Volume 43 (2022): Issue 2 (June 2022)

This article presents an action-research study investigating a spatially sensitive innovation process of place-based experiences in a rural area of Sweden. Lately, there have been a growing number of initiatives focused on developing location-aware mobile media – geomedia technologies – to offer place-based digital experiences within tourism. Drawing on contemporary critical studies on geomedia technologies, we stress the importance of reflecting upon the implications of place-based technologies to minimise both the negative impacts on a place and the neglect of local perspectives. We conducted action-research interventions to unpack the complexity of developing place-based mediated experiences. The study makes an illustrative case of how interventions lead to more nuanced development processes of geomedia technologies while simultaneously fostering creativity. We argue that as action research allows researchers to intervene in media innovations, it identifies models for more nuanced place-based development processes, including local spatial and sociocultural perspectives.

While traditional media often fails to engage young audiences with news, YouTubers’ content gains popularity and attracts attention with specific stylistic practices. Based on dimensions of audience engagement and a worthwhileness approach, this article examines how young audiences engage with YouTubers’ formats and genres used in news media products. Findings of five focus group interviews with Estonian teenagers show that while specific dimensions of engagement may increase due to a more relatable format, interest in traditional news content remains limited regardless of repackaging to a YouTube-intrinsic production. This article contributes to audience studies by demonstrating to news organisations that trying to engage younger audiences through mere formatting while forgetting content might not be worthwhile. However, making news more entertaining and adopting the youth's interpretation of what news is could prime young audiences to consume news through social media.

This article considers the extent to which action research can help local stakeholders tackle the permanent technological disruption in the media sector by reshaping journalistic production practices with original design by examining a specific case. The INJECT Norway (Innovative Journalism: Enhanced Creativity Tools) project was part of an EU Innovation Action with partners that included universities, technology companies, business consultancies, and local newspapers. The objective was to design a new tool for creativity support in journalism and stimulate innovation competence through a business ecosystem. The article evaluates the collaboration between academics and local partners in the Norwegian ecosystem regarding the workability of the new designs and the credibility of the approach. The evaluation is written as a chronological narrative of the project's collaboration from optimistic beginnings to eventual failure. The main findings reveal a tension between the academic researchers and the local project partners. Despite these tensions, the article concludes with a hopeful note about the current action research ecosystem: harnessing the power of students to mediate the relationship between academics and local partners.

News dissemination online is driven by three gatekeeping logics: the gatekeeping logic of the news media (publishing), the gatekeeping logic of social actors (sharing), and the gatekeeping logic of platform algorithms (spreading), each guided by different values and with a different relationship to content. Using a reverse engineering approach, this study applies a 2015 dataset to empirically explore how a Facebook algorithm changed the overall composition of the news users saw, highlighting the ongoing issue of how the different gates and associated gatekeeping logics – especially that of platforms – influence news distribution. In contrast to previous studies, we find the relationship between news properties and the distribution of news online to be non-linear. Results point to Facebook's role in the overall composition of online news, both directly and in interaction with other gatekeepers. As news stories become more widely spread online, algorithmic logics take precedence over user behaviour and preferences.

Since access to and use of digital devices and applications often become more challenging with age, it is important to study how media appropriation processes unfold later in life. The present article contributes to existing research by applying the concept of transaction – developed within relational sociology – to study digital media appropriation. Using this concept, I focus on how older adults’ relations with various actors (known others, distant others, and non-human transactors) fuel the appropriation of digital devices and apps. Drawing on interviews with 22 older adults (70–94 years of age), I identify four types of appropriation processes. This shows the diversity of ways in which digital devices and apps enter the lives of older adults and the diversity of agentic roles in media appropriation. The results also reveal how a sense of coercion in media appropriation was present among the older adults, especially in relation to their children.

Young people are perceived as heavy consumers of social media and less avid consumers of news. That notion, however, deserves nuance: Many factors, such as the national context, media system, trust in news, intentionally or incidentally encountering news from different sources, and interest in politics, influence how young people consume news. This study explores news consumption among Finnish adolescents through a representative survey of 15–19-year-olds. We seek to answer two research questions: What are the news repertoires of Finnish adolescents? And what factors predict different news repertoires? Latent profile analysis reveals three distinct news repertoires: 1) moderate digital traditionalists, the largest group, embracing traditional news in digital form; 2) minimalist social media stumblers, the second-largest group, tending to consume news infrequently through passive social media encounters and lacking credible information; and 3) a quite large number of frequent news omnivores, taking an interest in diverse news forms and actively seeking them.