For Presidential politics at least, social media is in the process of slaughtering the old school

[DisgustipatedinCA]

6. I consider that to be one of the biggest (and unheralded) stories of this election cycle.

Social media has been talked about for the last few election cycles, but this time around, it's mature, and it's making a real difference.

Look at Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, and others. People KNOW the media is lying to them, about this, that and the other. People know that the media pushes their preferred angle, whatever that happens to be. And people know that old school media outlets don't have any real value to offer them. And it's not just young people who intrinsically understand this. They're the biggest group, yes, but millions of us in our 40's still feel young and still avail ourselves of the latest technologies.

Incidentally, this is why I think TV spots for candidates are becoming less and less useful for the candidates who air them. And I think they're starting to get that, which is why a lot of spots are aimed at older voters.

With social media, the only thing we need to develop our own opinions and begin discussing/arguing amongst ourselves, are "just the facts". In practice, since the media is not trustworthy, this means getting a few different sources to ensure to the extent possible that we're getting the facts of a given story. And we've got it from there, thanks.

I'm glad you posted this.