Tradition media and non-traditional media are at odds with each other in many ways. To properly analyze the differences, I have chosen to look at two different news outlets, Buzzfeed and Time Magazine, that cover the same topic.
The link to the BuzzFeed article is here.
The link to the Time Magazine article is here.
BuzzFeed, being the non-traditional media outlet, has a structure in their reports more similar to a blog or social media website. This structure of how the news coverage of Thailand is presented was the first thing that I noticed. Traditional news is generally all writing whereas the news story featured on Buzzfeed is laced with pictures for every statement that they make. With each sentence, a picture follows as a visual reference. After focusing so much on traditional media in Thailand, I found this approach to be very refreshing. It gave a more visual coverage of Thailand as opposed to a just a description of the event and the details behind it. As is often said, a picture is worth is a thousand words. With this type of coverage, readers are given the opportunity to view news differently. 
As seen in the image above, readers are given the opportunity to see images of what they are reading about. I personally find these images to be very rewarding. It is clear though that the website has a tendency to lean more towards photojournalism as oppose to written journalism. One reason that BuzzFeed is able to report news in such a way is that since it is a non-traditional news outlet, it doesn’t hold the same amount of expectation of detail as a traditional news outlet. A traditional news outlet will typically go much more in-depth into an issue to give more context. It is clear how much more information is presented by traditional news publications (as seen in the Time Magazine coverage of the same news story below). 
I think it is important to bare in mind the type of news that readers are looking for. Someone who wants the full details and background story won’t typically go to a non-traditional news outlet such as BuzzFeed. Instead, they will read their news from a traditional one such as Time. However, it is still important that websites such as BuzzFeed contain news stories. BuzzFeed is a website that appears all over social media. People often post links of funny articles or meme’s to their friends Facebook walls. I have encountered these articles on many occasions, and often have spent more time than I should have surfing the website, looking at tabloid news. This is something I can only assume happens to many people.
By having news available on the website, and presented in a matter much more visually appealing than a long wordy article, those who don’t typically seek out news might stumble across something that catches their eye. Reading something on BuzzFeed might stir their interest, like it has mine in a numerous circumstances, and cause the viewer to want to explore the issue further. What I do if I am interested in a specific piece of news is then look on a more trusted, traditional news outlet such as The New York Times, Time Magazine, Washington Post etc.
My opinion is the rules regarding the truth telling ability of both traditional and non-traditional media outlets are the same but I don’t think that a website such as BuzzFeed should be held to the same standard as a traditional outlet such as Time or The New York Times. Instead, it can be looked at as a site to attract those who may not actively seek out news.
Journalism in Hostile Environments: Thailand 