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In examining how #NBCFail became a major story, it’s crucial to know this: Only about 8 percent of U.S. Internet users use Twitter on a typical day, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project. Put another way, 92 percent of U.S. Internet users aren’t seriously using Twitter. The demographics of the site skew heavily to young adults, urban and suburban residents, and African Americans.

They used to talk to each other in what was just a tweet-tweet echo chamber. As recently as 2010, research from the Project for Excellence in Journalism showed that “social media tend to home in on stories that get much less attention in the mainstream press. And there is little evidence, at least at this point, of the traditional press then picking up on those stories in response.”

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