This is an essay I have written for my English schoolwork. The actual title of the composition is “Television, newspapers and the internet — which of these do young people prefer as a source of information, and why?” I would love to develop more on my points but I am restricted due to the stringent word count set by my teacher.
Technology has changed expeditiously over the years, and it advances with a geometric progression rather an arithmetical one. In today’s world, the still propagating internet is the preferred medium among young people when it comes to the acquisition of news and information, ahead of newspapers and television. As the internet begins to extirpate the traditional media, young people have also established a strong affinity with the World Wide Web, treating it as a virtuoso who knows everything.
Undoubtedly, they would head over to the internet to source for information for their projects or to expand their knowledge since it carries a vast array of information resources. As the use of internet proliferates, so does the amount of information available. From its origin in 1991, the web has grown to encompass a variety of information sources — electronic journals, pre-prints, educational materials, you name it all.
People all over the world, including geographers, scientists and researchers have flocked to the internet to share their knowledge and ideas with others. One relatively good example would be Wikipedia. Touted as “the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit”, Wikipedia currently has over three million articles in two hundred and forty languages. If a student has stumbled across a little difficultly in his or her schoolwork, he or she could easily head over to Wikipedia where information is abundant and probably accurate.
Meanwhile, the major detriment of young people drawing information from conventional media such as newspaper and television is due to its relatively narrow scope of information in nature. For example, why would a teenager bother to read pages and pages of text where they could watch the news summarized on the internet or television. Although television eclipses print in obtaining news and information because of its striking non-still imagery, but young people still prefer the internet instead.
The underlying factor that made them prefer the internet to television is because the latter does not provide a greater accessibility in garnering information as compared to the internet. Simply fire up the web browser, type what you would like to search for on the Google search bar, and millions of links to web pages pertaining to your desired search query would be displayed almost instantaneously. This gives young people myriad sources of information to read from and some of theses sources even contain thoughts and opinions of bloggers and columnists. On the other hand, the scope of information found on television and newspapers is rather narrow and limited.
Traditional media is usually filled with political and financial news coverage whereby teenagers at this stage are not zealous enough in finding out whether the Obama administration has accomplished their promises or Dubai’s inability to repay its massive debt. The internet, on the other hand, allows young people to search for what interest them, be it information related to gaming or advice to which career path they should follow after their education.
Another prominent reason why young people prefer the internet as a source of information is because of the society they are raised in. Today’s teenagers are living in a technologically advanced world where the internet is readily accessible anywhere and anytime. Surfing the web for information in metropolises like Seoul and Singapore is much more time-efficient and convenient as compared to sourcing information from television and newspapers.
In conclusion, newspapers and television were once the only two major sources of information among young people, but with broadband speeds and technology increasing at an exponential rate in most countries, many young people are now choosing the internet as their primary source of information.