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Facebook, Twitter join coalition to improve online news

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IMO, the media today is too activist and too sensationalist, often the two intersect. The idea that social media is the real press is just not sustainable any more than having the eye witness to the tornado be described as a reporter. The media has long struggled, in the West, with the balance of objectivity over a desire to fulfill the particular media company's positions and the desire to spin certain topics to represent that position in the narrative. There is a reason eye witness accounts are seen as a weak sort of proof or evidence in most civilized state's courts of law. The very same issue concerning eye witness accounts are present in first person social media "news" that is often a grainy 5 second edited video clip. Such clips are often used as "news" by reporters and editors who know that they are not very good sources of information. Because of the operational bias being so deep rooted, today the press often are seen as trustworthy as politicians, a group who have record high levels of distrust. We have already seen FB put its finger on the scales to push their corporate views in the form of "news". Whose to ensure this from happening again? In short until government asserts some standard as to what is the press/new/media, people will continue to distrust many sources and feel their way to the "truth." This outcome, feeling ones way to the truth over having the information upon which you can make rational informed decisions, is course is exactly what failure of the fourth estate looks like.

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The problem is not with social media. the problem is with the electronic media, which panders to the lowest common denominator by offering click bait content, native content masquerading as news, and "fair and balanced" content that fills space while informing no one and obfuscating real problems by dressing them up as issues their readership can form opinions on in the absence of information, evidence or analysis.

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