
Jim Lehrer’s Rules of Journalism - funmi
https://kottke.org/20/01/jim-lehrers-rules-of-journalism-1
======
Knulp
I feel like the conversation is lacking a journalist point of view so I'm
going to pitch in :) I usually don't say anything in this kind of debate
(especially on Twitter ;) ) because it's pretty useless, but I love reading
the community here and it's the first time that a debate disppoints me. I feel
like it's one sided and completly lacking the usual counter-argument and
debate. Also, bear with me if I make english mistakes - I'm french and it's
not my native langage.

First I'd like to adress there's very different kinds of journalism, different
set of skills associated with it and of course, a company they work for. As a
job, working for the New York Times, for a local journal, for a tech magazine
or for travel channel is completely different. I don't think people realise
how different the job actually is from one media to the other. You can't say
'journalists' the same way you can't say 'engineers' because there's people
doing software, people doing tests, people building machines, people advising
companies and many other people doing many other things and having no idea how
to do some other engineer job because it is... entirely different. We're not
interchangeable and we don't all do the same job at all.

All medias are also different. Which implies different owners, rules, and
bosses. As a journalist, you're like everyone else : you're an employee. You
can have ethics, you can have thoughts or a list of rules. At the end of the
day, it's a job and if your boss asks you to do something completly stupid,
you can either say no, loose that job and possibly die of hunger. Or you roll
with it and hope very very hard it will not stay on the internet. (Spoiler
alert : it will and you'll be ashamed of it all your life.) You do have rights
in some countries; but first, like many rights, not everyone know them; and
second, those rights don't necessarily protect you. Maybe the media can't fire
you right away or because you refused working, but a few months later, when
they're considering reconducting your contract, you'll just get cut. It's just
sad math. Not everyone can afford to be a hero.

~~~
Knulp
Another point is that there's this image that being a good journalist means
investigating. Movies or tv shows never mention the actual money you're
getting for publishing online. I often see discussion here on how much
engineers make. Everytime I read those, I can't believe the numbers. So let's
talk money. In France the middle ground for an online paper is getting paid
between 40 dollars for a short piece and 120 for a long one. That's usually
8000 characters for long ones, so more or less 800 to 1000 words. If you want
to do a good job, it requiries usually two days : you have to research, get
people's contacts. Agree on a time for three or four interview which are going
to last between 30 minutes and an hour each. Then if you have everything
(rarely happens) you have to write. If no one answers or you realize the
subject was actually much more complicated than you thought, it might take a
week or a month. The nature of the job makes it hard to know how long exactly
something is going to take if you want to do it right... But at the end of the
day, the amount of money you get paid doesn't change and you might just get
paid 100 dollars for two days work, and that's before taxes. I'll talk about
my own experience as a freelancer for a year here, and I'm actually one of the
very lucky ones because I had work. I calculated that this year, I often got
paid 1 or 2 euro the hour. I earned 300 or 400 a month - well, usually it's
more 1500 a month, then nothing for two month, then 200, then 600, then
nothing again... Often I got paid four months after being published - and
sometimes on Paypal. I also worked for a big American media and they pay you
the same amount as in France - except at the end you get a check and your bank
at home will also cut its own share of it and you'll end up with two times
less money. I am absolutely not exagerating. Of course, I stopped being a
freelancer because I couldn't make it work. Yes, my job was more interesting
and I was travelling and getting to cover more exciting stuff. But it couldn't
compensate the stress that came with having literaly no money and my savings
going down and down and down and down. So now I have a job that is actually
one of the rare ones where I can do a good job in France and get paid ok. I'll
still never earn more than 20 to 25K a year after taxes. But I'm lucky.
Really. So imagine how it is for mostly everyone else.

~~~
Knulp
So I'd like to take the debate here where I think it should lie: with the
companies' management. The problem isn't the journalists - there's good ones,
bad ones like everywhere and they can't shoulder all the trust crisis that's
out there. The problem is that no one is really checking who posts what
online. Medias have had a history of having an article go through 3 to 4
people before getting okayed and being published. I actually hate that you
only have one name on an article because it is really not a solo work (or at
least it never should be). Often I have read articles I wrote and was unable
to recognize them. Or they were cut of a part I though balanced the whole
argument I was making. In those cases I feel like it's unfair only my name get
written down because I'll get all the criticism. In other cases, we were
really two working on an article and the editing work was formidable. But
somehow in the end, I'm the only one getting the credit for it, which also
feels unfair to my colleagues.

