This just in… the young process information differently. According to this story at NYT.com,

“…younger voters tend to be not just consumers of news and current events but conduits as well — sending out e-mailed links and videos to friends and their social networks. And in turn, they rely on friends and online connections for news to come to them. In essence, they are replacing the professional filter — reading The Washington Post, clicking on CNN.com — with a social one.”

“A December survey by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press looked at how media were being consumed this campaign. In the most striking finding, half of respondents over the age of 50 and 39 percent of 30- to 49-year-olds reported watching local television news regularly for campaign news, while only 25 percent of people under 30 said they did.”

“Rather than treating video-sharing Web sites as traditional news sources, young people use them as tools and act as editors themselves.”

One quote in the story really jumped out at me:

“If the news is that important, it will find me.”

What does this mean for those of us in the news business?