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You did no fact checking, and I must scream

shkspr.mobi

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Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#111

Post by yoyohello13 »

BurningFrog wrote: post #90
LeifCarrotson wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For-profit media is definitely a problem, but Jeff Bezos didn't buy the Washington Post and Elon Musk didn't buy Twitter because they thought they were more profitable than any other investments they could have made. I believe they did it because they wanted the power that owning a media outlet can provide in order to help protect their actually profitable businesses. It certainly helps that they have their own reven…

Elon was quite clear the he bought Twitter to make it a free speech forum where you could openly discuss things, even from non establishment standpoints. And that's what it's become.

Has it? I’ve never actually engaged with twitter. I always thought it was an echo chamber. From the outside looking in though it seems like twitter is the same pre-Elon as post-Elon. The difference is just which views are the blessed ones.

Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#112

Post by ccakes »

lynx97 wrote: post #100
chaps wrote: post #28

I've done a fair amount of data-intensive fact checking for journalism articles and have had fact checking done on my own data-intensive reporting. Couple things: 1. Fact checkers are not paid enough to do what they do. They're usually freelancers and they're usually financially struggling. The dynamics of that are difficult to say the least. 2. Editors change things last minute without informing the journalist whose…

So you're saying the pay is poor, and your coworkers deliberately fuck you over for their own gains. That pretty much sounds like a job you should stay away from by any cost. Do something else, something productive that doesnt lead to a bunch of lies being sold as truths.

Yes but many of us also complain about the lack of quality journalism. We can’t encourage good (presumably) people leave the industry and also want the standard of reporting to improve

Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#113

Post by nabakin »

JohnMakin wrote: post #98
beej71 wrote: post #97

Good reading for the ever-dwindling group of people who like facts. I remember there was a friend of mine who was of the opposite political persuasion, generally, than myself. He posted something that was demonstrably wrong to Facebook. And I was embarrassed for him just as much as I be embarrassed for myself having posted something so inaccurate. So I offered a friendly correction, but he replied in an unexpected wa…

Yea, the issue is fewer and fewer people care about objective fact anymore. Reality is whatever you feel it is, or whatever you feel you want it to be, and the internet (the current iteration of it) is perfectly content to feed you that reality, and fake/real is becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish. I've also been in similar discussions and have since given up - even if you show incontrovertible evidence to…

I wonder if there's something we can do. A social network that penalizes misinformation and rewards expert analysis. Something like that would never be as big as general social media but maybe it could be developed for a small set of users who care enough about truth to contribute to it and grow it over time

Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#114

Post by simonw »

chaps wrote: post #96
simonw wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"For me personally, I feel like advertising is directly at odds with quality journalism." Advertising is how journalism has worked since journalism first started. Running a newspaper used to be a fantastic business, because you effectively had a local monopoly on advertising to a geographic area. If someone wanted to promote things in your city, you would be top of their list. Facebook, Google, Craigslist etc complet…

Getting grants is an alternative way and it's how freelancers are able to do reporting for cash-strapped newsrooms. Grants definitely have their own can of worms, though. Things like restrictive reporting requirements, do-not-do requirements, and the dynamics that just come from people giving other people relatively large sums of money.

Yeah, the problem with grants is that even with no strings attached there's still a subtle influence where a publication may not want to harm the interests of the source if that grant since they might not provide more funds in the future.

Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#115

Post by blipvert »

BurningFrog wrote: post #90
LeifCarrotson wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For-profit media is definitely a problem, but Jeff Bezos didn't buy the Washington Post and Elon Musk didn't buy Twitter because they thought they were more profitable than any other investments they could have made. I believe they did it because they wanted the power that owning a media outlet can provide in order to help protect their actually profitable businesses. It certainly helps that they have their own reven…

Elon was quite clear the he bought Twitter to make it a free speech forum where you could openly discuss things, even from non establishment standpoints. And that's what it's become.

Aww, that’s sweet.

Only time I’ve been kicked off Twitter (permanently, no comebacks) was under Elon’s rule.

Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#116

Post by chaps »

projektfu wrote: post #109
chaps wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you focus on "one fact"? Reporting, fact checking, editing is a fluid project that changes as the piece progresses. What needs fact checking in one draft is very different from what needs fact checking in another draft. And like I said, editors make changes that the fact checkers never see. Again, these are economic problems. Donate to your local investigative newsroom.

The OP is about a news org basically republishing a viral text its people didn't write. There is no particular need to check every most of the facts like the OP did when a quick glance tells you that it's unreliable.

Sure, but my point wasn't to refute the article in any way. More of a preemption of people saying, "this is why journalism sucks!!" without understanding the dynamics of why things are the way they are.

Everything fuckin' sucks, it's not just journalism.

Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#117

Post by ofcourseyoudo »

dragontamer wrote: post #22
smallpipe wrote: post #6

The average journalist has to churn enough stories that they don't have time to be looking up anything. There must be a corollary somewhere about how much you should read the average newspaper.

The average newspaper has grossly declined in quality IMO. But there are some good investigative journalists out there. Arguably, all the smart and careful journalists have moved to the weekly or monthly format. Economist, The Atlantic, and the like.

I think a much smaller percentage of smart high school seniors want to go into journalism at all. And if they do they'll probably just start a TikTok debating people

Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#118

Post by lynx97 »

chaps wrote: post #103
lynx97 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're saying the pay is poor, and your coworkers deliberately fuck you over for their own gains. That pretty much sounds like a job you should stay away from by any cost. Do something else, something productive that doesnt lead to a bunch of lies being sold as truths.

These problems are largely economic. Donate to your local investigative newsroom.

I once sat on a table nearby of the local investigative newsroom crew having a chat in a cafe. The vibe I got was so evil, I definitely wouldn't give them any of my money. In fact, I have given up on the concept of independent journalism, I just dont believe anymore it is happening. Knowing the onwership structure of the publishers in my country (and many others around me) also adds to the unwillingness to donate. They are all inconservative hands, and are being used to push agendas.

Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#119

Post by chaps »

lynx97 wrote: post #118
chaps wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These problems are largely economic. Donate to your local investigative newsroom.

I once sat on a table nearby of the local investigative newsroom crew having a chat in a cafe. The vibe I got was so evil, I definitely wouldn't give them any of my money. In fact, I have given up on the concept of independent journalism, I just dont believe anymore it is happening. Knowing the onwership structure of the publishers in my country (and many others around me) also adds to the unwillingness to donate. Th…

I think a lot of what you're seeing is people being people rather than journalists being journalists. Sometimes gallows humor is the only thing you can do for yourself while you're looking through brutal, terrifying reports of abuse for hours and hours.

Re: You did no fact checking, and I must scream

#120

Post by monkey_monkey »

BurningFrog wrote: post #90
LeifCarrotson wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For-profit media is definitely a problem, but Jeff Bezos didn't buy the Washington Post and Elon Musk didn't buy Twitter because they thought they were more profitable than any other investments they could have made. I believe they did it because they wanted the power that owning a media outlet can provide in order to help protect their actually profitable businesses. It certainly helps that they have their own reven…

Elon was quite clear the he bought Twitter to make it a free speech forum where you could openly discuss things, even from non establishment standpoints. And that's what it's become.

> And that's what it's become.

Hilariously incorrect.

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