Blurred Boundaries Role In The Emergence And Existence Of Lifestyle Journalism

With the emergence of lifestyle journalism in the news room, the boundaries between news topics are blurring. Lifestyle journalism shifts traditional news into a new realm of news coverage, and becomes evaluative of products or topics, rather than the traditional inform-the-public model. This is referred to as the shift from hard news to soft news. The journalist takes on a different role than ever before, because of this shift in news coverage. In addition, this shift is fueled by the emergence of multi-media. Through outlets like Twitter and comment sections, the journalists now have a direct conversation with the audience, and this affects their angles and news coverage. As time continues, the boundaries blur further into the grey area, and it is important to understand this blurring to prepare for the future of journalism. Through the thesis project, which included creating lifestyle content YouTube videos, relevant to Appalachian State University Students, I learned valuable lessons regarding the field of lifestyle journalism. The main lessons or takeaways from the project included how to effectively tag the content, in order to reach the specific audience I was targeting and gain return visitors or readers. In addition, listening to my audience, in order to hone in on a tight niche within lifestyle journalism was crucial. Keeping an open conversation with the audience is important when creating a niche news source.