Some thoughts on the media

I often find it hard to understand the news, these days. The same event is, more often than not, reported in different ways: sometimes diametrically opposite. I therefore find myself reading from multiple sources to arrive at my own conclusion of what may have happened. I take the trouble of doing that, but a lot of people either don’t have the time or the inclination (or both) to do that.

Another thing that I find problematic is the noise in the news. It is very hard to separate the facts out of the loud and theatrical monologues, interrupted by bickering “panels”, that pass of as “News Hours”. These typically seem to end in utter confusion and chaos. 

A third issue is the cardinal issue of the separation of church and state: in this case, the separation of opinion pieces from factual news. I am unsure of what editorial authority means, but in my opinion, this should not include colouring of news articles. The political views of the news organisation may inform opinion pieces and editorials, but not the reporting of news. News organisations, more than anything else, are a crucial pillar of democracy and for prevention of tyranny. Trust in news organisations is therefore critical, as we can see from examples all over. I think that it is also crucial to have more than one news organisation (preferably the majority of news organisations) which the vast majority consider as fair. The numbers will help the news organisations reinforce each other in fairness of reporting. Given the weight of responsibility, it is not enough to be fair; it is also important to be seen as being fair.

Finally, there is the question of volume. TV channels have a need to fill 24 hours of air-time and are available at the press of a button or through apps in smartphones. Online news providers have Petabytes of space to play around with to create articles useful and otherwise, and are ubiquitous. Newspapers, on the other hand, must present news in 15-30 pages and are delivered only once a day. A newspaper would therefore only contain news which is actually newsworthy. To top it off, the once a day delivery of news means that there is no room for the hourly cycle of outrage. People tend to be efficient when they have less resources to work with.

I sometimes wonder if having everything free is one of the problems. Charge content and service consumers by the byte and people will surely prioritise. It is hard to miss the irony in publishing a rant on why content should be charged, on a free to create/free to consume blog. Maybe these thoughts are not worthy of public consumption. If they are, people may not mind paying for it on a paid consumption platform.