Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times • Hacker News Board

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#111

Post by TomMckenny » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:00 PM UTC

jimmy1 wrote: post #101

TomMckenny wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May I ask, do you have many specific examples?

For numerous others in recent times see the coverage of the Covington Catholic situation: misreporting and sensationalism at it's finest. I wonder sometimes if some of these traditional media behemoths even bother to follow basic journalistic practices like 1. cross referencing your sources 2. seeking the other side of the story / opposing viewpoints 3. asking those involved for comment because it seems glaringly obv…

The push to always be breaking news and the drive for ever more customers is certainly seriously problematic.

And I certainly won't say the NYT is perfect. But it seems a bit much to claim the NYT has so many errors that it is unreadable or reality free. And it is certainly better than the vast majority of alternatives.

After all, in the very case you mentioned, they did print this[1] almost immediately. And the problem in this case comes far more from the "like" button and yet more twitter storms than it does news papers. Papers which attract vastly fewer eyeballs, have far fewer curse words and require attention spans greater than a chipmunk.

[1]https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/20/us/nathan-phillips-coving...

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#112

Post by _2d30 » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:10 PM UTC

smithsenn wrote: post #108

magicalist wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Let’s not forget the 98% “chance of winning” estimate of the 2016 election. > For months ahead of the election, the election was never called by The New York Times as being below a 90% certainty. It's trivial to verify that neither of these things are true[1][2], so...just adding to the garbage, I guess? [1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/upshot/presidential... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/elections/2016/f…

Still, so laughably bad are the predictions, that you kind of prove the point being made. They were, more or less, calling the election, and in retrospect, trying to drive results. Perhaps it’s debateable to say no one really wanted Trump to win, given what we’ve now seen, but this points very seriously to the fact that The New York Times is not at all an objective news source, which makes them as worthless as their…

I'm not sure you understand probabilities when you drive at discrediting the NYT. Their last prediction given in the linked series gave Trump a 15% chance at winning. That's about equal to the probability of rolling a 10 or more with a two six-sided dice (16.7%). Would you find it laughable that someone looked at you before the come-out roll in a game of Craps and said there was only a 16.7% chance of rolling a ten or more and then it happened? I wouldn't.

Further, I think if you wanted to drive the results of an election you're far more likely to give your chosen candidate a _lower_ chance of winning in order to drive as much support as possible. If as a voter you thought it a foregone conclusion that your preferred candidate was going to win, it's not likely you see much reason to vote.

All of that said, the NYT is clearly constantly pushing particular agendas (just look at the "Business" section for a start) and has dropped so significantly in own esteem that I will very likely unsubscribe soon. However, when criticizing an organization we should do so objectively and point to their true flaws and not use misunderstandings of probabilities.

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#113

Post by mediaobserver45 » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:24 PM UTC

_bxg1 wrote: post #89

crazygringo wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, this is a lot of journalism in a nutshell, and the NYT tends to be far, far better than most. If you cancelled your NYT subscription, may I ask what other daily newspaper you find to be as informative but more objective? Or have you given up daily news altogether?

I read NPR now (only text; I can't speak to the audio segments). It's the most blessedly dispassionate news source I've yet found.

Ah no! If you want good, thoughtful news I suggest the Atlantic or the New Yorker (society, culture, politics), Talking Points Memo (politics only), or Propublica (no breaking news, just investigative). All of those four are controlled by journalists and have a more slow-news, news analysis focus. Add a local newspaper, just not one that is owned by a hedge fund or rightwing billionaire.

If you want to listen to audio, there are a lot of great podcasts, many from the above publications. (People in the rigthwing media bubble will complain that the above four pubs are liberal, but frankly: reality has a liberal bias in 2019, and all the above are truth-first, and thus VERY different from rightwing pubs like WSJ, Fox, Daily Caller, etc.)

As for NPR: it is really a terrible example of our current 'both sides', conservative-influenced media. NPR sounds fair, but the NPR news production is strongly controlled by its individual member stations. Because of that station control, NPR is highly susceptible to whining from the right, and so they end up presenting "both sides" of many issues, even when only one is true. It's sad. (Example: NPR refused to use the word "lie" to refer to DJT's statements even as late as Dec 2016, when the NYT had come out with a usage of "lie" to great hoopla in Oct/Nov 2016). The NYT is better than NPR, except for NYT politics coverage: don't read its politics coverage and if you can, skip its headlines. For some reason NYT editors and politics reporters are strong believers in the both sides, fact-second religion.

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#114

Post by scabarott » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:28 PM UTC

rossdavidh wrote: post #40

As someone who has (once) written an opinion piece for the NYT, I wonder how much the published piece resembled the author's original text. My experience: https://www.rosshartshorn.net/stuffrossthinksabout/nyt_opini...

This is really fascinating. Had no idea just an HN comment can get you an invitation to write a NYT op-ed. Is this usual? Have you written for a newspaper before or do they randomly source semi-anonymous internet commenters for opinion pieces?

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#115

Post by mediaobserver45 » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:30 PM UTC

_bxg1 wrote: post #105

bdamm wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was NYTime’s outstanding coverage of Ergodan’s entourage beating of protesters outside the White House that cemented my decision to subscribe to The NY Times. As a journalism company they’re often good and occasionally brilliant, which is a rare quantity these days.

Hence the mixed feelings. They have a track record of breaking really huge and well-researched stories. It's a shame they muddle it up with sensationalism.

