It isn't just social media, NBC will have their expert, Al Roker, on about every other night. Often with some simulated radar forecast. Rain or heatwaves in California, it will make the news. The expected thunderstorms in an area with a SLIGHT RISK, if in the Northeast, makes the nightly news.
We don't have enough hurricanes locally to judge, but even a remote possibility of ice or snow will be on the commercials for the local news. I don't know how many icing or snow events we haven't had, butit several.