There isn’t one kind of journalist. While the default definition for a journalist is someone who reports on breaking or local news, that isn’t everything. Journalism can stretch so much further than the parameters given by a civilian. Journalists can focus on different areas of news, not just what has the most attention. Some journalists focus on education stories or even travel. There are also photojournalists, whose job is to build a story without words. How can they express what is happening without any words?
Each different kind of journalist uses social media differently. Some types of journalists won’t have a heavy social media following because their face isn’t on television or social media stories every day; they work more behind the scenes. This enables them to be more private on social media.
With someone like Miya Shay at KTRK, her face is going to be everywhere. Shay works with the eyewitness news section at KTRK, a section that gains a lot of viewership. Because her face and name are her brand, that will reflect across social media and how she uses them. On Shay’s work-related social media accounts, news stories take the stage while personal posts cruise in the background.
Social media is a vast market and can be used in one’s favor to gain more attention. Television doesn’t do the numbers like it used to do, also, information is a lot easier to come by on social media. Having oneself tied into social media can be a major benefit to someone who needs constant access to the community and their community needs constant access to them.
In other less prominent but equally important roles, social media isn’t always necessary. For someone like Tania Colon at the Wall Street Journal, her life can be more private because she isn’t the one brining you the stories. She is the one helping them be told through pictures. Social media can be nice every so often to use pictures throughout the community, but it isn’t a lifeline in the way that it could be for other journalists.
