258 SATIRIC INFOTAINMENT AS A NEW TYPE OF CRITICAL JOURNALISM: IN THE CASE OF TURKISH WEBSITE ZAYTUNG Şakir Eşitti, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Ardahan University, Turkey sakiresitti@yahoo.com Mehmet Işık, Ph.D. Interior Ministry, Turkey mehmet.isik35@yahoo.com Şakir EŞİTTİ was born in Kars, in 1982. He graduated from Istanbul University, Communication Faculty, and Journalism Programme in 2005. He received his master degree in International Relations and Contemporary Political Theories from University of Westminster in 2008. He started his PhD studies in 2009 at The Marmara University, Social Sciences Institute, Journalism Department, which he completed on 2013 with the thesis of “Synopticon and Social Media in the Surveillance Society”. Dr. Sakir Esitti is studying in the field of communication and political science and currently working as an Assistant Professor in Political Science and Public Administration Department in the Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, at Ardahan University. Mehmet IŞIK was born to a farmer family in the Özbek village, Urla, Izmir. He has finished the primary and secondary education in Urla. He was graduated from Turkish Military Academy in 2002. He has completed his postgraduate study in The Turkish Military Academy, Defense Sciences Institute and The Ankara University, Social Sciences Institute. In 2009, he started his doctoral studies in The Marmara University, Social Sciences Institute, Journalism Department, which he completed on January 31, 2013 with the thesis “An Assessment Through The Strategic Communications Approach on Turkey’s Struggle Policy Against Drug Abuse and Addiction Within”. He is working in communication and political science and has two books. Abstract For the last two decade there have been significant changes in traditional news reporting in Turkey. Especially with the developments in the new communication technologies boundaries between journalism and entertainment, and between public affairs and pop culture, became difficult to discern. Journalism and politics mostly combined with entertainment. In this context, a new term, infotainment which is used in order to explain the change in the new communication era and understanding of information flow has emerged. When the current literature about infotainment examined scholars generally argue the negative effects of infotainment to democracy and Journalism. They argue that infotainment as an overall trend, paying less attention to politics, economics and society compared to sports, entertainment and scandals and therefore it is used as a refer to a decrease in journalistic principles. However they ignore that infotainment can also draw depoliticized society’s attention to the politics, social problems and reality since humor is memorable persuasive and can influence political attitudes. Main aim and objectives of this study is to assert that, usage of entertaining content, satiric news reporting or in general satiric infotainment, can take the attention of depoliticized society. Online satiric infotainment is rising gradually. Turkish website Zaytung (www.zaytung.com), is an important example of satiric infotainment in Turkey. Therefore, this study takes Zaytung as a case study and uses the content analysis method in order to examine this website’s information flow as an example of satiric infotainment. SATIRIC INFOTAINMENT AS A NEW TYPE OF CRITICAL JOURNALISM: IN THE CASE OF TURKISH WEBSITE ZAYTUNG INTRODUCTION For the last two decade there have been significant changes in traditional news reporting in Turkey. These changes are mainly technological improvements, monopolization, tabloidization