Emerging technologies like blockchain promise social change across various domains, yet their complexity and constant evolution often challenge public understanding and trigger contrasting debates. Media presentations of these debates can shape public attitudes and drive narratives around their development and adoption. To understand media's role in public perception of emerging technologies, we analyzed 20,501 press articles covering 327 ventures proposing blockchain applications with social impact. Utilizing the Structured Topic Model (STM), we developed a model illustrating how media convey blockchain’s societal potential through sensemaking, sensegiving, and sensebreaking strategies. Our findings reveal that media highlight blockchain’s potential for institutional change by contextualizing it within trends (sensemaking), detaching it from negative trends (sensebreaking), and spanning boundaries across different logics (sensegiving). This sets the stage for a hybridized technological logic with social transformational potential. The study contributes to understanding media’s influence on public perception and the role of emerging technology in institutional change.
