The J Word 3.5: Speculating Social Media Futures

The J Word: A Podcast by Journalism Practice

Journalists use social media to predict – and to respond – to audiences’ interests and needs. But how is this kind of engagement reshaping news and its processes for the future? Can we use our predictive methods of social media use, such as metrics, to also speculate about how journalists can use social media of the future?
In this episode, Constanza Gajardo León, a Ph.D. candidate at Vrije Universiteit in The Netherlands and coauthor of “From abstract news users to living citizens,” talks with us about the best methods being used to understand – and guess – what audiences want and where they will go next for their news. And Zhao Peng, a lecturer at Boston’s Emerson College in the U.S. discusses her coauthored piece, “An examination of how social and technological perceptions predict social media news use on WeChat,” moves us into a futuristic take on what social media could be based on the innovations of today’s platforms.
Text Featured in this Episode:

Peng, Z., & Miller, S. (2021). An Examination of How Social and Technological Perceptions Predict Social Media News Use on WeChat. Journalism Practice, 1-20.

Gajardo, C., Costera Meijer, I., & Domingo, D. (2021). From Abstract News Users to Living Citizens: Assessing Audience Engagement Through a Professional Lens. Journalism Practice, 1-17.
Produced and hosted by Robert (Ted) Gutsche, Jr.
Give feedback to the podcast on Twitter @JournPractice or email [e-mail]