Newsroom 2.0: A Comparative Case Study of the Philippine Social News Sites Rappler and Yahoo! News Philippines

The study explores the structure of the social news sites in the Philippines- Rappler and Yahoo! News. Similarities and differences in content production and distribution were analyzed and juxtaposed, focusing on the role of social media technology and user participation. The research used quantitative and qualitative methods. Homepages were monitored for two months. One month worth of headline stories were content analyzed. Interviews with students and professionals were also conducted. Journalistic practices evolved simultaneous with the changing media landscape. The integration of social media technology and online user presence revolutionized content distribution and production. Because of the intense competition to break the stories first, social media became an extension to published content. The study found interactivity as the prominent feature of the social news sites. However, the nature of user engagement differed between the two. Rappler.com encouraged content submission while Yahoo! News utilized shareability to make content viral.