Obama and the digital native generation

In his 2005 book, Tuned Out: Why Americans Under 40 Don't Follow the News, David Mindich argued that because youths weren't reading the news that civic engagement and democracy as we know it were faltering. However, the campaign and election of Barack Obama engaged the youth of America, which turned out in record numbers to help Obama get elected as president of the United States. Obama and his up-to-date, hip campaign team used their online communication strategy to the fullest to engage the generation of digital natives whose votes were essential to them.

This just shows that young people are getting news, and they are engaged. However, it is in a completely different way than any generation ever before them.

Obama utilized every online tool such as Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and his own extensive Web site.







In a Pew Research Center poll, more than 75 percent of Internet users used the Internet during the election to get information or participate in the election.


A different, not so surprising Pew Research Center reported showed that 40 percent of Americans use the Internet to get national and international news, which is a 17 percent increase from just more than a year ago. However, in this report, it was the first time that more people cited the Internet over newspapers as their main source of information. Only 35 percent of people surveyed read newspapers, while 70 percent said television was their main news source.

I remember being very small and playing computer games on a gigantic consul. Around the time I was ten, I remember using America Online and getting really excited when I got mail at my first e-mail address, which was Froggie722. I also remember reading international news stories from the Muncie Star Press everyday at the kitchen table after my dad had messed up all the pages of paper when he read it in the morning before me.

As a so-called digital native, it makes sense that my main source of news is the Internet. (I don't really watch television. I hate local news, and I generally only watch national television news broadcasts with my parents who watch them every night.)

As a journalist and a consumer, I'm torn. I never have time to read the whole New York Times, my paper of choice, during the day so I don't want to subscribe because I feel like it's wasteful. I spent at least 20 minutes to an hour online every day reading news, but that's sporadically. I also refuse to buy the Chicago Sun-Times because I think the journalism is shoddy, and I can't support the Chicago Tribune because I'm offended by Sam Zell's interpretation of journalism. Therefore, I would have to answer that I consume most of my news online even though I've always dreamed of working at a daily newspaper.