Madison Taylor

Earlier this month when I spoke to a group at Twin Lakes it was probably the most pro-newspaper crowd an editor could ever hope to find. They enjoy the newspaper, have few complaints and only wish there was more of it every day.

Frankly, I do, too.

But they were also a fairly savvy social media group. They were quite familiar with Facebook — although most didn’t care much for it. Twitter was a little more confusing. I couldn’t blame them. I didn’t get on Twitter for a long time because of the confounding names, symbols and hashtags.

None of it many any sense at all. Seemed a lot like gibberish to me. Now I understand it. That’s pretty terrifying in and of itself.

The video “Social Media Revolution,” which I posted earlier here, shocked them a little. There were audible gasps as the numbers related to social media use rolled by at a breakneck pace. The biggest concern? That email is becoming passé.

Most if not all have email accounts and are comfortable with that format. But they also recognized that their own children and grandchildren don’t use email quite so often anymore in favor of Facebook, Twitter and texting. Just yesterday I learned that Twitter is now approaching 500 million users.

After the presentation I was asked a number of questions about our move toward social media in the newsroom — make that “content center,” which is the buzz phrase today. The largest in their minds, however, was probably this one: “What impact is all the attention to social media having on the print Times-News?”

I had given the matter some thought.

For the most part, our reporters and editors don’t spend a huge amount of time on tweets or Facebooking. For our reporters, for example, it constitutes a short post here or there about things they’re already covering. Chris Lavender, for example, might tweet something a speaker says at a meeting of the Alamance County Board of Commissioners. Roselee Papandrea might post information from a wreck site, offering road conditions for travelers. It only takes a few seconds with a smartphone or tablet.

For many, it replaces some other activities previously used during the working day to break up long stints at a desk — making jokes, throwing spitballs, shooting rubber bands — all the adult things you might think go on in a newsroom.

Because I’m called upon to sometimes post not only on my personal page but the Times-News Twitter and Facebook pages as well, there is a definite challenge in my time management now, and I told them so.

“It used to be,” I said, “that I would get up and walk around the newsroom, touch base with the staff. Talk about how things are going in their lives. I also used to talk about stories they’re working and offer some advice if they wanted it.”

Now, that just doesn’t happen. Now I post little signs around the newsroom asking “Have you Tweeted today?”

It’s just not the same.

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