A study on the use of TPV (Third Party Video) materials by TV news

• Main Authors: Lin, Chia Hui, 林佳慧
• Other Authors: Kwan, Shang-Ren
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/u9e3jj

碩士 === 國立政治大學 === 傳播學院碩士在職專班 === 103 === The media ecology has been rewritten to a great extent by the application of social media in the digital age. In the 21st century, social media has even become a catalyst of social movements as Facebook and Twitter play an important role in disseminating the news on protests which commonly take place in North Africa and the Middle East. In fact, large news organizations at home and abroad have begun to reproduce and broadcast User-generated contents (UGC) that are greatly shared and forwarded on the social media. This applies especially to incidents such as social movements, including protests, and accidents. The video taken by an eye-witness’ mobile phone or the recording of an on-site surveillance camera has often become important news material due to timeliness of the news and the fact that reporters cannot arrive at the scene on time. According to foreign and domestic news agencies, especially TV stations, video is both appealing and persuasive as news materials. The growing popularity of UGC and the approach to make use of such resources have led the emergence of positive and negative viewpoints. It would be delightful to see the voicing-out of social problems through UGC since it could increase citizen participation. UGC could even lead to a breakthrough from pressroom authority, thus creating a more democratic media. However, UGC could also lower the news standard especially when there’s a deadline to meet. Furthermore, it could pile pressure on news reporters as they try to determine the authenticity of the video. The excessive use of UGC could lead to the media’s over-reliance on social media resources. The fragmentary nature of UGC could also be harmful to the development of news media at the public domain. The study attempted to analyze the purpose behind a TV station’s adoption of eyewitness/netizen-provided third-party video (TPV), as well as its frequency of use. The study was divided into two steps. First, research samples for content analysis were collected through a selection of one month’s worth of news reports that were broadcasted by a terrestrial station at prime time. A total of 1825 samples were studied through quantitative research and analysis with regard to the application of TPV by TV news. At the same time, in order to explore a TV station’s motivation, willingness, standard and the purpose in applying TPV, qualitative research was conducted through an in-depth interview with nine representatives from the TV station. This group included journalists, cameramen, editors and seniors who were responsible for ordering daily news in the Newsrooms.