6 ms·

So is this really fundamentally different from the plans in EU and Germany? https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/call-applications-selection-memb

So is this really fundamentally different from the plans in EU and Germany? https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/call-applications-selection-members-high-level-group-fake-news https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/call-appl... It's a dangerous illusion of modernity that you can just pick up a "high quality" newspaper or watch the news and understand what is happening in the world. Or even in your own region. One possible advantage of the total chaos of internet news is that the noise becomes so strong that we can't even receive the signal of traditional news sources with their "expert opinion" anymore.

addicted 9y ago
It depends on the kind of oversight policies the EU group develops.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
bovermyer 9y ago
I wanted to clarify. Are you saying that drowning out reliable journalism with intentional disinformation on social media is a GOOD thing? If so... why?
- nailer 9y ago
  Who determines reliable journalism? I'm liberal but CNN's had issued a massive amount of retractions for their Russia stories, still has the fake fish feeding article up, the Guardian had to retract their 'unarmed' front page story about the drug dealer with the gun in his car. Making shit up is commonplace, yet media censors inevitably only want to target Breitbart and right sources. It's a plain as day transparent power grab by the hard left.
  - bovermyer 9y ago
    That's an existing problem, and not an easy one to solve. It will have to rely on independent review. But relying on social networks for news drops both careful research AND independent review, which is a step backward, not forward.
  - ghostbrainalpha 9y ago
    I really love VICE news on HBO even though it definitely comes from the Hard Left perspective. Basically all news should be taken skeptically, but as much as possible they just go with first person video interviews of the people involved. I don't trust what CNN says about Steve Bannon or Roy Moore, but just hearing what they say about themselves in their own words is enough for me to know I don't belong in their camp.
  - rgbrenner 9y ago
    Journalists are just people. Reliable journalism occurs when those people try their best to provide accurate information, and when they make a mistake they correct it. That's it. You can't expect perfection from people.
    - laretluval 9y ago
      > when those people try their best to provide accurate information It is not enough to trust them to do their best. Journalists should be in a structure that strongly incentivizes telling the truth and strongly punishes false information. It is very unclear that US media outlets, almost all of which are highly politicized, have this property.
      - IronKettle 9y ago
        > Journalists should be in a structure that strongly incentivizes telling the truth and strongly punishes false information. It is very unclear that US media outlets, almost all of which are highly politicized, have this property. Really? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Rather#Killian_documents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Rather#Killian_documents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Williams#Iraq_War_helicopter_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Williams#Iraq_War_helico... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_M._Thompson#Reporting_scandal_and_termination_from_The_Intercept https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_M._Thompson#Reporting_sca... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayson_Blair#Plagiarism_and_fabrication_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayson_Blair#Plagiarism_and_fa... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lara_Logan#Benghazi_report_apology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lara_Logan#Benghazi_report_apo... https://www.timeout.com/chicago/tv/how-a-horrible-decision-cost-wiser-dream-job-at-chicago-sun-times https://www.timeout.com/chicago/tv/how-a-horrible-decision-c... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Finkel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Finkel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Glass#The_New_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Glass#The_New_Republic
    - nailer 9y ago
      I don't think anyone is looking for perfection, simply not creating a narrative one knows to be false. The CNN fish feeding story was deliberately created by zooming film at the point the Japanese leader dumped their fish food, then zooming out again to show Trump dumping his, then writing text to support the fake narrative. The Mark Duggan 'unarmed' headline was immediately followed by a story which revealed the suspect was armed. The retracted CNN Russia stuff might have simply have been gross incompetence though so your point does apply there.
  - IIIr3228 9y ago
    The Guardian isn't perfect, but you can't seriously compare it to Breitbart, which intentionally distorts facts on a regular basis, and goes out of it's way to sensationalize and offend. Would the guardian be caught dead printing these? https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2016/08/17/breitbart-news-worst-headlines/212467 https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2016/08/17/breitbart-news-... Or have they peddled lies as big as these ones? https://www.snopes.com/climatology-fraud-global-warming/ https://www.snopes.com/climatology-fraud-global-warming/ https://www.snopes.com/immigrants-california-wildfires/ https://www.snopes.com/immigrants-california-wildfires/ https://www.snopes.com/planned-parenthood-satanists/ https://www.snopes.com/planned-parenthood-satanists/ Look, maybe the media has a left bias. And it's plausible that right-leaning sources face more skepticism. That's not fair. But the reason Breitbart gets flack is because they really are that terrible.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - nailer 9y ago
      Well yes, the cited Mark Duggan example is pretty damning, but there's Olivia Solon'a recent White Helmet article (which simply presents other secondary sources as if it was primary evidence) and the bizarre 'no such thing as false rape allegations' editorial, which as we've seen is false twice in merely the last two weeks.
- benchaney 9y ago
