The Media

[becomingblue]

The mainstream media, elite media, whatever it’s called, is a joke. There appears to be no standards, no professionalism, no research, no nothing. After the last week or so, they deserve every criticism they are getting. It’s self-inflicted. You idiots.

There are of course a couple groups and individuals that I’m sure are not acting incompetently, but they’re likely to go down with the ship.

[Marin]

Lügenpresse

[j44ke]

Yawn.

[mzilliox]

is it the media, or consumers of media, or Politicians feeding fires and telling lies who are the bigger problem? perhaps if we liked hearing truth, the news would give us that, maybe even some of the politicians. but America isn't very fond of honesty in any arena, we prefer a facade of whitewashed little pleasantries. we cant even be honest about our food supply, immigration, or lack of culture/civility in this country, and you blame the media for giving people exactly what they want? entertainment and lies they can fact check on the internet, the worlds only source of truth, haha. Surely it has nothing to do with society moving to twitter to get its news?

[e-RICHIE]

Remove individuals with iPhones taking images of everything and a good deal of this (topic) would be different. Media is social now. That's what's changed.

[dgaddis]

When the Buzzfeed article came out recently I was immediately suspicious. Since when does anyone count Buzzfeed as a reputable news source? It was all CNN talked about all day (at least they were talking about when I went to lunch that day).

I mean...this is Buzzfeed. This is their 6th most popular video on YouTube, 34 million views. Their top video (73 million views) is titled "If Disney Princes Were Real".



Richard is right that the media is social now. That's a double edged sword IMO.

EDIT to add, just for fun.

Fox New's most popular YouTube video (8.6 million views)



And CNN's most popular with 38 million views.

[Saab2000]

Any media entity is which has a profit motive needs to be viewed through the eyes of skepticism.

[Matthew Strongin]

There's some amazing investigative journalism happening right now. We have so much more access to data and many journalists are using that data to report in new and exciting ways. There is also some sensationalist garbage that gets misconstrued as journalism and is tarnishing the reputation of the profession. The race to break a story combined with the social media machine Richard points out is creating a dangerous dynamic, but the press as a whole shouldn't be discounted or dismissed due to the poor reporting of some bad reporters.

Also, FWIW/IMO/Etc., while there are certainly faults with the so-called mainstream media (as there always has been), much of what comes out of the non-mainstream media is nothing short of fiction and conspiracy theories that should hardly be considered journalism. Yet here we are...

The fact that most people need information spoon fed to them in photos or in 280 characters (twitter should have stayed at 140 so it would be harder for people to use it for info-sharing) means that fewer and fewer people have the ability to actually discern between real journalism, editorial works, poorly executed reporting, and conspiracy fiction. We did this to ourselves.

[becomingblue]

Not so long ago, when Armstrong and others were doping heavily, people put out the opinion that the fans had some ownership in the doping. That the athletes were just giving the fans what they wanted and in order to do that, the riders had to dope. I disagreed with that then and now. I’m on the receiving end. I didn’t influence anything or have any input, I watched.

Which is why I disagree with this statement.

We did this to ourselves.

I didn’t do this. If the “Profession” is going to use social media, or BuzzFeed type organizations, as their primary source and go with it to get the scoop, then again, they did it to themselves.

[Saab2000]

This goes back to when laws banning media monopolies were removed from the books unless I am mistaken. Congress repealed some media ownership laws which then allowed single owners of huge numbers of radio stations, TV stations and newspapers.

Of course, the internet and 24-hour cable news wasn’t in anyone’s imagination 25 years ago, or at least not the monster it has become.

A critical eye is required for all content that is sold or distributed as “fact”. Does this pass the smell test?

[mzilliox]

Consumption goods are a reflection of what consumers demand. we did this to ourselves by not demanding truth, by consuming this crap. to not admit this is a large part of the reality of where Media is today is just ignoring data. It doesn't matter what "you" did, you are just one person, consumer goods dont care about one person. it matters what we did. But sure, its "the media". thats so much easier than looking in the mirror at our culture

[Scott G.]

Slow news is better news, time tends to add context.

The iphone is the soda straw view of the world.

As was said in Soviet times, There is no news on Fox and no truth on MSNBC.

[GrantM]

The mainstream media, elite media, whatever it’s called, is a joke. There appears to be no standards, no professionalism, no research, no nothing. After the last week or so, they deserve every criticism they are getting. It’s self-inflicted. You idiots.

There are of course a couple groups and individuals that I’m sure are not acting incompetently, but they’re likely to go down with the ship.

"No research"? That's just hyperbole.

