As Natalie Fenton discusses in her article, news through journalism has changed dramatically in the past 10 years (and is continuing to change). The “speed it up and spread it thin” motto that journalists now live by is an important point that has created a somewhat summarized version of current events or news stories for our generation. It seems that the faster something is done, the more it is praised, regardless of how complete and/or truthful the article/news story actually is.

This, to me, does not seem like the best way to get accurate news out to the people. I personally would much rather a several hour delay and then get the full story rather than a quick but half-assed version of the truth.

There are now SO many places that people go to get their news and information as compared to the older days. Everything is now online as well as printed. There are so many different sources that are skewed or biased in one way or another, so people are able to pick which ones they want to read or listen to. There are advertisements and distractions all over the actual articles or news story that cause unnecessary clutter for people to get caught up in.

With all of these things taken into account, I believe it is still safe to say that my fellow undergraduates and I are much more well informed than people in our position ten years ago. We are certainly better and more “minute to minute” informed as compared to undergraduates ten years ago. Even though news companies have been criticized for trying to be the “first people with the story” while sacrificing the details and perhaps not knowing the whole story, we still get the news and hear the quick overview of the situation. We can then dive deeper into the story ourselves… as the news companies learn more and share the further details. Our generation is hungry for the “minute to minute” updates that help piece together the mystery or the crime or any other kind of story that is drawing a lot of attention from the nation or world.

There is no question in my mind that we are so much more informed than undergraduates of ten years ago. And although it does get cluttered and is often times hard to sift through, the Internet allows us to find pretty much whatever we need whenever we want it. We have the world at our fingertips and it is just a matter of sorting through everything to find the goods we are after. (My main criterion is having news and information of all kinds available and reachable to the masses).

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