online, traditional media content still prevails, which means the cutbacks in old media heavily impact what the public is learning through the new.
Lee Rainie, who is the Director of the Pew Internet & American Life Project provides his own thoughts on journalism’s future. He seems to be optimistic. In an interview with Leonard Witt, he says:
"News organizations are trying to adapt to the new realities that will allow them to provide [high quality journalism], and there will always be a portion of the population who deeply cares about public life and civic life and the way that public institutions perform."
Here’s the video of the interview and the full transcript .
Woods Institute for the Environment informs about the Stanford University study, a working paper which documents how climate change skeptics can affect Americans’ thinking about climate change. A synopsis of the study can be found here, including videos used in the study that feature interviews of mainstream and skeptical scientists discussing global warming issues.
News media coverage of global warming has often offered "balanced" accounts, quoting mainstream scientists and skeptics in the same story. Balanced accounts might be considered admirable efforts to abide by the journalistic norms of objectivity and fairness. However, critics have noted that balanced reporting of this particular issue actually conveys a misleading portrait of the science of climate change, since scientists endorsing the mainstream view appear to outnumber skeptics. Our study explored the impact of including skeptical voices in news media coverage. In particular, we explored whether adding a skeptic to a story about a mainstream scientist’s views or findings would reduce the number of people who perceive agreement among scientific experts on this issue and think global warming is a serious problem.
Newspapers are still searching for business and editorial models that are sustainable in this new world of media. Outlets that cling on to their old methods of doing things will die.