Social media has been given a pretty bad rap since its conception not too long ago. Between teenagers posting ridiculous images of themselves and others, to body shaming of celebrities, to cyber bullying, the list of reasons to avoid social media is often longer than the number of reasons to continue using it.
For many people, social media is a way to reconnect with old friends and family who might live on the other side of the world. Or maybe it’s used to keep tabs on friends who are just too distant to consider calling directly, and you just want to peek in to their lives and check on them to see how they are doing.
I’d like to offer a third way to use social media: as a news source. Lately, all major news program have social media accounts that they keep fairly active. The Washington Post has a twitter account, the New York Times has a Facebook…more and more news channels and newspapers are joining the social media world and often even publishing news there first. All you have to do is search their name and “like” their page.
Here’s a list of news sites that I follow in Facebook and/or Twitter: