Negativity drives online news consumption • Hacker News Board

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#321

Post by starkd » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 2:26 PM UTC

bpm140 wrote: post #186

About a year ago, I stopped consuming news cold turkey (save technology and movie news [the former work-necessary and the latter a personal vice]). I took the extra step of banning Twitter and Memeorandum at the router level, so that I couldn't revert easily. I didn't read a single political news story in the ensuing six months. Some of the happiest months of my life. These days I will read the section headlines on M…

Entirely understandable. But taken too far, it is sort of like a person being raped coming to terms with the abuse and actually learning to like it. News can be addictive, so its important to keep it in check. But too much ignorance makes you an unwitting slave.

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#322

Post by ianai » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 2:28 PM UTC

LoganDark wrote: post #311

ianai wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reply with a response that will get the response you want. If you want them to leave the topic, say something non-engaging like “ok”. You’re likely to come across not entirely socially acceptable in either case, but that’s probably impossible to counter.

> Reply with a response that will get the response you want. This is something that I understand, but unfortunately can't really perform for some reason. I always have to be... "honest", for lack of a better word. I will always say something that makes things worse for me because it's... just how I feel. I used to be a pathological liar, and from a young age I had this one friend who was a living lie detector, and th…

That’s not quite lying. It’s just not being interested in a topic and being clear but polite about it.

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#323

Post by chmod600 » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 2:42 PM UTC

nradov wrote: post #215

bpm140 wrote: post #186

About a year ago, I stopped consuming news cold turkey (save technology and movie news [the former work-necessary and the latter a personal vice]). I took the extra step of banning Twitter and Memeorandum at the router level, so that I couldn't revert easily. I didn't read a single political news story in the ensuing six months. Some of the happiest months of my life. These days I will read the section headlines on M…

I guess it's one of those game theory things. Individually each of us can improve our lives by "defecting" and ignoring the news. But if we all "cooperate" by consuming a lot of news then we have better odds of voting in ways that actually improve the world. An interesting moral dilemma: is it right to become a low-information voter in order to be happier? (I am not judging your choices. I honestly don't know the cor…

"by consuming a lot of news then we have better odds of voting in ways that actually improve the world"

I doubt that's true. Certainly not if we are all reading broadly and shallowly, from a few dozen media sources all trying to trigger outrage.

It would be true if we all looked deeply at different topics. Then voting would represent some combination of all of that deep knowledge.

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#324

Post by AndrewKemendo » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 2:49 PM UTC

wolverine876 wrote: post #296

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And thus, because profit motive drives literally everything (because it's impossible to forestall a takeover if you're broke) then all news-media trend toward maximum tolerable negativity. That is, there is a saddlepoint for how much negativity viewers desire. While I don't personally know what the threshold for psychological damage from exposure to this kind of media is, I would guess it's lower than the average exp…

I don't observe "maximum tolerable negativity". Could you give an example, maybe a link to a serious news website that looks this way?

https://www.cnn.com/ as of 10:47ET:

32 links to stories above the fold for my browser

3 are emotionally neutral or positive

---------------------------------------

https://www.foxnews.com/:

6 links to stories above the fold

0 are emotionally neutral or positive

The only thing next is to just be the violence network

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#325

Post by dahart » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 3:24 PM UTC

t12hrow wrote: post #150

ar-nelson wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how an unmoderated, anarchic space like 4chan is close to what I described; the entire point of what I had in mind is a very specific kind of moderation: stories are only published if (a) they're reasonably likely to materially affect some significant portion of readers sometime in the next 6 months, and (b) there's something they can do about it or in response to it. For example, if the readership of thi…

> (a) they're reasonably likely to materially affect some significant portion of readers sometime in the next 6 months, and (b) there's something they can do about it or in response to it. That's the entire point. Who are you to decide that? How can you quantify 'likelyhood to be materially affected'? How can you empirically determine if 'someone can do something about X'? Your opinion is worth the same as the next g…

> Anarchy and no moderation whatsoever, in this context, is always better [...] the opposite is much much worse.

Why do you think this? What is your basis for this claim? Note specifically that in unmoderated channels, governments already do participate with propaganda, so your claim that the only problem is distinguishing signal from noise is false by your own stated standards.

Agenda in reporting is a problem, there is no question, but I don’t buy for a second that anarchy is “always” better or even often better. I would agree that there are times when it helps, but I think it’s closer to few and far between, and that the noise and chaos in the mean time is detrimental and damaging to someone’s ability to see truth when it does come through. To use the example from this thread, 4chan is usually demonstrably and objectively worse than any mainstream news at sharing important, relevant, and true information.

