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If you know the topic at hand you can somewhat believe you're good at finding the Expert. If you don't know jack about topic X, you'll end up trusting another
by m2f2 3y ago
If you know the topic at hand you can somewhat believe you're good at finding the Expert.
If you don't know jack about topic X, you'll end up trusting another newbie, or a charlatan.
Or, you can go around talking to lots of people, go search professors and professionals and ask them.
Here you are, welcome to Journalism.
Oh and the same works for photographers (my 24yo son is one of them).
- api 3y agoIs picking a newbie or a charlatan that much worse than listening to a journalist who interviews a newbie or a charlatan? Or one who doesn’t understand the subject (as is usually the case) and totally mangles what they get from an actual expert? I’d rather at least take my chances at picking an actual expert. You can see how bad journalism is when you read a popular article on something you do understand deeply. Now consider that it’s probably about that bad on every subject. The problem is that you must understand something deeply to report on it well or describe it well. Only a programmer can be a good journalist on software. Only a former military person can do good war reporting. Etc. If you don’t know what you are talking about you can’t talk about it well.
- mcphage 3y ago> Is picking a newbie or a charlatan that much worse than listening to a journalist who interviews a newbie or a charlatan? Or one who doesn’t understand the subject (as is usually the case) and totally mangles what they get from an actual expert? Given the quality of discourse, and rocketing levels of misinformation on the internet—yes! It’s a lot worse!