  He’s saying there is to reliable journalism, and that shattering the illusion that there is is a good thing.
  - IIIr3228 9y ago
    It's not a good thing. You risk committing a false equivalence. Saying there is no 100% reliable journalism is technically accurate, as all news organizations make mistakes and are subject to biases. But some news is more reliable than others: Reuters is not Breitbart.
    - fixermark 9y ago
      Exactly. There are news outlets that will hold themselves to a standard and issue corrections and there are news outlets that care more about clicks than truth. These are not equivalent.
    - unknown_apostle 9y ago
      True, a news agency like Reuters aims to be a neutral observer whereas a polemical site like Breitbart wants to influence politics. Reuters succeeds to the extent that it sticks to transmitting basic facts to newsrooms around the world. Which is already very hard to get right. But a lot of what also passes for quality journalism involves not news agencies but newspapers and magazines. I consider a lot of these to be just more sneaky versions of Breitbart. They are more subtle, use more sophisticated language, have specific formatting and typesetting, have a longer history and they mix up their activism with a broad spectrum of neutral news. (I'm mostly familiar with the press in my own country so it's hard to give widely recognizable examples.) And of course, then there's publications like The Economist. In my very personal opinion, even though they may be "honest" in their intentions, they still end up giving their readers an illusion of understanding. You don't really know what happens in Iraq or Syria or China from reading the Economist. But it's so well written that you might end up believing you do. Anyhow, I see enough reasons not to trust anyone who wants to use this fake news scare to punish their competition or to herd the population to the "proper" sources of information. The untamed internet, when used properly as a source of information, will just give a snapshot of bewilderingly diverse points of view. Which is still not much, but so much better than the best polished story written by the best journalists.
- unknown_apostle 9y ago
  No, it's worse: I doubt the existence of reliable journalism :) Reading 20-year old "quality" news magazines makes me think so. Numerous personal experiences make me think so. Ads in quality newspapers and their subtle or not so subtle political affiliations make me think so. Reality is extremely complex. Journalists, even when they are honest, neutral, capable and of good will, struggle with it. Especially when they try to come up with a polished story. I know this is the case for unimportant events happening nearby, so I assume it's especially true for complex, confusing situations in very different parts of the world. Getting confused by reading totally different accounts of the same event, is what makes me smarter. Because this confusion accurately reflects reality. Getting confused happens to me way more often while reading the internet (or when talking to real people) than when reading The Economist. For the record: I'm not condoning intentional disinformation. And I do want to know about important events.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
soundwave106 9y ago
It seems to be at first glance. The EU initiative you linked to at least seems to try to "[balance] fundamental principles such as freedom of expression, media pluralism, and the right of citizens to diverse and reliable information" in its wording. It also seems to be a committee linked to a EU cabinet, and thus is not directly sponsored by a national military force. The Vietnamese "cyber-army" in contrast seems to be a direct arm of the military, and the language in the articles appeared to be more military / aggressive oriented ("fight", "combating", etc.) with no mention in the articles regarding "freedom of expression" or other balancing factors. At first glance, there doesn't appear to be a direct link to the policy initiative from the Vietnamese government, unlike the EU initiative. Though language barrier may be an issue here; I tried Googling lực 47 and didn't get much beyond other news articles and a Wiki entry, but perhaps there are better terms to use. Still, military policy tends to be more opaque in most nations overall, so it didn't surprise me to find no published government information about this initiative.
- unknown_apostle 9y ago
  "[balance] fundamental principles such as freedom of expression, media pluralism, and the right of citizens to diverse and reliable information" Typical EU-style communication. The word "balance" conjures up images of health, reason, yoga classes and whole grain breakfasts. But in the end, it still represents a worldview of enlightened apparatchiks vs idiotic plebes. Why does there need to be a "balancing act" between freedom of information and anything else? When is something reliable or diverse or pluralistic?
  - soundwave106 9y ago
    It's more, I suppose, the idea that multiple sources of information should be supported ("pluralism"). There is no such thing as an unbiased news source, so it is best in the long run for multiple sources of news to exist, each with their own viewpoint. It is easier to obtain a more informed opinion if one makes the effort to escape single-viewpoint media. Furthermore, by highlighting "freedom of information", there is at least a signal of intent to try and keep a degree of openness in the process, in that review of what they would call "fake news" does not infringe on that right as much as possible. Whether you think the EU will actually accomplish what they say, that's another story. My guess is, it is very likely that the process will be more transparent and allow more leeway, versus what is going on in Vietnam -- a single political party controlling opinion through opaque military concerns. All nations / parties / political philosophies produce propaganda and advocacy pieces, that is not news. Vietnam, however, has never been known for generous press freedom. In fact, it recently has been cracking down heavily on all opinion points that do not reflect the ruling party (https://www.economist.com/news/asia/21731192-american-indifference-has-contributed-crackdown-dissidents-communist-party https://www.economist.com/news/asia/21731192-american-indiff...). I don't see an equivalent in the EU right now, to be honest. Once Western governments start arresting bloggers and journalists for having an opinion differing from the government like Vietnam is doing, let me know.

