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I'm Lauren Rae Orsini, a graduate student, journalist, infographic designer, anime convention reporter, and documentarian. Welcome.
Googlezon revisited: My response
Filed Under Future of News
I’m glad my last post on Googlezon generated such fervor. Everyone had some very good points on the issue, some which I do agree with. Brendan’s point that the mainstream news has an editing problem is certainly true by my book. However, I think I should definitely follow up to crystallize my thoughts on the issue. Here’s why I still don’t think Googlezon is a good idea:
1) No one is held accountable in the Googlezon scenario. In the fictional world of Googlezon, the search engine would grab bits and pieces from all the blogs and information sources in the world in order to piece together news stories. It’s not entirely clear from whom each bit comes. As a result, if a fact were deemed to be faulty, it would be hard to trace back from whence it came. Meanwhile, right now in the highly flawed mainstream media, we at least know who to blame when something goes wrong.
2) Questions of accuracy are still a problem with Googlezon. How do we know what we read on the Internet is true? This is a question Adam Gurri tackled shortly after my post. In the end, we have come to the same conclusion- it’s a judgment call based on one’s own instincts and experience. Unfortunately, as Gurri points out, this is no different than how we receive mainstream news right now- we have to be conscientious news consumers and not trust that everything given to us is accurate. Once again, Googlezon would not solve this current media problem.
3) People will get a false sense of security about their news. I’ve written before about how people are more likely to listen to their friends as a news source than the mainstream news. So if people buy into Googlezon, where they (and people they know) are both producers and consumers of the news, they will naturally be more trusting of it. And given my second point, this trust is not earned- news consumers need to continue to be wary with this new medium.
This doesn’t mean I disagree with all new media concepts of news- I wouldn’t be blogging/publicly disagreeing with some media practices if I did! I just think that Googlezon would not be a successful or reliable method.
If you don’t agree, which is likely, definitely comment respectfully about why not. On the off chance that you do agree, I’d love to hear why, too. In this emerging new form of media, we’re all more or less beginners.
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4 Responses to “Googlezon revisited: My response”
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Provenance (what fact came from where) is not an unsolvable problem, however; indeed, with computer-based tools, it’s not difficult to have it keep a record of where it grabbed facts at. So that’s #1.
#2 is handled by reputation– just as it is today. I’ve already linked work on moving that into the digital age.
#3: Don’t people get that today when they buy into the NYT or the Post? You assert, both blindly and, I believe, falsely, that people will inherently place more trust in a news source to which they can contribute.
At this point I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree. After reading your paper (OK, just the abstract and first few pages, sorry), I think the Mniker concept has a lot of merit, and I see how it ties in to this concept, but I simply can’t see Googlezon going well. I can’t help but replay the “at its worst” section of the video in my head. Thanks for your points and let’s definitely keep talking about this.
A great discussion.
Brendan: reputation certainly is a lot of what determines which sources we choose to put more or less trust in. But in the end it doesn’t “handle” anything. The responsibility for what we choose to believe still rests on no one’s–or no mechanism’s–shoulder than our own.
@Adam
I agree with you fully. In the end it comes down to what we choose to accept as a valid source. Sadly casual empiricism wins the day for a vast majority of people… as it does with many news sources. Casual empiricism is the notion that if something happened to you and a few people you know then you can make the logical leap that it’s affecting everyone, or it’s the cause of the problem etc. /Rant
In the end we are responsible for our sources and the quality of our information, but sadly we don’t know our information quality is poor until we are caught “with our pants down” (using poor quality information) and generally speaking that doesn’t happen unless your in an academic setting or dealing with specialized information related to your field of work.
@All
In the Googlezon universe I feel that this could result in two possible outcomes.
1) Since everyone will receive different news, it’s possible that no one will trust the other’s information because they don’t use the same source and might not agree with the creditably of the other persons source. Think of this as the Fox vs CNN, conservative vs Liberal debate. Liberals generally don’t trust Fox news and conservatives don’t trust CNN and thus debate about the quality of information takes place instead of debate on the issues sometimes. In the Googlezon universe this has a really possibility of being magnified due to the automatic dissemination of news that fits your attitudes.
2) The second possibility is that because everyone source is specialized the reality check (getting called out for using faulty information) which forces you to reevaluate your sources of information (outside of academic settings where your professors and peers are encouraged to check your information) won’t happen as frequently. This I believe is what Lauren is getting at with her third point. Your sources aren’t called into question as much and so you don’t reevaluate them as frequently as you should.
@Brendon I’ve not had time to read your paper yet… but it’s on my to read list. However just going off of my gut here I have to say that reputation is a poor substitute for a actual system of publication and peer reviews which happens in the publication of news now.
From my experience reputation in business and on the internet doesn’t mean you know what your talking about it just means you can B.S. more and no one will call you on it. So I’m not sure how reputation solves the accuracy problem besides giving people a false sense of creditability.
@all
When you cut out the system of incentives associated with peer reviews and editors that go into news publication process the quality of news will fall.. it’s economics.
Editors have the monetary incentive to make sure what they OK to be published is right. (Their job and job growth depends on it)
Publishers have an monetary incentive to pay editors to make sure the news they publish is accurate. (No one will pay to read it if they lose their credibility)
/Rant