Politainment programmes management on Twitter: strategies and social answer

Abstract

Since the end of the 20th century, politainment (conjunction of political information and entertainment) has intensified in the media, especially on television. Simultaneously, in a context of media convergence, social networks have transformed the behavior of viewers, so that there is more and more a social audience that shares, comments and generates content on the social network sites. This research describes the work carried out by community managers of politainment programs on Twitter to check to what extent their routines favor this phenomenon, and also examines the behavior of social audience. Conclusions highlight that several of the criteria applied by community managers when tweeting are linked to political infotainment, specially controversy and humor. Social audience also participates in the phenomenon by broadcasting critical content, often aggressive and highly polarized, which helps to simplify and exaggerate the message.