It's a logical fallacy to attach errors made by individuals to everyone in a group.
You should make a more cogent and specific argument if there is going to be an interesting discussion.

The logical counter to "the MSM sucks" is there are millions of media stories, some are going to be wrong.
How many times is it acceptable for false reporting to make it through to being published?
Is the practice of media outlets rebroadcasting the reporting of others contributing to the speed
at which errors are spread?

-g

[vertical_doug]

Not so long ago, when Armstrong and others were doping heavily, people put out the opinion that the fans had some ownership in the doping. That the athletes were just giving the fans what they wanted and in order to do that, the riders had to dope. I disagreed with that then and now. I’m on the receiving end. I didn’t influence anything or have any input, I watched.

Which is why I disagree with this statement.



I didn’t do this. If the “Profession” is going to use social media, or BuzzFeed type organizations, as their primary source and go with it to get the scoop, then again, they did it to themselves.

It's actually how the ecosystem is set-up. If you watch how click-throughs and algorithms work, fast news is the news of outrage.

NPR did a podcast on the business of internet outrage and how it works. It cuts both ways, left and right. I have seen friends go down the rabbit hole.

The Business of Internet Outrage : NPR One

Because of click through, even if you are watching it on TV, chances are it is being driven more by online shares etc. Everything has an online counterpart. The more extreme stuff is what gets 'SHARED' and drives revenue.

And do not underestimate the number of sock puppets and other troll farms driving some of this. The last statistics I saw estimated twitter content is 58% by volume BOTS.

[Dallas Tex]

The mainstream media, elite media, whatever it’s called, is a joke. There appears to be no standards, no professionalism, no research, no nothing. After the last week or so, they deserve every criticism they are getting. It’s self-inflicted. You idiots.

There are of course a couple groups and individuals that I’m sure are not acting incompetently, but they’re likely to go down with the ship.

Real journalism died quite sometime ago. I lay 99% of the blame on online 'news' sources. The moment that technology allowed to track the number of 'clicks' with micro precision, the race to the bottom began. The appeal to the lowest common denominator creates the largest number of clicks, which in turn drives the financial part of the 'journalism' upward.

There's no longer an unshaven editor with his sleeves rolled up drinking coffee at midnight to ensure what gets printed the next day met the journalistic standards of the day. That has been replaced by algorithms tracking the intensity, quality, and number of clicks a 'story' receives. Accuracy, integrity, truth no longer matter. Now get off my lawn.

[Dallas Tex]

Any media entity is which has a profit motive needs to be viewed through the eyes of skepticism.

Which would be nearly all media.

[Dallas Tex]

"No research"? That's just hyperbole.

It's a logical fallacy to attach errors made by individuals to everyone in a group.

-g

He's not talking about individuals in a group. He's talking about an industry. And yes the industry he speaks of has been in decline for quite some time, I doubt many would argue that point. You may have reached for your 'logical fallacy' bullet too quickly.

[theflashunc]

There is no "The Media" as if its some monolithic mass operating as one entity.

There's lots of hard working, dedicated, smart, enterprising people in the industry today producing amazing work in what continue to be challenging economic times.

Is the industry perfect? No. They're writing the first draft of history, sometimes they get it wrong. But they get it right far more often than the "fake news" crew would care to admit.

Anyone who clamors for a throwback to some halycon days of postwar media glosses over the fact the rush to get news out has always existed, bias has (and will continue) to exist. If anything, modern media is more analogous to 18th and 19th century publications and the hyper partisanship that often bled into those outlets. The days of de facto media monopolies in markets are over. Media is far more fragmented now than it's ever been, and on balance that's a good thing.

As always, a free and open press is the right answer. Sunlight is the best disinfectant after all.

[Saab2000]

Which would be nearly all media.

I never said it wasn’t. As with anything in life, follow the money.

[davids]

The mainstream media, elite media, whatever it’s called, is a joke. There appears to be no standards, no professionalism, no research, no nothing. After the last week or so, they deserve every criticism they are getting. It’s self-inflicted. You idiots.

There are of course a couple groups and individuals that I’m sure are not acting incompetently, but they’re likely to go down with the ship.

This is a nearly content-free post. What new organizations are you clumping as "mainstream media, elite media, whatever it's called"? What specific articles are you referring to, during "the last week or so"?

I honestly have no idea what you're talking about, and no way to either agree or disagree with you. This appears to be shit-stirring without evidence.

But thanks for playing.

He's not talking about individuals in a group. He's talking about an industry. And yes the industry he speaks of has been in decline for quite some time, I doubt many would argue that point. You may have reached for your 'logical fallacy' bullet too quickly.

Glenn, I can't figure out how you could figure out what the hell he's referring to!