Study reveals that Twitter is the top source for breaking news
A new survey by the American Press Institute of nearly 5,000 social media users in US has found that Twitter is the most popular source for staying updated with breaking news among all the social networking sites.
As any journalist can tell you, timelines get quite crowded when news breaks, and the study offers empirical proof of this – 70% of those surveyed said they had used Twitter in the last month to follow a news story in real time.
While Twitter users follow news in general on the service, and sometimes do so just as a way of passing time, they act differently when they are following breaking news, becoming even more participatory – commenting, posting and sharing at moments when events are moving fastest.
More than that, users actively participate during breaking news situations:
- 80 percent of those who tracked news in the last month clicked through to links as they scrolled.
- Only 39 percent of Twitter users normally do this.
There are a lot of ripple effects to this trend:
- 55 percent of breaking news Twitter users retweeted a story.
- 53 percent used a hashtag to find more information.
- 40 percent of users tweeted their own reactions to the story.
- 30 percent followed someone new.
Other sites also feel the benefit of Twitter’s reach:
- Half of users went to a search engine to get more information about a topic.
- 40 percent checked another news website.
- 34 percent went to another social network.
[Via]