addicted 9y ago

It depends on the kind of oversight policies the EU group develops.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

bovermyer 9y ago

I wanted to clarify. Are you saying that drowning out reliable journalism with intentional disinformation on social media is a GOOD thing? If so... why?

nailer 9y ago
Who determines reliable journalism? I'm liberal but CNN's had issued a massive amount of retractions for their Russia stories, still has the fake fish feeding article up, the Guardian had to retract their 'unarmed' front page story about the drug dealer with the gun in his car. Making shit up is commonplace, yet media censors inevitably only want to target Breitbart and right sources. It's a plain as day transparent power grab by the hard left.
- bovermyer 9y ago
  That's an existing problem, and not an easy one to solve. It will have to rely on independent review. But relying on social networks for news drops both careful research AND independent review, which is a step backward, not forward.
- ghostbrainalpha 9y ago
  I really love VICE news on HBO even though it definitely comes from the Hard Left perspective. Basically all news should be taken skeptically, but as much as possible they just go with first person video interviews of the people involved. I don't trust what CNN says about Steve Bannon or Roy Moore, but just hearing what they say about themselves in their own words is enough for me to know I don't belong in their camp.
- rgbrenner 9y ago
  Journalists are just people. Reliable journalism occurs when those people try their best to provide accurate information, and when they make a mistake they correct it. That's it. You can't expect perfection from people.
  - laretluval 9y ago
    > when those people try their best to provide accurate information It is not enough to trust them to do their best. Journalists should be in a structure that strongly incentivizes telling the truth and strongly punishes false information. It is very unclear that US media outlets, almost all of which are highly politicized, have this property.
    - IronKettle 9y ago
      > Journalists should be in a structure that strongly incentivizes telling the truth and strongly punishes false information. It is very unclear that US media outlets, almost all of which are highly politicized, have this property. Really? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Rather#Killian_documents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Rather#Killian_documents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Williams#Iraq_War_helicopter_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Williams#Iraq_War_helico... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_M._Thompson#Reporting_scandal_and_termination_from_The_Intercept https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_M._Thompson#Reporting_sca... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayson_Blair#Plagiarism_and_fabrication_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayson_Blair#Plagiarism_and_fa... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lara_Logan#Benghazi_report_apology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lara_Logan#Benghazi_report_apo... https://www.timeout.com/chicago/tv/how-a-horrible-decision-cost-wiser-dream-job-at-chicago-sun-times https://www.timeout.com/chicago/tv/how-a-horrible-decision-c... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Finkel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Finkel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Glass#The_New_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Glass#The_New_Republic
  - nailer 9y ago
    I don't think anyone is looking for perfection, simply not creating a narrative one knows to be false. The CNN fish feeding story was deliberately created by zooming film at the point the Japanese leader dumped their fish food, then zooming out again to show Trump dumping his, then writing text to support the fake narrative. The Mark Duggan 'unarmed' headline was immediately followed by a story which revealed the suspect was armed. The retracted CNN Russia stuff might have simply have been gross incompetence though so your point does apply there.
- IIIr3228 9y ago
  The Guardian isn't perfect, but you can't seriously compare it to Breitbart, which intentionally distorts facts on a regular basis, and goes out of it's way to sensationalize and offend. Would the guardian be caught dead printing these? https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2016/08/17/breitbart-news-worst-headlines/212467 https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2016/08/17/breitbart-news-... Or have they peddled lies as big as these ones? https://www.snopes.com/climatology-fraud-global-warming/ https://www.snopes.com/climatology-fraud-global-warming/ https://www.snopes.com/immigrants-california-wildfires/ https://www.snopes.com/immigrants-california-wildfires/ https://www.snopes.com/planned-parenthood-satanists/ https://www.snopes.com/planned-parenthood-satanists/ Look, maybe the media has a left bias. And it's plausible that right-leaning sources face more skepticism. That's not fair. But the reason Breitbart gets flack is because they really are that terrible.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - nailer 9y ago
    Well yes, the cited Mark Duggan example is pretty damning, but there's Olivia Solon'a recent White Helmet article (which simply presents other secondary sources as if it was primary evidence) and the bizarre 'no such thing as false rape allegations' editorial, which as we've seen is false twice in merely the last two weeks.
benchaney 9y ago
He’s saying there is to reliable journalism, and that shattering the illusion that there is is a good thing.
- IIIr3228 9y ago
  It's not a good thing. You risk committing a false equivalence. Saying there is no 100% reliable journalism is technically accurate, as all news organizations make mistakes and are subject to biases. But some news is more reliable than others: Reuters is not Breitbart.
  - fixermark 9y ago
    Exactly. There are news outlets that will hold themselves to a standard and issue corrections and there are news outlets that care more about clicks than truth. These are not equivalent.
  - unknown_apostle 9y ago
    True, a news agency like Reuters aims to be a neutral observer whereas a polemical site like Breitbart wants to influence politics. Reuters succeeds to the extent that it sticks to transmitting basic facts to newsrooms around the world. Which is already very hard to get right. But a lot of what also passes for quality journalism involves not news agencies but newspapers and magazines. I consider a lot of these to be just more sneaky versions of Breitbart. They are more subtle, use more sophisticated language, have specific formatting and typesetting, have a longer history and they mix up their activism with a broad spectrum of neutral news. (I'm mostly familiar with the press in my own country so it's hard to give widely recognizable examples.) And of course, then there's publications like The Economist. In my very personal opinion, even though they may be "honest" in their intentions, they still end up giving their readers an illusion of understanding. You don't really know what happens in Iraq or Syria or China from reading the Economist. But it's so well written that you might end up believing you do. Anyhow, I see enough reasons not to trust anyone who wants to use this fake news scare to punish their competition or to herd the population to the "proper" sources of information. The untamed internet, when used properly as a source of information, will just give a snapshot of bewilderingly diverse points of view. Which is still not much, but so much better than the best polished story written by the best journalists.
unknown_apostle 9y ago
No, it's worse: I doubt the existence of reliable journalism :) Reading 20-year old "quality" news magazines makes me think so. Numerous personal experiences make me think so. Ads in quality newspapers and their subtle or not so subtle political affiliations make me think so. Reality is extremely complex. Journalists, even when they are honest, neutral, capable and of good will, struggle with it. Especially when they try to come up with a polished story. I know this is the case for unimportant events happening nearby, so I assume it's especially true for complex, confusing situations in very different parts of the world. Getting confused by reading totally different accounts of the same event, is what makes me smarter. Because this confusion accurately reflects reality. Getting confused happens to me way more often while reading the internet (or when talking to real people) than when reading The Economist. For the record: I'm not condoning intentional disinformation. And I do want to know about important events.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

