From TV to Twitter: How Ambient News Became Ambient Journalism

Abstract

Scholars have applied the term "ambient" to journalism to describe the omnipresent nature of news in society through the proliferation of one-way media into public spaces. This approach is based on a one-directional model of mass media where the audience is framed as the receptor of communication. However this paper suggests that we need to reassess the meaning of ambient as applied to news and journalism due to the participatory and interactive characteristics of the networked digital media. The Internet has changed the relationship between journalists and audiences from a one-way, asymmetric model of communication to a more participatory and collective system, where citizens have the ability to participate in the news production process. This paper argues that ambient news has evolved into ambient journalism – an awareness system that offers diverse means to collect, communicate, share and display news and information, from both professional and non-professional sources.

Keywords: Ambient Journalism, Internet, Journalism, Social Media, Television, Twitter

JEL Classification: O30