The Augmented Newsbeat: Spatial Structuring in a Twitterized News Ecosystem

• In Event: The Role, Content, and Shaping of Political News in a New Media Environment

Abstract

This article deals with the intertwining of digital and nondigital spaces of news reporting. It focuses specifically on how Twitter affects spatial and temporal orderings of news ecosystems. At the New York State Government, actors within the space permeate informational barriers through Twitter while enabling others to follow and engage in events from remote locations. The always-on mentality of tweeters not only blurs boundaries between work life and private life but also helps correspondents to get access to and pass on information instantly as well as to anticipate events. The proliferation of digital spaces enhances awareness of nondigital spaces but requires coordination between the two. This paper is based on over two years of field research, involving observation, interviews, digital ethnography of the statehouse twitterverse and analysis of journalists’ tweets around the passage of same-sex-marriage law.

Author

• Matthias Revers, University of Graz