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Isn't that the main credibility problem facing journalism today though? It's these publications asking for credibility because "just look around, bro" or "look
by jimbob45 5y ago
Isn't that the main credibility problem facing journalism today though? It's these publications asking for credibility because "just look around, bro" or "look at these six examples, it's everywhere". You can't establish a pattern based off of emotions and expect to be respected as a serious news agency. You could argue that it's the reason that FOX News lost so much respect around ~2010 from FOX and Friends. It's the BLM activists asking you to "look at the racism happening everywhere" and the election truthers telling you that "you just know fraud is happening - nobody I know voted for Biden". I can't draw conclusions based on your feelings, no matter how strong they are.
It's telling that 13/52 and 13/90 have stuck around so well because those are real, factual numbers. Perhaps they're entirely misleading but, at the very least, newsreaders appear to be far more interested in those real numbers than "feelings-based" articles like the one above.
Part of the magic of FiveThirtyEight early on was their deep commitment to showing the statistical analysis behind every single article. You didn't have to just trust their reporters because they had the MiniTab or MATLab printout on every article that you could read for yourself. They fully describe their methodology behind their pollster ratings and election forecasts, even if you don't agree with them. 538 has since gotten away from their statistical analyses a bit and their viewership and credibility has suffered accordingly.
- nradov 5y agoModern journalism consists of looking at today's trending topics on Twitter, then finding a few related anecdotes about it to turn into a "news" story that pushes the publication's preferred narrative. Those articles aren't false per se, but they do nothing to help readers understand what's really happening.