Abstract

This thesis investigates how a select group of Montreal sports journalists use Twitter in their daily work lives. Specifically, it asks whether journalists who cover the Montreal Canadiens of the National Hockey League are guided by their editors and supervisors in the way they use this form of social media. The work that journalists do is often accompanied by a series of editorial “checks and balances” before a story is published or goes to air. This thesis will answer the question: Do these same editorial checks and balances exists for these journalists on Twitter? To help answer this question, I have interviewed a cross-section of Montreal sports journalists who use Twitter in their daily routine as reporters covering the Montreal Canadiens and what they’ve been told about the use of Twitter to ascertain management directives, along with two supervisors whose job it would be to provide editorial guidance to their reporters and journalists.