It's not a joke to the media, but fundamentally their job is to report new things. Not to take a view on the things, or check them for truthiness or flawed meth

It's not a joke to the media, but fundamentally their job is to report new things. Not to take a view on the things, or check them for truthiness or flawed methodology -- just to report them. (Your choice of media will determine how much extra value in terms of checking, discrimination etc is added to the news you see reported) But they like telling you to forget what you know and take on board $newfact because it is easy copy (scientists say so!) and it gets pageviews/sells papers.