Yes I think 'mixed feelings' is right. But it's not just sensationalism that is their failing -- "savvy journalism", the "view from nowhere" and "bothsidesism" are greater problems with the info the NYT conveys. (also, NYT editor Dean Baquet fired the NYT public editor after she questioned their "Not a Russian puppet"[1] story just before the 2016 election)

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/01/us/politics/fbi-russia-el... "Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia" Nov 11, 2016 (Note that quite a few reporters have publicly said they think this story was sourced to Trump partisans in the NY FBI office, but there has been no firm reporting about the true reasons for it. Yet.)

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#116

Post by mediaobserver45 » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:33 PM UTC

jimmy1 wrote: post #101

TomMckenny wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May I ask, do you have many specific examples?

For numerous others in recent times see the coverage of the Covington Catholic situation: misreporting and sensationalism at it's finest. I wonder sometimes if some of these traditional media behemoths even bother to follow basic journalistic practices like 1. cross referencing your sources 2. seeking the other side of the story / opposing viewpoints 3. asking those involved for comment because it seems glaringly obv…

So here's a great example of where Talking Points Memo gets to the truth and why we all should read it.

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/making-sense-of-the-phi...

Over the last couple days I’ve been watching the unfolding reaction and re-reactions to the video of the confrontation between Native American activist and elder Nathan Phillips and a crowd of high school students from Covington, Kentucky on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington. The whole story is a good example of how we can react quickly to a zoomed in (both literally and metaphorically) video and miss a lot of what led up to it, as well as some key context. With that said, though, when you add all the context I’m not sure it’s all that different from what it looked like on the first go, despite some now saying the new evidence and new videos change everything.

Saturday night and into Sunday I watched numerous different videos of the encounter itself and what led up to it. So let me give you my impression of what happened as well as links to videos and accounts which can help you come to your own conclusions.

First, the initial videos could easily give the impression that Phillips (the man with the drum) was in the midst of marching in a protest when he was surrounded by a crowd of white teenagers in MAGA hats. That’s not what happened.

(Be very careful of the takes from rightwing, billionaire-funded/owned publications like the Daily Caller, Reason, WSJ, IJR, Fox News, Drudge, or anyone on rightwing radio: they have a political reason to play down racism from a white kid wearing a MAGA hat.)

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#117

Post by scabarott » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:33 PM UTC

ALittleLight wrote: post #110

scabarott wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately this happens a lot but I don't entirely blame the media companies. In the age of twitter and social media, some news moves fast and they have to decide quickly whether to publish something about a trending news item or wait to do proper reportage and lose valuable page-views to more sensationalistic outlets which they have to compete with. I've come to accept this is the new reality and not get too bumm…

It's difficult to trust the reporting of an organization that misrepresents or gets wrong an event that is entirely recorded on video from many angles. I agree that the New York Times publishes some great articles, but I'm deeply concerned about the bad articles they publish. If their editorial standards permit them to rush to judgment as they did in the Catholic school incident how can I trust their editorial standa…

I don't think their original piece actually made a judgment, it just reported what everyone else initially thought was the case (correct me if I'm wrong ). Still I agree it's disappointing that they a news organization takes what you see on the internet at face value, like the rest of us

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#118

Post by laretluval » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:34 PM UTC

rhizome wrote: post #57

laretluval wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every individual article will have some bias. But GP is complaining that the entire editorial staff seems to share a bias, indeed a single agenda, meaning that there is a lack of rigorous discussion.

There's a long-existing term for this: "editorial policy," which is a fundamental feature of all publications. All. In programming, this would be like complaining about the existence of indenting.

If I thought indenting was lowering the quality of programming I would comment about it too.

If the last decade or so has shown anything it is that people are tired of the standard operating procedures of legacy media. Maybe the idea that the editorials all present a unified narrative is part of that.

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#119

Post by mhb » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:40 PM UTC

mediaobserver45 wrote: post #115

_bxg1 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hence the mixed feelings. They have a track record of breaking really huge and well-researched stories. It's a shame they muddle it up with sensationalism.

Yes I think 'mixed feelings' is right. But it's not just sensationalism that is their failing -- "savvy journalism", the "view from nowhere" and "bothsidesism" are greater problems with the info the NYT conveys. (also, NYT editor Dean Baquet fired the NYT public editor after she questioned their "Not a Russian puppet"[1] story just before the 2016 election) [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/01/us/politics/fbi-russi…

You're claiming that the NYT is letting Trump off too easy? It is to laugh.

Re: Letter in Response to Jan. 17 Article in The New York Times

#120

Post by _bxg1 » Mon, Jan 21, 2019, 10:43 PM UTC

mediaobserver45 wrote: post #113

_bxg1 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read NPR now (only text; I can't speak to the audio segments). It's the most blessedly dispassionate news source I've yet found.

Ah no! If you want good, thoughtful news I suggest the Atlantic or the New Yorker (society, culture, politics), Talking Points Memo (politics only), or Propublica (no breaking news, just investigative). All of those four are controlled by journalists and have a more slow-news, news analysis focus. Add a local newspaper, just not one that is owned by a hedge fund or rightwing billionaire. If you want to listen to audi…

I've found NPR to usually present "no sides", which exactly what I want. Simply facts. Minimal analysis or hypotheticals. Just, "X happened." The "both sides" mentality presumes a conflict, and implies that the content either lives in the sphere of opinion or includes "alternate facts". I've no interest in it from my news source.

I do end up finding myself on The Atlantic fairly often through links. It has some good opinion pieces, but I don't really think of it as "news" so much. Or at least, not the stuff that I've read.