I have not been a big consumer of blogs. I generally stuck to
"legacy media" because there is simply so much information on the web.
I have never felt like I had the time to properly vet writers or
bloggers that hadn't already been put forward as reputable through
well-known news sources. Its not to say that citizen journalists/bloggers/etc. don't have anything good to say. On the contrary, I think that the dialogue that has been provided with the ease of publishing on the web is fantastic. People should be able to participate in news. I'm just not the one that will always follow the threads or care to see what specific bloggers think of this or that event. When I'm looking for news, I want news - not opinion.
Of course, opinion is far from absent in legacy media news sources
as well. Some writers are given permission to use loaded words or pick
unfair images. One of my favorite instances of obvious bias was in the New York paper, I believe it was The Post,
in 2000. The paper ran side by side articles that profiled Bush and
Gore. The photographs of Gore were all very sophisticated, with
dramatic and flattering light. The photographs of Bush, specifically
one of him sat spread eagle on the grass next to his father who was
sitting in a chair, made him look like a foolish man-child. It was not the most presidential-looking picture. And it was a not so subtle way to editorialize Bush's bio. It seemed quite obvious to me that the paper preferred Gore; however, maybe some considered it fair and equal. Maybe they should not have been allowed to print those pictures while claiming to be fair and balanced journalists. Maybe that bias should have been transparently identified. I've been taught to always question everything. Even those sources you like. An important part of consuming information is to be critical of it. So it comes as no surprise that sites would be created to aide one's critical eye. Spinspotter.com and Newstrust.net set out to do exactly that: help the reader cut through the ... bad stuff.
Both Spinspotter and Newstrust engage the reader in becoming a kind of content editor.
Spinspotter allows the reader to highlight elements of a story that are on the list of the "Seven Deadly Spins." These include reporter's voice, passive voice, biased source, disregarded context, selective disclosure, lack of balance, and over-reliance on press releases. These are spins that have been identified by Spinspotter's own journalism advisory board.
The ultimate goal behind Spinspotter may be to threaten writers on a more personal level. By marking up their articles with red highlighter, perhaps the writers will become more vigilant about the fairness of their own news reporting.
However, and perhaps we can blame this on the beta version, Spinspotter is easy to criticize based on first use. For one, it runs in to the same problems that it was created to identify: bias. Spinspotter relies on the user to identify spin according to the rules set out on the program's website. The program expects the user to be an expert in identifying these elements, and then feeds the information to an algorithm that will become more efficient about identifying the elements on its own. But who will edit the elements that have been identified?
In one article, the word "loquacious" was identified as spin when it was used to describe Senator Biden. In the next sentence, "Mr. McCain" was identified as spin because the user considered it an improper reference. The perceived meaning of the use of the word loaquacious seems to be defined by the writer's own bias. Indeed, in thebiden.tiff Spinspotter notes, the user writes "Synonyms: babbling, chattering, gabby, garrulous, jabbering, noisy, talkative, voluble, wordy I guess it was the prettiest "sounding" word for what he[Biden] is." This relates the user's own opinion; the words "gregarious," or "verbose" were not considered (and I think they are pretty words). The user surmises that the writer would like to sugar coat the criticism of Sen. Biden by using a "pretty word" to describe his talkative nature. However, there is no evidence in the article to support this point.
The second element that the user identified - Mr. McCain should be referred to as Sen. McCain - is also revealing of the user's bias because the article merely adheres to AP standards, and addresses all the other people mentioned in the same pattern. It is not evidence of disrespect or bias at all.
Newstrust.net falls victim to the same problems. Rather than users identifying articles of strong journalistic merit and articles of weak journalistic merit, they seem to rank articles depending on whether or not they like the information in them. The user Roland Hirsch, for example, criticizes every article that questions the McCain campaign and praises every article that is critical of the Obama campaign. His review choices reflects a list of articles that he likes or dislikes rather than engaging in a serious discussion of whether or not an article provides fair and balanced journalism. A majority of users, it seems from my less than thorough survey of the site, are biased the other direction.
However, there are users that focus on whether or not the attributions in an article are thorough and accurate. In that sense, the site could serve more as a fact checker to make sure that journalists are not simply lying or making things up in their pieces.
Both sites fall victim to the same plight: how do we expect ordinary users to be fair and balanced, and have the expertise, to identify the subtleties of bias in articles written by professional journalists. Much like the question of the validity of citizen journalists, do we really want citizen editors? The average person does not study semantics at the level even of a college freshman course, much less to the degree that a journalist should be sensitive to the use of certain words.
Newstrust.net seems to be a little more useful, as it is more of a favorites list compiled by users; much like emailing articles to your friends. The ratings of these articles may be a helpful addition to the discussion bias in the media. That brings me to the question as to why these sites would be useful in the first place. Is the average news consumer so easily swayed by a writer's lullaby of indoctrination (if it truly is the case that the writer is trying to indoctrinate)? Do readers not trust real editors to require fair and balanced reporting when an institution claims to be dedicated to such things?
