What Michael Jackson's death taught me about old and new media

Related Categories: Social Media

Judette Coward-Puhglisi

Michael Jackson is dead!

Six seconds later I corrected my facebook post

Judette Coward-Puglisi at 5:57pm June 25

I should have said Twitter reports are announcing that he has died. According to the streams its cardiac arrest. Have not seen major news organisation announce his death.

Maria C. Mohammed at 5:57pm June 25

TMZ is saying he is dead

Judette Coward-Puglisi at 6:02pm June 25

Don't find TMZ credible though. Let's wait and see. We know he was rushed to hospital. Know paramedics state a cardiac attack.

That's an actual conversation that happened in real time between my friend, Maria Mohammed and I, moments after the first streams from Twitter had the words 'Michael Jackson' as a trending topic.

For those of you not yet in Twitterverse, when you're a trending topic it means that the world is buzzing with something new about you. When the buzz on Michael Jackson (MJ) started, I thought it was just another concert announcement, turns out it was so much more.

The the King of Pop was gone.

Maybe it was my journalism training (to second source information and make sure your sources are accurate ) but TMZ ‘s online story was not credible enough for me and I waited for CNN and BBC to make the confirmation before reposting the news of Jackson’s death on my facebook page.

Time magazine had a brilliant article today on why my initial instinct was the correct one. According to the article: (and I hope you’ve clicked the link to read it)...

“Jackson's death was the first of its kind to occur in the new media world, where news can come from anywhere and gets passed around the Web on Twitter feeds and Facebook updates and story comments with millions of individuals volunteering their particular insight or spin or emotion. Instead of a few media monoliths speaking for us all, Jackson's fans, detractors and impartial observers all spoke for themselves. This story should have provided a blueprint for how new media has overthrown old. But what it actually did was shine a white hot spotlight on the myths of the current media landscape.”

I agree.

A week after Jackson's death, he may still the No. 1 and top trending topics on Twitter but it was to MTV that I turned when I wanted to get the complete retrospective of his musical genius. Not Twitter.

And facebook may have strained under the weight of the volume of searches on the very evening of the MJ announcement but it was NBC, trustworthy and familiar like an old friend who scored big with the most comprehensive reports of MJ’s life and times. And then when actor Jeff Goldblum became a trending topic on Twitter and I feared the worse, it was CNN that I watched to for reassurance that he too had not passed.

Time magazine surmised it the best.

"What the story of Jackson's demise might have actually proved is that each type of media —new, social, mainstream — has a part in the news ecosystem and one does not replace the other. The new media provides the speed, the social media provides the emotion, the mainstream media provides the heft. And Goldblum, well, he brings the weird."

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I like Time Magazine's term 'news ecosystem' . Funny enough on Wed., I saw a headline report on CNN referring their source to TMZ, which bothered me, as you stated they are not perceived as credible with CNN being the other extreme, which just goes to show how the ecosystem is working.

I trust the reputation of CNN to know, they would have more than likely made sure it was a credible story before making reference to TMZ.

# Posted By Maria Mohammed | 7/3/09 4:05 PM

I really like this article. Good job. Could you post the link for the Time article please? Thanks

# Posted By Sean Bennett | 7/6/09 8:59 PM

No problem, Sean. Thanks for the input. The direct link to the Times article is: http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/complet...

# Posted By Christine Nanton | 7/6/09 9:35 PM

Fantastic!

# Posted By Nicole du Boulet | 7/6/09 9:57 PM

great article.
i did the same discrediting of TMZ when i saw their reports too. actually, my girlfriend sent me their story as the proof that he died. i went ahead to bash that source "a gossip site?? seriously??" so i tuned in to the live feed on BBC. next ting you know, BBC is saying that TMZ has already confirmed his death AND said that "THEY HAVE BEEN KNOWN TO UNLOCK CELEBRITY STORIES IN THE PAST". she did not hesitate to laugh at my BBC now praising her source for unlocking what they unlocked media light years after.

# Posted By q | 7/11/09 11:46 AM

Whoa Q. Hold on here. Not quite so fast.

Post the original announcement at TMZ, Michael Jackson posts continued to come into TMZ thick and fast, many of them with little news value and some flat out wrong, says Time.

Like the part where they reported that MJ's the trust provides for Michael's children and mother, and distributes money to several charities. How wrong can you get?

The credibility they won in their initial reporting was lost in their subsequent news coverage.

So hold onto to your pinch of salt and sprinkle it liberally on TMZ.

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5am At Mango Media Caribbean

What Michael Jackson's death taught me about old and new media