The Great Advances In Media Technology Flow Easily Across The World

Michael Hedges January 11, 2023 Follow on Twitter

News shifts quickly in these post-modern days with attention spans barely existent. Journalism watchers blame too many stories that are too complicated. Others say listeners, viewers and readers are tuning out in favor of celebrities, fake news and sports scores. Their attention has migrated to TikTok and such, where seven seconds is an eternity. Reality is slipping from the agenda.

Brazilian institutions withstood an attempted right-wing insurrection this past weekend. Supporters of former president Jair Bolsonaro violently stormed the presidential palace, supreme court and congress buildings in Brasilia, the capitol, on January 8th. President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was elected in October after a campaign fraught with disinformation from Bolsonaro supporters both inside Brazil and afar. The inauguration took place on January 1st. A day earlier Sr. Bolsonaro exited for Miami, Florida.

As the largest, most populous South American country, Brazil is also the continent’s biggest media market. There are thousands of radio stations, hundreds of TV channels and newspapers. A generally robust internet infrastructure has bred a huge online audience. Nearly 80% of the population - 171.5 million - are active social media users, spending more than three and a half hours a day with Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok. Many outside observers quickly pointed to social media as the disruptive organizing platform for the rioters.

Media watchers universally describe Brazil’s media scene as “highly concentrated.” Grupo Globo owns the major television channel and influential newspaper O Globo. TV Globo is a prolific producer of telenovelas. Its Sunday night news magazine Fantastico, which went wall-to-wall on the riots, posted its highest audience in six months, according to news portal uol.com.br (January 9). O Globo has the biggest circulation of all Brazilian newspapers. It is considered considered “conservative.” O Globo was the first media outlet to report Sr. Bolsonaro’s medical condition as “not serious.”

Also very influential, at a different end of the editorial spectrum, is newspaper Folha de S. Paulo. It is published by Grupo Folha, which also owns online TV channels and several online publications. In an editorial (January 9) Folha - as it is known locally - called out the “coup-mongering mob… facilitated by the leniency of security forces and local authorities.”

Grupo Globo, Grupo Folha and other Brazilian publishers and broadcasters have invested significantly in internet infrastructure in recent years. Noting this, some observers have questioned how the web so quickly became the organizational heart of the recent riots. Fact-checking as it does, international broadcaster Deutsche Welle reported (January 9) that an internet shut-down in Brazil over the weekend was fake news.

Some critics, generally foreign, argued against social media, specifically, and the web in general. “For months,” wrote Politico EU (January 9), “the warning online signs” were clear that Bolsonaro supporters would take to the streets. “Social media companies were again caught flat footed.”

"Since 2016, the former president (Bolsonaro) and his supporters have been using social media and messaging apps to distort political, economic and social narratives, creating a parallel reality where all these people seem to be trapped,” wrote Brazilian fact-checking site Agência Lupa chief executive Natalia Leal, quoted by US public broadcaster NPR (January 10).

See also...

• Hot Topics - Social Media

• Hot Topics - Digital Transitions

Media in Spain - Diverse and Challenged – new

Media in Spain is steeped in tradition. yet challenged by diversity. Publishers hold great influence, broadcasters competing. New media has been slow to rise and business models for all are under stress. Rich in language and culture, Spain's media is reaching into the future and finding more than expected. 123 pages, PDF. January 2018

Order here

The Campaign Is On - Elections and Media

Elections campaigns are big media events. Candidates and issues are presented, analyzed and criticized in broadcast and print. Media is now more of a participant in elections than ever. This ftm Knowledge file reports on news coverage, advertising, endorsements and their effect on democracy at work. 84 pages. PDF (September 2017)

Order here

Fake News, Hate Speech and Propaganda

The institutional threat of fake news, hate speech and propaganda is testing the mettle of those who toil in news media. Those three related evils are not new, by any means, but taken together have put the truth and those reporting it on the back foot. Words matter. This ftm Knowledge file explores that light. 48 pages, PDF (March 2017)

Order here

More ftm Knowledge files here

Become an ftm Individual or Corporate Member to order Knowledge Files at no charge. JOIN HERE!