Media and the audience have a complex and intertwined relationship. On one hand, media provides a means for audiences to access information, entertainment, and communication. On the other hand, the audience shapes and influences the content and messages that media outlets present.
One of the main roles of media is to inform the public about events, issues, and ideas. This can be done through various forms of media such as television news programs, print journalism, and online news websites. The media has the power to shape public opinion and influence the way people think about certain topics. For example, a media outlet may present a particular perspective on a political issue, and this perspective can influence the way that its audience understands and thinks about that issue.
At the same time, the audience also has a role in shaping the media. For example, media outlets often seek to attract and retain a large audience in order to generate revenue from advertisers. In order to do this, they may present content that is of interest to their audience or that aligns with their audience's values and beliefs. In this way, the audience's preferences and values can shape the content that is presented by the media.
In addition to informing and shaping public opinion, media also serves as a platform for communication and dialogue. Social media platforms, in particular, have allowed individuals to share their thoughts and opinions with a wider audience, leading to a proliferation of diverse perspectives and voices. This has the potential to facilitate greater understanding and collaboration, but it can also lead to the spread of misinformation and the amplification of harmful or divisive viewpoints.
Overall, the relationship between media and the audience is dynamic and multifaceted. Media has the power to shape public opinion and facilitate communication, while the audience has the power to influence the content and messages that media presents. It is important for both media outlets and audiences to be aware of this relationship and to strive for responsible and ethical communication.
MediaScience
The figure illustrates the how this theory works: Figure 4 Katz, 1955 In the diagram above, messages no longer dispatch from the mass media producers to the receivers directly. Other factors present in society, such as personal contact and religion, are more likely to influence people. This will in turn, ensure that the narrative is understood by the audience it was intended for. However, Media representations of crime: the dramatic fallacy In addition to 'the age fallacy,' Felson also identified the 'dramatic fallacy'. The role of audience in mass media is great as in case the audience is not interested in the theme presented either on TV or in newspapers the material is a failure. The impossibility to measure media effects is as a result of not being able to isolate the media from all the other potential influences at work in society. The example of famous media website which takes advantage of web 2.
Who Is the Media's Audience?
To apply this theory into the context of audiences which watch TV, watching TV provide the basic needs, society media structure and individuals characteristics which will sum up to gratifications in Blumeler Theory where by they are information, personal identity, integration and social interaction, and entertainment. Diversion refers to people escape from reality like everyday problem and the constraints of routine. Many young people spent much time on playing online game in the virtual world. The twostep flow model helps us to understand that, ideas flow from mass media to opinion leaders, and from them to a wider population instead of people being directly influenced by the mass media. Extraordinary crimes like murder and rape are overplayed, whereas ordinary crimes like shoplifting are underplayed.
Audience Theories
Take times online as example, reader may write comments towards specific news and share the comment with other reader. Media texts can meet the needs of audiences that want to find out about relevant events and conditions in immediate surroundings, society, satisfying curiosity and general interest, gaining a sense of security through knowledge. In additional, some scholars discover that transmitting information in society not only two step flow. Felson 1998 came up with the theory of 'the age fallacy' to articulate how crime victims are often portrayed as older, middle-class women. Therefore, mass communication must compete with other non-media resources such as interrelationship communication aim to produce the need. Depending on many factors, data may be either supported or not.