soundwave106 9y ago

It seems to be at first glance. The EU initiative you linked to at least seems to try to "[balance] fundamental principles such as freedom of expression, media pluralism, and the right of citizens to diverse and reliable information" in its wording. It also seems to be a committee linked to a EU cabinet, and thus is not directly sponsored by a national military force. The Vietnamese "cyber-army" in contrast seems to be a direct arm of the military, and the language in the articles appeared to be more military / aggressive oriented ("fight", "combating", etc.) with no mention in the articles regarding "freedom of expression" or other balancing factors. At first glance, there doesn't appear to be a direct link to the policy initiative from the Vietnamese government, unlike the EU initiative. Though language barrier may be an issue here; I tried Googling lực 47 and didn't get much beyond other news articles and a Wiki entry, but perhaps there are better terms to use. Still, military policy tends to be more opaque in most nations overall, so it didn't surprise me to find no published government information about this initiative.

unknown_apostle 9y ago
"[balance] fundamental principles such as freedom of expression, media pluralism, and the right of citizens to diverse and reliable information" Typical EU-style communication. The word "balance" conjures up images of health, reason, yoga classes and whole grain breakfasts. But in the end, it still represents a worldview of enlightened apparatchiks vs idiotic plebes. Why does there need to be a "balancing act" between freedom of information and anything else? When is something reliable or diverse or pluralistic?
- soundwave106 9y ago
  It's more, I suppose, the idea that multiple sources of information should be supported ("pluralism"). There is no such thing as an unbiased news source, so it is best in the long run for multiple sources of news to exist, each with their own viewpoint. It is easier to obtain a more informed opinion if one makes the effort to escape single-viewpoint media. Furthermore, by highlighting "freedom of information", there is at least a signal of intent to try and keep a degree of openness in the process, in that review of what they would call "fake news" does not infringe on that right as much as possible. Whether you think the EU will actually accomplish what they say, that's another story. My guess is, it is very likely that the process will be more transparent and allow more leeway, versus what is going on in Vietnam -- a single political party controlling opinion through opaque military concerns. All nations / parties / political philosophies produce propaganda and advocacy pieces, that is not news. Vietnam, however, has never been known for generous press freedom. In fact, it recently has been cracking down heavily on all opinion points that do not reflect the ruling party (https://www.economist.com/news/asia/21731192-american-indifference-has-contributed-crackdown-dissidents-communist-party https://www.economist.com/news/asia/21731192-american-indiff...). I don't see an equivalent in the EU right now, to be honest. Once Western governments start arresting bloggers and journalists for having an opinion differing from the government like Vietnam is doing, let me know.