Be clear about another great election loser. “Let’s reignite British spirit,” implored the Mail as it wound up its own bitter campaign with a 13-page special on the evils of Corbyn. He’s “Cor-Bin” howled the Sun, fearing “apocalypse” if he won. “Your country needs you,” boomed the Telegraph. “Vote May today,” said the Express. Only the Guardian (at the last) and Mirror stable supported Labour. And yet, and yet, it didn’t matter on the day. The supposed power of the Tory press was a bust.
Paul Dacre of the Mail instructed his faithful millions how to vote tactically. They turned a deaf ear. Rupert Murdoch’s fearsome Bun issued awful warnings. They were ignored. The printed press – with the FT and Times as reluctant Conservative backers – has seldom seemed more overwhelming. Labour cries of “fix” and “grotesque” were rising again as a reason/excuse for defeat, with the BBC added to that hate list. In the end, though, it didn’t matter – even before the May-bashing tabloid U-turns of hypocrisy the morning after.
In the changed world of 2017, this ought to kill many media preconceptions for good. Print circulations have shrunk and shrunk again even since 2015. Fewer faithful to read the tablets from on high. More balky floaters bent on doing their own thing.
But that’s only part of it because the mists over the march of digital coverage are beginning to clear at last, thanks to exhaustive research from Enders Analysis. We’re used to saying that social media handed America to Trump last November, a string of rightwing websites worsting newspapers and mainstream TV in the rust belt. Now, surely, we can sense a similar phenomenon from Hastings to Hallam.
There was no fake news, to be sure. Maybe Putin and co weren’t interested enough to intervene: but the same clear positioning streamed from mobiles and laptops. Look at Facebook, with over 56% of the voting population on board and political ads pouring in at an unprecedented rate. What did members of that giant community mostly share among themselves? News about Corbyn and May from the Independent, Guardian, Mirror and online Labour backers like the Canary and Evolve Politics.
Nor, to repeat, are we talking big press numbers against smaller social media hits. The Canary has more Facebook shares on the party leaders than the Telegraph or the BBC. Another Angry Voice’s reach left the Mail, Standard or Express trailing. (“Blown it”, as the Mail now snarls at Theresa).
It’s a “highly pro-Labour skew”, according to Enders, “tilted heavily towards content against May and for Jeremy Corbyn.” With exactly the same pattern on Twitter. And “worryingly for the UK’s biggest news brands, a common angle among much of the most shared content was criticism of the campaign coverage of UK national newspapers and public service broadcasters”. In other words, here were millions of largely young people going online every day to berate print and correct all its biases – but, equally, hefting a weight of opinion of their own.
What about the conversion rate for floaters, though? How does that all work in an era of visceral views-mongering? The fascinating thing is to examine a clash of communities. The Mail and Express don’t affect to despise Corbyn by accident. They think their readers are overwhelmingly Tory. They’re told what they want to hear. And, similarly, the Canary cheeps a parallel song. It knows what its users want too. As Corbyn surges forward, May’s allies start jumping ship.
In one way, this can appear merely a replication of the old print power, but smaller, cheaper, feistier, online. But the sharing and individually caring nature of social media gives it a different dimension – a feeling that you, the voter, are in charge not just at the ballot box but in your reaction to the campaign as it winds on. There are obvious perils here: see the closed communities of digital discussion and information who elected Trump. But there are also signals, in an era of startling swings, that the old ways of press hegemony, just like those of party loyalty, have had their day.
No more excuses, then: no more wailing about what’s “unfair”. We’re moving on.
Paul Dacre of the Mail instructed his faithful millions how to vote tactically. They turned a deaf ear. Rupert Murdoch’s fearsome Bun issued awful warnings. They were ignored. The printed press – with the FT and Times as reluctant Conservative backers – has seldom seemed more overwhelming. Labour cries of “fix” and “grotesque” were rising again as a reason/excuse for defeat, with the BBC added to that hate list. In the end, though, it didn’t matter – even before the May-bashing tabloid U-turns of hypocrisy the morning after.
In the changed world of 2017, this ought to kill many media preconceptions for good. Print circulations have shrunk and shrunk again even since 2015. Fewer faithful to read the tablets from on high. More balky floaters bent on doing their own thing.
But that’s only part of it because the mists over the march of digital coverage are beginning to clear at last, thanks to exhaustive research from Enders Analysis. We’re used to saying that social media handed America to Trump last November, a string of rightwing websites worsting newspapers and mainstream TV in the rust belt. Now, surely, we can sense a similar phenomenon from Hastings to Hallam.
There was no fake news, to be sure. Maybe Putin and co weren’t interested enough to intervene: but the same clear positioning streamed from mobiles and laptops. Look at Facebook, with over 56% of the voting population on board and political ads pouring in at an unprecedented rate. What did members of that giant community mostly share among themselves? News about Corbyn and May from the Independent, Guardian, Mirror and online Labour backers like the Canary and Evolve Politics.
Nor, to repeat, are we talking big press numbers against smaller social media hits. The Canary has more Facebook shares on the party leaders than the Telegraph or the BBC. Another Angry Voice’s reach left the Mail, Standard or Express trailing. (“Blown it”, as the Mail now snarls at Theresa).
It’s a “highly pro-Labour skew”, according to Enders, “tilted heavily towards content against May and for Jeremy Corbyn.” With exactly the same pattern on Twitter. And “worryingly for the UK’s biggest news brands, a common angle among much of the most shared content was criticism of the campaign coverage of UK national newspapers and public service broadcasters”. In other words, here were millions of largely young people going online every day to berate print and correct all its biases – but, equally, hefting a weight of opinion of their own.
What about the conversion rate for floaters, though? How does that all work in an era of visceral views-mongering? The fascinating thing is to examine a clash of communities. The Mail and Express don’t affect to despise Corbyn by accident. They think their readers are overwhelmingly Tory. They’re told what they want to hear. And, similarly, the Canary cheeps a parallel song. It knows what its users want too. As Corbyn surges forward, May’s allies start jumping ship.
In one way, this can appear merely a replication of the old print power, but smaller, cheaper, feistier, online. But the sharing and individually caring nature of social media gives it a different dimension – a feeling that you, the voter, are in charge not just at the ballot box but in your reaction to the campaign as it winds on. There are obvious perils here: see the closed communities of digital discussion and information who elected Trump. But there are also signals, in an era of startling swings, that the old ways of press hegemony, just like those of party loyalty, have had their day.
No more excuses, then: no more wailing about what’s “unfair”. We’re moving on.
