I have been in this country for a month now and I call my brother every week, this last time he was talking about our family and suddenly he mentioned: Do you remember when abuelo Pepe (our grandfather) used to read those big pieces of paper every morning while having breakfast?
This conversation gave me the perfect idea for this week’s post. That question made me realize that new generations will not understand what was reading physical newspapers. I read every day my favorite newspaper, but with a big difference in how used my grandfather to do it. I wake up and while having breakfast I’m always scrolling on Twitter (or X). On social media you can have fun watching nonsense videos, you can entertain yourself by reading what are your friends’ thoughts or you can suffer seeing the new picture your ex posted with his new girlfriend. We are the ones who decide what we see or how we use social media in our days.
How can you read a newspaper nowadays?
Big companies, newspapers ones, in this case, know about this, and they have also adapted to how life is during these years. Physical newspapers are available if you want to buy them, of course, but they know this is not cutting edge so apart from having their webpage where you can read all the news, even at the moment they are occurring, they have their accounts on social media where they post news with attractive headings to make people press on them and keep reading.
This has positive consequences as the waste of paper is less and news can be spread easily and faster, which can be controversial sometimes. When someone wants to be the first one telling a story/news they must be fast writing it or looking for the right sources to contrast the information, so sometimes the message can be fake news and has the danger to be spread fast.
My own experience with newspapers on social media
I am a huge fan of Eurovision and this year it was celebrated in Liverpool; I couldn’t go but I felt as if I was there. The days before the contest there are different social events where the singers are involved. I was in class and could be checking what was happening in a specific moment in a different country following a Twitter thread when I was in my house, I used to play the YouTube channel of that specific newspaper to see how things were going there in life as you can see here. So, this is another way of spreading information, with media (photos and videos)
Sometimes I want to check how my village is going or if something important happened. My village is very small and it’s in the south of Spain, so it’s as easy as going to Google and typing its name and then checking the news part.
My own experience is positive, I keep updated when I’m interested in something, whether it is, Liverpool or Trebujena (my village in Spain) But I agree people need to be conscious of what use they give to their social media.
Great post! It reminded me of my grandfather’s post-lunch routine, where he used to relax in his armchair and read the newspaper. It’s interesting to reflect on how new technologies have transformed the way we engage with news. What’s even more captivating is the generational shift we’ve observed and continue to witness daily. By the way, here’s a fun fact: my grandfather has embraced technological advancements and now switches between reading the news in traditional printed newspapers and on his iPad. He’s definitely keeping up with the times! 😂