Social Media Era
Politics and media have always had a very close knit, hand in hand relationship since the dawn of both. But with the recent development of social media over the past 15 years, one can say that the paradigm has shifted. No longer do a few major news companies control the narratives being pushed to the people, instead, social media has allowed narratives to be developed organically and shared to a worldwide audience. What remains to be seen is the overall impact of social media on political agendas; will they divide us more than ever, or bring us together? Since the 2016 election with former president Trumps unprecedented use of social media, and ensuing ban on both Twitter and Facebook, the use of social media in politics has only grown. Mike Bloomberg went to social media “Meme Pages” and payed them directly to post information relating to his campaign - but it didn't seem to have the same impact as Trumps direct and sometimes random Twitter rants.