Pew Research is out with another installment on its study of
News Use across Social Media Platforms, some of which may be helpful to activists in the political grassroots movement.
Facebook leads the way as a social media platform for news consumers. 64% of US adults are on Facebook, with 47% of those using the site to obtain news - this translates to 30% of the US population using Facebook as a source of news. Though in a previous Pew Research report (noted below), most indicated they do not necessarily go to Facebook seeking out news, rather, they get the news while they're there for other reasons.
In contrast, only 16% of US adults use Twitter, with just over half of those using it for news, which translates to 8% of the population using Twitter as a source for news. And while reddit's users are very active news consumers, a very tiny fraction of the US population is even using reddit at all.
From the Pew Research report:
The proportions who get news, combined with the total reach of a site, show how many U.S. adults are learning about events and issues through each social networking site. Facebook is by far the largest social networking site among U.S. adults, and with half of its users getting news there, is also the largest among U.S. adults when it comes to getting news. As discussed in an earlier report, roughly two-thirds (64%) of U.S. adults use the site, and half of those users get news there—amounting to 30% of the general population. YouTube has the next greatest reach in terms of general usage, at 51% of U.S. adults. Thus, even though only a fifth of its users get news there, that amounts to 10% of the adult population, which puts it on par with Twitter. Twitter reaches just 16% of U.S. adults, but half (8% of U.S. adults) use it for news. reddit is a news destination for nearly two-thirds of its users (62%). But since just 3% of the U.S. population uses reddit, that translates to 2% of the population that gets news there.