Why Students Are Choosing News Daddy Over The New York Times

For today’s college students, social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram have become the primary news source, dramatically outpacing traditional newspapers and magazines. Despite widespread awareness that misinformation thrives on these apps, students find the format irresistible, drawn to the speed, personality-driven content, and algorithmic curation that legacy media lacks.

Ankit Khanal, a George Mason University sophomore, exemplifies this trend. He checks TikTok more than twenty times daily, often to watch Dylan Page, a 26-year-old UK-based influencer known online as News Daddy. Since starting his TikTok account in 2020, Page has built a massive following, with his posts accumulating billions of likes. His content blends breaking news, politics, and pop culture, all delivered with high energy. Khanal, a computer science major, is acutely aware of how algorithms shape his media diet. He even gave a class presentation arguing that these systems secretly influence user opinions and content exposure in potentially harmful ways. He acknowledges the irony, knowing TikTok can be unreliable. His fact-checking method involves scanning the top comments on a video, looking for users who point out inaccuracies.

Yet, he consistently returns to News Daddy and similar aggregators. He finds traditional news outlets unappealing due to their perceived biases, feeling that news influencers are more genuinely connected to their audience. Khanal is far from alone. A recent survey of over 1,000 students from 181 colleges found that nearly three in four consider social media a top news source. Half of those surveyed at least somewhat trust platforms like Instagram and TikTok to deliver news accurately. Word-of-mouth ranked as the second most popular news source. In stark contrast, traditional newspapers are a regular source for just two in ten students, even though they are seen as more likely to be accurate.

Professor Karen North, who founded the University of Southern California’s digital media program, sees this daily. When she asks students where they hear about current events, the most common answers are Instagram, TikTok, and, distantly, their professors. The classroom is a far third in the race for student attention.

Syracuse University junior Zau Lahtaw also gets his news from TikTok, from both News Daddy and a popular account that uses a talking fish, styled after the cartoon news anchor from SpongeBob SquarePants. He finds the format entertaining. Countless accounts on Instagram and TikTok use this AI-generated fish character to deliver news to millions. Lahtaw doesn’t seek these out; they simply appear in his feed during his two to three hours of daily scrolling. When a story interests him, like news of strikes between Israel and Iran, he watches the video and then turns to Google to verify the information. He follows a consistent pattern: see a story on TikTok, get interested, and then look it up online.

This “TikTok-to-Google pipeline” is widespread. Professor North notes that while her students also search for verification, most skip reading full articles, instead relying on the AI-generated summaries provided by search engines, which they assume are correct. She observes that AI has become the new Wikipedia for her students.

Zachary Gottlieb, a Stanford sophomore and managing editor for his school paper, represents a different approach. He has free access to major publications and starts his morning by reading newsletters. Yet, even he cannot escape the social media news cycle. During his daily scrolling, headlines from News Daddy and other influencers are unavoidable. He describes the experience as a “chronic” and “ubiquitous” onslaught of information. One afternoon, he opened TikTok to relax and was immediately confronted with graphic videos of a fatal shooting. His first reaction was disbelief, prompting him to verify the event through a Google search.

The nature of social media feeds has transformed. What was once a stream of vacation photos and coffee drinks is now dominated by infographics and political content. For Harvard freshman Aria-Vue Daugherty, roughly 80% of her Instagram feed is politically oriented, largely from friends made through political organizing. She actively reads established outlets like The New York Times, but the majority of news she encounters comes via Instagram, either from accounts she follows or reposts from peers. When news broke that Harvard’s certification for international students was revoked, her Instagram feed was flooded with over a hundred reactive posts. She used the campus paper to confirm the story, finding Instagram a convenient and rapid entry point to current events. However, when a federal judge later blocked the ruling, she noticed far fewer posts, creating a significant awareness gap among her peers.

This selective exposure is a key concern. The same survey that found 72% of students get news from social media also revealed that only two-thirds regularly check for accuracy. Just half verify information before sharing it. Professor North confirms this trend, noting students often get headlines from Instagram and persuasive opinions from TikTok.

While these platforms can rapidly spread important information, the risk of deception is high. Lahtaw openly admits his generation is susceptible to being scammed by AI. The line between real and fabricated content is blurring, with AI-generated deepfakes of everything from bouncing bunnies to fake tragedies fooling millions. Khanal experienced this firsthand when he posted a joke image of a fake Roblox tattoo; nearly 190,000 viewers saw it, and many reacted with genuine anger, despite his use of a “#joke” hashtag.

Some students are pushing back. UCLA political science student Barnett Salle-Widelock became disillusioned with TikTok’s tendency to encourage “doomscrolling” and deleted the app. He still uses Instagram, where his feed is mostly sports and memes, interspersed with headlines from followed news outlets. He appreciates traditional media but admits the curated, effortless nature of social media is hard to resist.

A small niche of students, like Lewis & Clark College junior Toby Strawser, maintains a more traditional news routine, spending 15-20 minutes daily with email newsletters and family news channels. Harvard sophomore James Pippin uses Apple News for about 20 minutes a day, valuing its spectrum of sources from CNN to Fox News. He approaches infographics with caution, having made them himself and understanding their potential for unreliability. Like Daugherty, he first learned of the Harvard international student news on Instagram but immediately sought verification from The New York Times.

A significant barrier for traditional news is cost, with paywalls preventing access for many. While many colleges offer free digital subscriptions to major papers, the appeal of free, algorithmically-delivered headlines on social media is often stronger. Salle-Widelock captures the sentiment, acknowledging that while it feels like he should do more research, the ease of a curated feed is undeniable.

Lahtaw suspects his habits will change with age, imagining that as he matures and becomes more involved in society, he will turn to traditional media. He envisions becoming the “worldly person” with a newspaper, a persona Salle-Widelock believes is largely obsolete for their generation.

For now, the algorithm’s appeal remains powerful. Students understand the pitfalls of getting news from social media, citing algorithmic addiction and the manipulative design of the platforms. Khanal’s presentation thoroughly details these detrimental effects, from creating echo chambers to disorienting worldviews. His only proposed solution is a simple reminder for users to remember that their feed is engineered to be addictive. Yet, most nights, this knowledge is an afterthought as he scrolls through hundreds of videos before sleep, knowing that amidst the memes, a post from News Daddy is only a thumb-swipe away.

(Source: The Verge)