Cross-media within the Facebook newsfeed: The role of the reader in cross-media uses

This study investigates the role of interpretation in cross-media uses. Highlighting the specificity of cross-media uses within meta-media environments such as Facebook, we argue that interpretative processes play a crucial role in the formation of cross-media repertoires. The methodology relies on a reception analysis for which we conducted interviews with eleven expatriates using Facebook on a daily basis, in conjunction with a commented consultation of their newsfeed. In the analysis, we show that reading Facebook’s newsfeed is an activity that contributes to the construction of the user’s mediated lifeworld. Schutz’s phenomenological approach allows us to explore how users develop reading strategies to typify their experience of the social world within Facebook, to maintain the relevance of their newsfeed and to negotiate the technological features of Facebook, shedding light on how users assemble their cross-mediated experience within meta-media.