Most of what we see these days from online blogs, is the modern day equivalent of the tabloid rag magazines. People just making stuff up based on random facts and/or images they’ve seen. Couple the uninformative, rumour-based blogs of your aver Joe, with the overload of “information” being Tweeted, who knows where true journalism has gone.
Richard Wilkins fell for “citizen journalism” a couple of years back. Michael Jackson and Farah Fawcett died on the same day. That morning, someone blogged, a single sentence, saying that Jeff Goldblum had died in New Zealand falling off a cliff. This was a baseless, unverified blog by someone, which the “real” news decided to jump on.
Even today I watch the news and see how opinionated and biased the news has become. I’ve always seen morning shows and current affairs programs as opinionated, financially-fueled nonsense. But the actual news programs on mainstream channels is riddled with sarcasm and political influence.
So if citizen journalism is rubbish, and media journalism is biased, where do we hear the truth from? I think through our own discourse, we discover the truth for ourselves. With the abundance of news media outlets out there, most people can discover the truth for themselves, filtering out the political bias, unverified information and nonsense for themselves.
I think you have a good point here but you forget that both you and I, as well as many other people in our course have been taught to look for this media bias. Now we can't hide from it. But many people in society trust media or at least subconsciously believe what they say. Also, the truth can be sought out, but only by those who want to and sadly many don't care.
ReplyDeleteA very passionate post Chris, but what we have to realise is that this kind of thing doesn't always happen (referring to your video). Many people learn things from word-of-mouth and sometimes this is a good thing but also it can be bad. As Annie said, people are lazy and sometimes really don't care about the news. I know a guy who becomes informed only through other people telling him stuff, needless to say he's dumb as Sh*%! But hopefully the more educated people are the more they want to be more informed. That's my theory anyway...
ReplyDeleteI agree Chris. I honestly think it has always been on us as the viewer/consumer to actively participate and to seek out our own truth when it comes to news. I have been highly sceptical of the news, particular mainstream news programs, for a large amount of time simply because they over exaggerate and over emphasise almost everything. It is nothing new that news programs put their own spin and bias on what they present to us, and as was outlined in the lecture they show us what they want. What I like about citizen journalism is that you now have the option to observe many varied viewpoints on a particular topic or news item. Through this we can make up our own mind and judgement on the news based on how relevant, significant and truthful it really is.
ReplyDeleteNice post Chris and you drive many valid points. It's hard to watch mainstream news or current affair programs ever again after knowing the bias and shotty journalism involved in some of the news stories. I remember the first time I saw ABC's Media Watch - I could no longer watch news programs with the same complacency that I did before. But I agree with many of the comments above, not everyone is so discerning.
ReplyDeleteThe Press Gazelle ran an article in 2006 entitled 'The Four Critiques of Citizen Journalism' to view the article, cut and paste the link below:
http://www.pressgazette.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=1&storycode=34418
Hey Chris, nice post. I understand why a couple of people have criticised you, suggesting that people in general are too lazy to see this bias and attempt to filter it, but I tend to lean on the side where the mass audience is slightly more intelligent than we give them credit for. Although people in general are too lazy to search out the truth for every story, I think there is still a vague understanding that the media is just that- a medium... and therefore we shouldn't trust everything it says.
ReplyDeleteAnnie's correct in saying that as communication students, we're more likely to pick out bias; but I think that there are very few people, when they are passionate about a topic (be it refugees or carbon taxes etc) that aren't critical of the media's take on that topic. I, like you, am getting frustrated with how low the media's standard is getting, and am always looking for something more reliable.
As I aspire to being a journalist of some sort, I don't like people who tweet and blog about news items as if their account is the be all and end all. I also don't like references to social media being used in mainstream media news like SKY and FOX. I think it cheapens the value of information. Like Annie said, most of Australia thinks the mainstream news is the truth and I often find myself in a debate arguing against someone who uses the daily telegraph as a reference to back them up. Citizen journalists are confusing an already naive nation.
ReplyDeleteLove this post, especially the headline. It is so true that anyone from anywhere can be a journalist. All you need these days is your phone and you're good to go. I know we're all very skeptical when reading produser generated content.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I completely agree with you when you say that "Citizen journalists are confusing an already naive nation", however, some content produced by citizen journalists are at times more accurate and may show no news framing in their reporting.
Have a look at this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QU5LonkXbCE) is discusses how relevant citizen journalism is as we as audiences are no longer passive. There is many-to-many way of communicating rather than one-to-many.
Awesome. Enough Said.
ReplyDeleteCompletely agree with you about the biases of media and I credit the education I am receiving for showing me. I do agree that shows such as The Morning Show, Sunrise, Today Tonight, A Current Affair etc... are all story tellers posing as news programs. But that being said some news shows do tend to hit real stories (from time to time), the real question is would you trust a citizen journalist any more than you would a traditional one. Or rather, should you?
I agree Chris i think we take what we will from a multitude of sources. I am afraid to that there are so many variables in play the mood we are in, who is telling us, where we are ect, somtimes i think there is no predicting how my opinions on news are formed (and it concerns me a little).
ReplyDeleteI do find myself turning now to social networking site for news because of the constant streaming. Sites such as twitter who have those amazing thing called Hash tags which i only just realised are super awesome seem to make my own personal mediation of the facts easier some how short bursts of information form multiple sources, i think its a good thing.
"Like this page if you love Timmy!" haha.
ReplyDeleteIt depends on what you mean by "truth" here. I think they only way to know truth here is to have been there or have a completely unbiased and emotionless and fully detailed version, which would likely be impossible. I agree with Joanna, it's even changed by where we're at when we hear it.