Yet after seeing the "How to Spend It" weekly supplement I retracted my thought and considered whether maybe ads and supplements like this one are doing the agenda setting? So after further reviewing this glossy supplement and all of its columns on lavish goods and international travel, I settled for a position on the question. I now believe the media sets the agenda for its public. A number of columns in "How to Spend it" literally instruct the reader where and how to spend quantities of money. It's rare to see even a customer review on these recommendations they are giving to the readers. I think it might be easier to set such an agenda in London because it is obviously an economically thriving city. But that shows that in order to answer the question of "who sets the agenda: media or the public?" one would have to count socioeconomic and a slew of other factors into such a debate.
Thursday, July 17, 2014
"How to Spend It" and the discussion of agenda setting
During the beginning of our class Q&A session at the Financial Times, one of our classmates (I can't seem to remember whom) asked Editor Chris Grimes about whether he believed the media sets an agenda for the public or vice versa. It was an interesting question because we as a class had posed the same question the day earlier, yet Mr. Grimes had a hard time answering it. (He argued for both stances.) Personally, I assumed he would answer the question by saying that the UK public "determines" what the FT publishes. As a publication based upon financial roots I feel as if editors like Mr. Grimes reach out into the public for stories to publish. It is in their interest to examine who is spending money, on what, and where that money is going and then to turn that around and build a story.
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It is hard for me to imagine as a consumer of several types of media, requesting information regarding a specific subject. The more we discuss this question, the more I agree with media sets the agenda for the public- especially in terms of advertising.
ReplyDeleteI wish to share with you a couple of quotes from a Magazine article called "Confessions of a Bloggers Boyfriend"; "Date night's the same story: my offer of an all expenses-paid trip to our local burger joint kinda pales in comparison, when she's been chowing down on a 49 pound- a potion Wagyu beef at Sushi Samba the night before with a PR promoting a face cream or something." and then "It's hard to treat your girlfriend when PR's are doing it ten times better." These influential people in the media have a lot of power over what consumers think about. They have the power of the pen and can choose to either post it, publish it, or not.
I think that the answer to who sets the agenda is anything but black and white. It can be argued that the media sets it because they are the ones producing what the public sees and have free range. On the other hand, the media only projects messages that the public wants to hear. We live in a society where communication is no longer one-way. This interaction between media and the audience has blurred the lines of who has the power to set the agenda.
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