All the News that’s Fit to Watch: How the New York Times Uses Video on Facebook

ABSTRACT

The New York Times has a long history as the purveyor of all the news that’s fit to print. In a multi-layered journalistic world, this study examined how the Times utilized Facebook video and found the Gray Lady highlighted its signature products in news, analysis, reviews, and Crosswords while expanding into videos. The legacy newspaper used Facebook to drive traffic to its website through hyperlinks in prerecorded videos while also creating specific content for social media through its Live platform. Additionally, the Times focused on mostly hard news and analysis in its prerecorded videos and packages while focusing more on soft news in Live coverage. The impact of Facebook’s algorithms as well as users’ reactions are also discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Gatekeeping
• shareworthiness
• newsroom practices
• Facebook Live Video
• content analysis
• social media

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).