Breaking News: Breaking News Drives Traffic To Web Sites

from the in-case-you-were-wondering dept

It's amazing what you can find studies about these days. Is there really anyone who needed to be told that more people visit news websites when big stories are breaking? Of course, there are some interesting research areas around this concept, but it's unclear from this report if any were researched. How do people use the web when news is breaking? Do they just visit one site? Or do they start visiting multiple sites to get the latest news and perhaps "triangulate" on what's actually happening? Since mistakes can happen when news is being broken, do people find breaking stories less credible, or do they still find them as believable as stories that have simmered for a little while? It would be quite interesting to see if people have learned to really check out multiple sources to get the real story.
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  1. identicon
    ZOMG CENSORED, 5 Jan 2006 @ 12:10pm

    My news is broken...

    I just generally read my massive wall of rss feeds as often as I can to break up the boredom. However, when news is brand new, it seems a lot more chat worthy with co-workers.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    BroncoMarc, 5 Jan 2006 @ 2:16pm

    No Subject Given

    What else is new.. My local NBC channel starts the news out every night with BREAKING NEWS!!!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. icon
    jeff (profile), 5 Jan 2006 @ 3:32pm

    BREAKING NEWS: WOMAN BUYS PEARS, NOT PEACHES, PUBL

    most of the time, i don't watch news on television, too many people who aren't concerned enough about getting the facts straight. sure, you were the first network to break the news, but you got 16 separate pieces of information totally backwards, gave incorrect names and times, all in ONE story...good for you. you keep that up.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    Bob, 5 Jan 2006 @ 4:21pm

    News

    Well I have to say I normally don't do that. I've got a dozen or so news sites that I gather my news from that make it their mission not to irritate me to no end (user-friendly Techdirt being one of those sites).

    The other sites, what with their pop-ups, registrations, hostile scripts and endless annoyances are simply internet garbage, unworthy to even receive my mention, let alone visitors.

    If I'm in the mood for mindless drivel, I'll turn it to the 10 or so cable news channels who repeat to me endlessly about the woman who bought a pear.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. identicon
    Ken, 5 Jan 2006 @ 4:34pm

    Google.com

    Get GMAIL.

    It will allow you to customize your home page with many news outlets.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. identicon
    Andrew Strasser, 5 Jan 2006 @ 4:36pm

    Is there really news?

    I mean other than catastrophy and who's being denied by the congress right now in Bush's cabinet or under indictment for crimes in his cabinet. Other than that they cover nothing. Especially not all the laws they've been changing everyday. For that you'd need to watch channels like C-Span.

    I'm sure there are better ways though in all my looking I haven't found a more detailed review of what exactly the senate and congress are actually working on. We all know they don't want you to know what they are up to when it comes to saying the only way of giving the middle class man a cost of living adjustment is to take away overtime pay. Or maybe we should just look at the total lack of care in the news about the fact our own President has blatantly broken our laws. Then on top of that when questioned on it further broke the laws by saying he would not stop breaking the laws of our Government.

    I'm not one necessarily to say all laws are right, sometimes though you make huge mistakes in the wrong areas to help yourself in ways you shouldn't be trying to help yourself.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. identicon
    me, 5 Jan 2006 @ 7:44pm

    You are a loser Andrew Strasser

    Show me one law Bush has broken, just one. Silly.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. identicon
    Alex, 6 Jan 2006 @ 3:14am

    No Subject Given

    It's not really scientific, but I definitely do see a traffic spike on my site when nokia announces new handsets - something in the 10-20% range...

    link to this | view in thread ]


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