All those problems are not easy to solve. They beg many questions : is there
just too many people in journalism ? Should companies shrink so they finally
get profitable again and the remaining staff can do quality work - at the
expense of thousands of people that would get without a job ? Should there
only be subscription-based info ? But then does that mean no one without money
would get the right to good information ? Should every company sort out a way
to be both a newsroom (one that doesn't make much money or even none at all)
and develop multiple activities on the side like an ad company, so that they
can stay afloat (some have succeeded that way but it's not a valid point for
everyone) ? I don't have an answer and mostly every media is trying to figure
out their way out of all this. The thing is it's easy to criticize from
outside that the managment is shit... but the ships are sinking and when
you're sinking, you're not thinking ahead as to which direction you're going
to take, or what part of the boat you're going to make better. First you try
to figure out how to get all the water out and keep all the people inside
alive. It's not an excuse, just the context we have to deal with.

Side note : there's also a problem of journalist schools. That's my own
opinion, but I actually think they are very bad for the job - because you
won't learn more than in a media, and it makes all the journalists come out
very similar. Problem is, if you don't do them, you have no network and, at
least in France, you actually can't intern in big medias. Twitter is a similar
bubble to the bubbles school create. Twitter makes journalists feel like what
they see or talk about has a bigger influence than it really has. But that's
not a problem that's only with journalists. It's also with the platforms and
it's been argued that it's all over the internet.

~~~
Knulp
Then... I want to adress one final fact which is that it's easier to say it's
the "journalists" fault if information has gotten so bad. Journalists for sure
hold responsability in this but the public that doesnt value the work, isn't
willing to pay for it and will click on whatever is coming up without caring
about sourcing... Well, that crowd also has its share in how bad the situation
has gotten. I don't think you can blame journalists for all the fake news
websites that came up and how they often became the first things you got to
access. The tools for visibility that we have to deal with are completely not
appropriate for responsible journalism and also require an amount of time that
will never be worth the money (Google, Facebook etc). Those fake news website
play dirty and of benefit greatly from it.

In one of the medias I worked for, it does say something that one of the most
visited article of the year was about a tenia worm that was in someone's
intestine and took literally ten minute to write, edit and publish. None of
the very interesting piece of good journalism got as much attention. If you
want to do good reporting that will shine, you need good keywords, a video,
tons of links... And a long text for good SEO. They can't all have that. And
because of the lack of money, all those steps are often asked of the
journalists themselves. How can you do a good job if you have to get a good
idea while browsing the internet because you don't have time to go out, talk
to people and take the risk it will be all for nothing ? Then you have to sell
your idea to your boss. Then research. Then interview. Then maybe do a video.
Then maybe edit it. Then write the story. Then also doing editing and all the
linking. Then publishing. Then promoting it with your own media so you get
recognised by your coworkers. Then promoting it online. Then get another idea.
All that in one morning of course because where's your worth as a stable
employee if you can't publish 5 articles a day ?

I'm not saying journalists are not responsible for what is happening, that all
the points you made weren't good points or that I have any answers. I'm just
getting tired of always reading hate and simplistic arguments like "Anyway,
Buzzfeed is shit" and "Journalists are only caring about twitter". Those are
the symptoms, not the cause of the illness. And it would do great to move the
debate elsewhere if we want to cure this. It won't be done by journalists
alone. A journalist doesn't exist without an audience and this will have to be
a common effort or journalism is just going to die and well, it's only my
opinion, but I don't think the world will be better for it.

Sorry that rant ended up being a whole book. But if you get there, I would
love to hear what you think and we can discuss this outside of hate and "they"
and "journalists" and "toxicity".

~~~
luckylion
I get the feeling that you're somewhat justifying the state of journalism with
"you have to make money somehow" and "people are also not valuing good
journalism". Consider what would happen if you transferred that to other
professions. "Oh well, people die because the house collapses, but the owners
want it cheap and I have to pay the rent. Also, people don't value good
craftsmanship in buildings", or, let's take it up a notch, "I'm breaking into
hospital networks, encrypt their data and ask for a ransom, I have to pay the
rent. Also, the general public never valued all the great software I wrote
beforehand".

Journalists aren't the root cause of the state of the media, but they aren't
unwilling victims either. It's like working for a land mine manufacturer.
You're not responsible for the concept of war existing, but you sure are
contributing to suffering.

