Alyssa Newcomb had just celebrated her one-year anniversary as a Tech reporter at NBC News in San Francisco when the Charlottesville protests began.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were questions about who was marching in Charlottesville. It felt as though people were so shocked to see this happening in 2017,\u201d Newcomb said.<\/p>\n
In Aug. of 2017, the Unite the Right rally took place in Charlottesville, Virginia, where white supremacists preached anti-Semitic and racist beliefs. Shouting \u201cJews will not replace us,\u201d videos and photos of the rally circulated the Internet, horrifying viewers everywhere.<\/p>\n
Newcomb, who spent 11 years as a tech and investigative reporter for ABC in New York City, did not attend the Charlottesville protests. She did however, rely on twitter to follow and report on the coverage, prompting her to publish a story that would show the world the power of user accountability.<\/p>\n
Newcomb\u2019s article mentioned Twitter user Logan Smith, known as @YesYoureracist, who called upon himself and his fellow twitter users to identify all the men pictured the photos from the rally. \u201cThese could be their neighbors, friends, relatives, so when people started being outed with the help of social media, it seemed like it was time for a story,\u201d Newcomb said.<\/p>\n
Beginning on Aug. 12, Logan tweeted, \u201cIf you recognize any of the Nazis marching in #Charlottesville, send me their names\/profiles and I\u2019ll make them famous #goodnightaltright.\u201d Smith first, identified Cole White, an employee at Top Dog Restaurant in California who lost his job as a result of participating in the protests.<\/p>\n
Soon, nearly all of the men pictured were identified, exposing them to their fellow peers, and holding them accountable for preaching hatred.<\/p>\n
Without Logan Smith\u2019s contribution on Twitter, many of the men who participated in the Charlottesville protests could have resumed their day-to-day lives with no consequence.<\/p>\n
Social media exists and is here to stay. People need to remember that there is no such thing as anonymity,\u201d Newcomb added.<\/p>\n
\u201cHowever, it can be helpful or harmful. We need to be careful with this and just remember that if someone tweeted it, it doesn’t mean it’s true. We still have a duty to do our do diligence,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
Logan Smith\u2019s outing of white supremacists isn\u2019t the only instance of the user influencing journalism. In the recent #Me too movement, Twitter has become the central platform for the outing of high powered men in Hollywood who have been accused of sexual harassment and abuse allegations.<\/p>\n
Women used twitter to share their experiences in dealing with sexual harassment and to expose the realities of abuse. It provided them a platform to tell their stories, and thus, has begun to transform journalistic reporting.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe way outing changes journalism, is that it makes the whole process faster. It makes things happen faster, spread faster, get to the public eye faster,\u201d a correspondent from NBC who wishes to remain anonymous, said.<\/p>\n
As a reporter for the last four decades, this unnamed reporter has witnessed the older, traditional newsrooms of journalistic reporting, stacked with newspapers and Teleprompters, as well as the current digital age, where technology and social media have taken control.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt provides people a way to go around us, above us, beside us. Public officials and others are able to get their message out without using the traditional means of a press release.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAll matter of social media is that there are many more ways for many more people to say things, publicly and as a person out in the world you have to be more careful about what you do,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Because of social media, there is now a myriad of ways for people, especially journalists to get their information. With the availability of social media platforms, come more leads and more access to information than ever before.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt some point it became more important to include peoples\u2019 opinions on social media on something. It\u2019s also the place for powerful people to get their message out faster than they would of a while ago. Social media has a profound influence in countries around the world especially things you may not be able to see.,\u201d they added.<\/p>\n
According to this journalist, instances such Arab Spring relied on social media to get their message out to the public. If it were not for twitter, it would of not had as much of an impact, nor would it have reached the other half of the world.<\/p>\n
This phenomenon has changed the world and if anything showed people to be more skeptical of what they see.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow the demand is on us to produce more. I have social media accounts; I write more across platforms, you have to meet the audience where they are. There is a need to create more than 1 kind of story, the equipment is smaller, lighter, faster, so you broadcast from places live that you couldn\u2019t years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Alyssa Newcomb had just celebrated her one-year anniversary as a Tech reporter at NBC News in San Francisco when the Charlottesville protests began. \u201cThere were questions about who was marching in Charlottesville. It felt as though people were so shocked to see this happening in 2017,\u201d Newcomb said. In Aug. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":207,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n