How the millennial generation gets its daily news digest?

The advent of digital age seems to have transformed our lives in numerous ways, even impacting the way we read our news today. The Generation Y particularly seems to be taking in news through a combination of sources and varied technologies, be it for jobs, sports digest or regular page 3 feed. Few are actually reliant on the print media for their news updates.

In fact, according to a recent study social media seems to have surpassed newspapers and may soon equal TV as a primary source of daily news, for the new millennial. Along with television, apparently a large portion of the young adults today depend on social networks for their news and very few utilize print or digital newspaper content.

News Trends Today…
Many have been concerned that the new age adults or “Millennials” rarely visit news sites or seek out news through televisions and newspapers, suggesting that maybe they are less interested in news than the earlier generations. Fortunately, this is not the case and as a respite to those concerned, the new generation is actually quite active about the news and civically rather interested.

In fact, staying in touch with the world and being aware about the news is an important part of today’s digital adult’s daily activity. It is just that the new generation is consuming news and information in a much more different way as compared to the previous ones.

New trends have evolved, where news consumption is not done as a specific activity during a certain time of the day, but is a generic act of being connected and aware with the world. Though this is done usually online through the various digital devices available, at times it is also done as part of the social flow and some even proactively look for news on their own. Overall, news seems to have developed more into an enjoyable and engaging activity. Most studies state that the advent of social media and mobile internet devices has brought about this change towards digital news today.

While older adults are more likely to read, watch or hear a news story in-depth; the younger ones are less attentive to in-depth daily news and prefer short news which is visual, timely, and hyper-relevant. The generation Y seems to be more attentive about breaking news and much more likely to follow up in detail on breaking news.

News & Online Activity
With Millennials using smartphones connected to the internet and tablets much more in comparison to older generation; the world news and information is constantly accessible to these new age adults throughout the day.

Though still lower than television but much ahead of the newspaper and radio, the internet seems to be becoming a major source of national and international news chiefly with generation Y and is definitely on the path of eventually completely changing our news reading habits. Here are few of the trends of news consumption which have evolved today.

Social Media
This has become a major source of news for the younger generation especially individuals below 35 years of age, who are most likely to view news headlines or news on Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites. There has been a sharp rise in the growth of social media in the past couple of years as a source of news.

Mobile Devices
A high percentage of tablet and smartphone users get their news from their devices today and these seem to have become defining devices for digital news today. Various users vary between reading short news to in-depth articles and even longer stories at time on their devices.

Browsers & Mobile Apps
A large portion of mobile device users get most of their news through the online websites and apps. Both these avenues seem to be used by users in various countries, and in fact, various consumers feel that their mobile device is increasing the amount of news they read every day. Recent reports also show few places where online sources are used much more than traditional mediums to get news. In line with this trend, short news platforms like Inshorts are available today where readers can easily browse their news. Most of these sites are built keeping the younger generation in mind. For instance, Inshorts provides a complete brief of the most important stories in just 60 words, so that readers can grasp the latest news in a short span of time.

The Verdict
Overall, one can say that news has become quite popular amidst the younger adults of today and due to the easy access of the latest news, the millennials have developed news reading into a generic activity as they check their news online or from social networks. In fact, these days many news consumers may use both the internet as well as the television at the same time while following an interesting event.

About the author: Utkarsh Sahu is a digital strategist with over three years of writing experience for business magazines. You may connect with him on LinkedIn and Twitter as @UtkSahu

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