  Popular media is an unspoken yet ever-present element of the physics
landscape and a tool we can utilize in our teaching. It is also well-understood
that students enter the physics classroom with a host of conceptions learned
from the world at large. It stands to reason, then, to suspect that media
coverage may be a major contributing factor to students' views on physical
phenomena and the nature of science - one whose influence will only grow amid
the 21st century digital age. Yet the role of the media in shaping physics
teaching and learning has remained largely unexplored in the physics education
research (PER) literature so far.
  Here, we explore the phenomenon of media hype from a theoretical and
practical perspective: how media rhetoric of current topics in science and
technology evolves, and how it affects students and instructors. We argue that
media hype of cutting-edge science can be a double-edged sword for educators,
with the same amped-up rhetoric that motivates students to enter the classroom
tending to result in inflated preconceptions of what the science and technology
can actually do. We draw on examples related to teaching quantum computing as a
case study, though the findings we present should generalize to other topics
garnering significant media attention - from exoplanets to graphene to
batteries for electric vehicles. We conclude with a set of practical
recommendations for physics teachers at all levels who wish to be more
cognizant of the role exposure to popular media has on students and to tailor
our teaching accordingly.