Personally, if I'm not in the mood for an opinion piece, I just won't read them. I view articles with a critical eye and try to be fair and balanced in my opinion that is informed by the information I have just read. If I'm in the mood for punditry, or a call to rally the troops, I know who my preachers are and I would never be silly enough to think those sources were objective. I generally rely on myself to be my own spinspotter.
Perhaps I am not enough of a visionary to figure out how these two sites will be usefully implemented in the future ( though I have much more confidence in NewsTrust.net); but as of right now, I can't imagine ever thinking about visiting the sites again. There is enough information to sort through -- those sites just clutter the pages even more.
Spinspotter allows the reader to highlight elements of a story that are on the list of the "Seven Deadly Spins." These include reporter's voice, passive voice, biased source, disregarded context, selective disclosure, lack of balance, and over-reliance on press releases. These are spins that have been identified by Spinspotter's own journalism advisory board.
The ultimate goal behind Spinspotter may be to threaten writers on a more personal level. By marking up their articles with red highlighter, perhaps the writers will become more vigilant about the fairness of their own news reporting.
However, and perhaps we can blame this on the beta version, Spinspotter is easy to criticize based on first use. For one, it runs in to the same problems that it was created to identify: bias. Spinspotter relies on the user to identify spin according to the rules set out on the program's website. The program expects the user to be an expert in identifying these elements, and then feeds the information to an algorithm that will become more efficient about identifying the elements on its own. But who will edit the elements that have been identified?
In one article, the word "loquacious" was identified as spin when it was used to describe Senator Biden. In the next sentence, "Mr. McCain" was identified as spin because the user considered it an improper reference. The perceived meaning of the use of the word loaquacious seems to be defined by the writer's own bias. Indeed, in thebiden.tiff Spinspotter notes, the user writes "Synonyms: babbling, chattering, gabby, garrulous, jabbering, noisy, talkative, voluble, wordy I guess it was the prettiest "sounding" word for what he[Biden] is." This relates the user's own opinion; the words "gregarious," or "verbose" were not considered (and I think they are pretty words). The user surmises that the writer would like to sugar coat the criticism of Sen. Biden by using a "pretty word" to describe his talkative nature. However, there is no evidence in the article to support this point.
The second element that the user identified - Mr. McCain should be referred to as Sen. McCain - is also revealing of the user's bias because the article merely adheres to AP standards, and addresses all the other people mentioned in the same pattern. It is not evidence of disrespect or bias at all.
Newstrust.net falls victim to the same problems. Rather than users identifying articles of strong journalistic merit and articles of weak journalistic merit, they seem to rank articles depending on whether or not they like the information in them. The user Roland Hirsch, for example, criticizes every article that questions the McCain campaign and praises every article that is critical of the Obama campaign. His review choices reflects a list of articles that he likes or dislikes rather than engaging in a serious discussion of whether or not an article provides fair and balanced journalism. A majority of users, it seems from my less than thorough survey of the site, are biased the other direction.
However, there are users that focus on whether or not the attributions in an article are thorough and accurate. In that sense, the site could serve more as a fact checker to make sure that journalists are not simply lying or making things up in their pieces.
Both sites fall victim to the same plight: how do we expect ordinary users to be fair and balanced, and have the expertise, to identify the subtleties of bias in articles written by professional journalists. Much like the question of the validity of citizen journalists, do we really want citizen editors? The average person does not study semantics at the level even of a college freshman course, much less to the degree that a journalist should be sensitive to the use of certain words.
Newstrust.net seems to be a little more useful, as it is more of a favorites list compiled by users; much like emailing articles to your friends. The ratings of these articles may be a helpful addition to the discussion bias in the media. That brings me to the question as to why these sites would be useful in the first place. Is the average news consumer so easily swayed by a writer's lullaby of indoctrination (if it truly is the case that the writer is trying to indoctrinate)? Do readers not trust real editors to require fair and balanced reporting when an institution claims to be dedicated to such things?
Personally, if I'm not in the mood for an opinion piece, I just won't read them. I view articles with a critical eye and try to be fair and balanced in my opinion that is informed by the information I have just read. If I'm in the mood for punditry, or a call to rally the troops, I know who my preachers are and I would never be silly enough to think those sources were objective. I generally rely on myself to be my own spinspotter.
Perhaps I am not enough of a visionary to figure out how these two sites will be usefully implemented in the future ( though I have much more confidence in NewsTrust.net); but as of right now, I can't imagine ever thinking about visiting the sites again. There is enough information to sort through -- those sites just clutter the pages even more.
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