How Gen Z Gets Their News in The Speed of Information Age

Note: My thoughts and prayers go out to Ukraine and everyone around the world affected by war crimes and atrocities. This article reflects my thoughts only, they do not reflect any organization I associate with.

When British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web in 1989, we entered a whole new world, one we called the Information Age. For the first time, access and control of information became a defining characteristic of human civilization.

Some thirty years later, we’ve entered what I call the “Speed of Information Age”, an era defined by not just the access to information, but also the speed that we absorb it. The greatest catalyst of this era? Social Media.

While every generation continues to increase its social media usage, the way we consume news still varies by age. According to a Pew Research study in Fall 2020, older generations above 50 still default to television, while younger ones rely on their digital devices. Among digital device usage, only the youngest generation of Gen Z rely primarily on social media, while others turn to news websites and apps.

How Gen Z Consumes News Different From Their Parents

So how does this shape our news experience as generations? For one, network and cable news and even news websites are carefully sculpted. Every piece needs approval and some even require censorship. Are they more accurate and nuanced sources than social media? Likely yes.

But for better or worse, they simply cannot match the real-time speed and exposure of social media platforms, namely Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok. When watching Villanova star Justin Moore injure himself in March Madness last week, I logged into Twitter and in seconds knew details about the severity of the injury and conversations overheard on the sideline, long before they shared anything on the TV broadcast. During the Black Lives Matter protests following the death of George Floyd in Summer 2020, numerous videos of police brutality circulated TikTok and Instagram days before being shown on cable networks like CNN or Fox News. And now, with the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine, this speed and exposure of information has been taken to the next level.

While older generations might be following the invasion via news sites or television, many Gen Zers are quite literally experiencing the war from first-hand accounts that pop up on their feed. Notable videos that have circulated across Twitter and TikTok in real-time include Russian soldiers posting videos of themselves parachuting out of airplanes, Ukrainian teens documenting their family’s escape from Kiev, and even cell phone videos of tanks and missiles firing on cities. It’s not just a few videos either. They come in droves to your feed from different angles, from different perspectives (i.e. soldiers, refugees, politicians), and from varying sources involved in the war and outside it. Some TikTok accounts, like that of Myca Hinton, a Fordham University student, have become go-to news channels for updates on the war.

Myca Hinton — Fordham student posting TikToks with war updates and unnamed Ukrainian soldier documenting his experience in the war.

Tackling the Problems of The Speed of Information Age

Social media platforms absolutely have a responsibility in censoring some of this user-generated content. No thirteen-year-old should be scrolling through TikTok or Twitter and accidentally watch a video of literal bloodshed from war. The reality is though, no censorship algorithm can keep up with speed of content sharing on social media.

This speed of information sharing also has exacerbated misinformation. While Gen Z makes fun of their parents for believing everything they see on cable news, being social media natives and tech-savvy does not make our generation immune to misinformation and false narratives.

With Twitter and TikTok especially, you are consistently exposed to content from strangers, and this can often lead to engaging with 1) well-meaning users with incorrect information and 2) bad actors with malicious intent. Not all information is good information. For example, a video that has 6 million views on TikTok is actually a clip using audio from an explosion in Beirut in 2020 to make it seem like the footage is from present day Ukraine. And who could forget Russia’s tampering in the 2016 election via social media.

Luckily, social media platforms and other institutions have attempted to address misinformation. Twitter has a tool called Birdwatch that allows users to report information in Tweets they believe are misleading and other social media platforms have followed with similar reporting features. President Biden and the White House have also created a coalition of 30 TikTok stars, in partnership with Gen Z for Change, to receive White House press briefings on the War in Ukraine. These are all efforts to combat the spread of misinformation that can sometimes go viral in mere hours and develop more trusted sources of information within the social media space.

And so when it comes to generational differences in the way we consume news, I think there’s a few key takeaways.

1) Parents are often consuming news in different ways than their children

2) Digital savvy Gen Zers are not immune to misinformation

3) Social media is an amazing lever for speed and exposure of information, but also brings challenges of online safety and misinformation

As humans of all ages start using social media more and more as a news channel, it’s important to remind ourselves that faster does not equal better. Every channel has its pros and cons, and it’s more important than ever to use a variety of channels to get the most nuanced and accurate set of news possible.