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 IMI Tracks Decline in Quantity of Online Content about Covid-19  

August 26 Institute of Mass Information (IMI) experts stated in their online media monitoring report for July 14-16 that just 12% of online news content was devoted to the Covid-19 pandemic, compared to 27% in May and 58.5% in March 2020.

Ukrayinska Pravda, https://suspilne.media/, and Tyzhden.ua posted the highest percentages of Covid-19-related content in their news services, at 17.6%, 20%, and 18.2% respectively. The Weekly Mirror devoted 11.3% of its online news to the pandemic, and Liga.net – 10.4%.

IMI monitoring showed that online media mostly avoided emotional wording and personal judgments in their coverage (only 7.5% of content contained emotions or judgments). Almost the same picture was observed during the previous monitoring wave in May. The highest number of emotional reports was found at Znaj.ua, in 58% of its Covid-19 coverage.

The share of constructive news stories increased from 15% in March and 13% in May to 16.2% in August. The highest share of constructive stories was found on the https://suspilne.media/ website and at Weekly Mirror (37% and 32.4% respectively). Constructive news stories give the audience an in-depth overview of a certain topic. They bring context, perspective, background and solutions, generating debates among media consumers.

IMI conducted its media monitoring from July 14 to 16; it analyzed 1,181 content pieces at 19 national online media. Among those media monitored were ten with the largest online audiences and the highest rating, and nine that are signatories to the memorandum of the Media Movement for professional standards.

The 10 with the largest online audiences and highest rating are:

1. obozrevatel.com,

2. segodnya.ua,

3. 24tv.ua,

4. tsn.ua,

5. strana.ua,

6. pravda.com.ua,

7. znaj.ua,

8. rbc.ua,

9. unian.info, and

10. gordonua.com.

The nine signatories to the Media Movement’s memorandum are:

1. nv.ua,

2. liga.net,

3. ukrinform.ua,

4. zn.ua,

5. censor.net.ua,

6. tyzhden.ua,

7. interfax.com.ua,

8. https://bykvu.com/ua/, and

9. Suspilne.media.

More on the website of the Institute of Mass Information in Ukrainian.

Photo – es.123rf.com