Co-writing journalism on TikTok: media legitimacy and edutainment communities

Abstract

By combining traditional practices and the codes of TikTok, news media on TikTok provide journalistic news targeting in particular the so-called “Generation Z.” Short and often playful videos represent a new journalistic discourse that links journalistic information to TikTok culture. With the emergence of journalism on TikTok, news media have to negotiate and justify their authority on this digital social network and have to explain how journalism works. Journalists on TikTok are thus also providing media education, by showing manifestations of journalism or by justifying that the newspapers deserve to be TikTok-certified. Media adapt the content and the nature of their videos to TikTok, for example, by participating in viral trends, by publishing videos that affect the lives of young Internet users, or by telling information with a humorous angle. Through the different ways of interacting, media manage to include Internet users in the news production and to show the media community.