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#326

Post by pessimizer » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 3:37 PM UTC

ar-nelson wrote: post #132

gwbrooks wrote: post #10

Former newspaper city editor here. With few exceptions, positive stories -- although readers clamored for them in surveys -- never drove newsrack sales the way negative stories did. That's why we had a whole section for feel-good features but they didn't usually get prime front-page real estate. In the age of infinite content, headlines have become a sort of drama arms race. But the basic dynamic of what works and wh…

The way I see it, news serves three purposes: --- 1. To let you know about local or world events that could affect you and those close to you. 2. To let you know about world events that affect others far away, in order to judge the effectiveness of political decisions and the necessity of future political decisions. 3. As a form of entertainment derived from the ongoing story of world history (or celebrity gossip, or…

> 1. To let you know about local or world events that could affect you and those close to you.

> 2. To let you know about world events that affect others far away, in order to judge the effectiveness of political decisions and the necessity of future political decisions.

> 3. As a form of entertainment derived from the ongoing story of world history (or celebrity gossip, or whatever else).

The stories people classify as "positive" are exclusively category 3. Crime stories are entertainment, charity porn (especially about children doing charity work), stories about sick people and animals that got well again, all entertainment. Sports. Stories about soldiers and cops that are framed as inspiring and patriotic. None of it is news, it's messaging.

It only makes sense. News that affects people is mostly news of problems, or more accurately, actionable news. "Ongoing Processes Maintaining Themselves As Planned" isn't news that affects you unless it's a followup on "Potential Problem Found In Ongoing Process." The other actionable news is "Event Occurring That You May Wish To Take Part In," and the "news" doesn't care about those unless the "event" writes a check.

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#327

Post by dirtybird04 » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 4:14 PM UTC

wolverine876 wrote: post #281

bpm140 wrote: post #186

About a year ago, I stopped consuming news cold turkey (save technology and movie news [the former work-necessary and the latter a personal vice]). I took the extra step of banning Twitter and Memeorandum at the router level, so that I couldn't revert easily. I didn't read a single political news story in the ensuing six months. Some of the happiest months of my life. These days I will read the section headlines on M…

Who is going to make decisions and hold power in our society, if not you and me? We have responsibilities for it; if it's malfunctioning, that is on us. Who will take care of these responsibilities for you? Expecting someone else to do it is playing a victim and a child - it is us, there's nobody else; there are no parents or authorities to take care of us while we act out. People following your path are why nothing…

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I live on the west coast and the above items you mentioned are pure sensationalism and have absolutely nothing to do with me, my state, or my local community. They add absolutely no value, informational or otherwise, to my life. They do not help me make more informed choices for me and my family or better my life in any discernible way.

You want to care about all that fluff and noise? Good for you. Just don't go around pretending to be a better person for that, or denigrating others who don't fall for that crap. People like you are part of the problem, not the solution.

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#328

Post by dirtybird04 » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 4:31 PM UTC

0xbadcafebee wrote: post #116

ilamont wrote: post #81

A tale that predates the "yellow journalism" movement. One of my favorite anecdotes about Ben Franklin (via the Isaacson biography) was his tendency to deliberately gin up stories or controversy in his publications, using fake letters to the editor and other tricks. This was in the mid 1700s. TV news has the same problem. After the Eagles broke up, drummer Don Henley nailed it with one of his first solo hits, Dirty L…

There's a podcast called "The Past Times!" where two comedians just read a newspaper from 200 years ago. They're insane .

Thank you for the recommendation! These guys sound hilarious and I am really looking forward to listening to the whole series

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#329

Post by mrexroad » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 4:36 PM UTC

wolverine876 wrote: post #288

mrexroad wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> against a mostly harmless virus. Wtf. It’s easy to say that now after covid variants have become decreasingly virulent as they became increasingly transmissible, but it was absolutely not mostly harmless. The human species won the lotto with how it evolved, but just spin that to play to our political leanings. I’ll take the downvotes for saying this, but with all respect, please just duck off back to “doing your ow…

We won the Lotto? Over 6.8 million people, including over 1 million Americans died. Many more suffer from long-term damage. The economic cost was astronomical.

Sorry, yeah, we’re in agreement here, my comment was poorly worded — I meant the death rate and global economic damage would have been beyond catastrophic had it become more virulent as it became more transmissible. Yes, it was bad, really bad (my healthy 40y/o friend was on death bed at start), and to hear someone say it’s “not that bad” or “no worse than a bad cold” is beyond the pale. I think my lotto comment was more in line of, “do you know how fucked we would be had it become more virulent while you all played along with games of politicizing masks and vaccines?” Sigh.

Re: Negativity drives online news consumption

#330

Post by hot_gril » Sat, Mar 18, 2023, 5:18 PM UTC

wolverine876 wrote: post #284

whitemary wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same but I just don't vote at all, unless there are any strong trustworthy pro-worker candidates which basically doesn't happen. I will also show up to vote against anti-worker ballot measures, which are more frequent.

You'll end up with a many more anti-worker activity if you don't vote. And you will be ignored. And who will make decisions for you? Who will take on your responsibilities? What other authority is there? When we are children, we can be irresponsibile and our parents ultimately see to them. As adults, there's nobody else; it's just us.

One vote doesn't matter, in fact you get negative value out of it cause it takes time and exposes some of your private info to the public. I vote despite that, only cause I want to. There isn't a logical explanation for it.