Today the news is driven by speed. The news outlet that breaks the Pakistan today news story first leads their competitors, and consumers reward such news outlets that bring the timeliest news to them first. It's true.  When you see the scrolling ticker at the bottom of the TV screen that says "Breaking News", what do you do?  You stop, listen and watch. While listening to the radio you hear the announcer interrupt the song with a "news update" and you immediately pay attention. The most recent news stories are the most relevant and media outlets have worked for decades to be the "first one" to get the news to you before their competitors. 

Guess what? The Internet and social media have turned this news model upside down.  Now, instead of the news teams rushing to the scene of an accident to be the first to provide live video, and the first to have a word with the eyewitnesses, the first to break the news are no longer the news outlets. Instead, the first person to break the news is the one who was in the accident or an eyewitness. How? With social media. Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram now break news at the speed of light. 

Did you remember that when the Pakistan International Airlines flight 661 crashed in 2016 that resulted in the death of Junaid Jamshed, as the plane smashed into the side of a mountain near the town of Havelian some eyewitnesses captured the video and posted it to different social media platforms? Instead of the media outlets interviewing the eyewitnesses and breaking the news - the eyewitnesses broke the news themselves via social media. Eyewitnesses provided a real time update to the social media users that news outlets could not provide.

The Internet and social media have transitioned power away from the media outlets to the actual newsmakers. Does this mean that present day media outlets will soon become outdated?  No - but it does mean that the speed of breaking Pakistan today news stories has just accelerated rapidly to almost near time information. Social media not only allow individuals to share news rapidly, but it is also a simple way to share information rapidly amongst a large number of followers. Now, rather than relying on a reporter in the field rushing to the scene, the news media outlets have an army of millions of "news reporters" who can share breaking news with them instantly via social media as it happens. 

Moreover, social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook also provide the immediate relevancy of news that the search engines have been looking for. When you search up the terms for ‘Terrorist attack’ on your favorite search engine after hearing about the incident, you don't want to see search results that share articles which are several years old. The older search engines would often do this, as the "old news" had been indexed in the search algorithms and was deemed most relevant to your search.  The search engines have recognized the lightning speed of news via Twitter and Facebook, and are already rewarding Twitter and Facebook posts with immediate relevancy on the search engines. 

As social media is the fastest way of getting Pakistan today news. The majority of the population uses social media platforms to get news these days. Owing to social media every individual has become a reporter today. Therefore, you need not rely on traditional reporters to get news in the age of social media.

Author's Bio: 

Hamza Ahmad wants to share valuable content about the speed of social media with visitors.