Social filtering on the Internet – a new mechanism of content curation and its consequences

Dominik Batorski

Pełny tekst artykułu English version of the article

This article shows that online news services are no longer motivated to filter out content before publication. Potentially, any piece of content can attract the attention of the audience, therefore is worth publishing. Moreover, large number of unpopular items can generate much more revenue than the small number of the most popular ones. Thus, the mechanisms of how the content is distributed and how its salience is determined are changing. This is done not by the editors before publication, but more often after the publication, on social networking sites where users recommend content to each other, socially determining its relevance and importance. The results of World Internet Project research conducted in Poland confirms that social networking sites are used primarily as a way to access content on the web and to filter information for other users. As a result of the changes in selection and distribution of information the role of online media editors in setting the agenda is decreasing.

KEYWORDS

internet, social networking sites, online news, filters, Facebook