ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the relationship between the quality of news and social media metrics. Audience engagement on social media in the form of followers, shares, and likes can provide news media outlets with valuable resources which can be tangible (e.g., advertising opportunities) and intangible (e.g., influence). However, the mechanisms that drive social media engagement are often far from democratic considerations, and subject to other factors. These include algorithmic promotions, partisan motivations of users, and the degree of interest of the news content, which have little bearing on news quality from a normative journalistic view. The “reward system” set up by social media can incentivize the production of low-quality news and allow clickbait and sensational news to prevail over high-quality news. Finally, the negative consequences of such a scenario on society and potential solutions to mitigate the problem are discussed.
