Aggregatori o nuovi editori? Google News e le diete mediali comparate nel conflitto russo-ucraino = Aggregators or new editors? Google News and comparative media diets during the Russian-Ukrainian conflict

Abstract

This study explores the role of Google News as a news aggregator and its impact on shaping media diets during the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Considering platforms not only as technological agents but as socio-technical and political-cultural entities embedded in global, national, and local contexts, the study compares media diets aggregated by Google News in Georgia, Italy, Poland, Serbia, and Turkey. Through comparative analysis, the study investigates Google News' editorial agency and the potential accessibility inequalities among countries. The analysis reveals divergent patterns of source nationalisation and concentration, highlighting Google's influence in building diverse media diets, with different shades of national-centric news and sources' variety both from a glocal and diverse perspective of plurality. The findings emphasise Google News' dual strategic role as a socio-technical, cultural, and political actor, simultaneously maintaining a 'minimum' Western influence, reflecting national and geopolitical asymmetries of power within global information ecosystems.