I generally like Thomas Jefferson on the topic:

 _To your request of my opinion of the manner in which a newspaper should be
conducted, so as to be most useful, I should answer, "by restraining it to
true facts & sound principles only." Yet I fear such a paper would find few
subscribers. It is a melancholy truth, that a suppression of the press could
not more compleatly deprive the nation of it's benefits, than is done by it's
abandoned prostitution to falsehood. Nothing can now be believed which is seen
in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that
polluted vehicle. The real extent of this state of misinformation is known
only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knolege
with the lies of the day. I really look with commiseration over the great body
of my fellow citizens, who, reading newspapers, live & die in the belief, that
they have known something of what has been passing in the world in their time;
whereas the accounts they have read in newspapers are just as true a history
of any other period of the world as of the present, except that the real names
of the day are affixed to their fables. General facts may indeed be collected
from them, such as that Europe is now at war, that Bonaparte has been a
successful warrior, that he has subjected a great portion of Europe to his
will, &c., &c.; but no details can be relied on. I will add, that the man who
never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them;
inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is
filled with falsehoods & errors. He who reads nothing will still learn the
great facts, and the details are all false.

Perhaps an editor might begin a reformation in some such way as this. Divide
his paper into 4 chapters, heading the 1st, Truths. 2d, Probabilities. 3d,
Possibilities. 4th, Lies. The first chapter would be very short, as it would
contain little more than authentic papers, and information from such sources
as the editor would be willing to risk his own reputation for their truth. The
2d would contain what, from a mature consideration of all circumstances, his
judgment should conclude to be probably true. This, however, should rather
contain too little than too much. The 3d & 4th should be professedly for those
readers who would rather have lies for their money than the blank paper they
would occupy._

~~~
jariel
It'd rather seem that Jefferson really didn't have the answer either. His
'solution' probably wasn't a solution, and would probably drive said paper out
of business.

~~~
luckylion
Yes, and I don't believe there is a definite answer. I like his description of
the problem, and the fact that it works very well to describe the problem
today is noteworthy as well: it's not a new problem, but each generation has
to deal with it, and maybe the magnitude changes from time to time.

~~~
jariel
The answer is either private organizations have to act with integrity to
promote and coordinate 'proper news' \- or there has to be social
intervention. The former kind of holds true for network news wherein there is
institutional control over distribution. But not so much in print, and
definitely not on the net. In Canada, there's the CBC and they are considering
subsidies for other news outlets.

~~~
luckylion
Relying on private organizations to act with integrity isn't going to be easy,
I think. For public options, I'm skeptical as well, they are very mixed in my
perception, some are doing good work, others are little more than very
expensive mouth pieces for the government. Subsidies for private companies
might be a way, but that will undoubtedly get gamed and you end up needing a
large bureaucracy to counteract that.

------
mannykannot
I think the author unintentionally misspoke in calling him "one of the last".
The growth of journalism in which Lehrer's standards are not observed should
not distract us from the fact that there are many journalists reporting with
integrity, and in some cases, great courage.

~~~
jc01480
Can you reference some?

~~~
nl
There are plenty. The Pulitzer prize winners and finalists last year seems a
good place to start.

[https://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-
year/2019](https://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-year/2019)

------
proximitysauce
In addition to partisanship and sensationalism, access journalism has
dramatically lowered the quality of what gets reported:

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Access_journalism](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Access_journalism)

It's also worth referencing Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent which lays out the
playbook for propaganda posing as journalism:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent)

~~~
mc32
Just want to point out that while often manufacturing consent is seen in a
negative light because it’s been used to negatively manipulate people that it
is also also possible to be used to the better good (vaccinations, education,
etc. of course this can get abused and thus the negative aspect).

~~~
proximitysauce
I disagree. It's not the job of journalism to manipulate people, even if they
think they're doing it for a good cause. Jim Lehrer's rules are very correct
here.

~~~
mc32
I think we’re talking past each other. Manufacturing consent isn’t always
about lying or making things up. It can be presenting a united front on
something and it entails telling the truth with which you’re persuading a pop
to see that POV.

~~~
proximitysauce
I've never heard manufacturing consent used like that. Do you have any
examples of what you're talking about? Genuinely curious.

~~~
jariel
"I've never heard manufacturing consent used like that. Do you have any
examples of what you're talking about? Genuinely curious."

It's called 'PR', it's used all day, every day by most companies and political
organizations, social movements and even the government.

Highlighting the positive aspects of whatever you're doing, avoiding the
negative aspects, discrediting opponents and most insidiously -
misrepresenting their arguments is how it's done.

It's about creating the intended narrative around a specific subject.

Take any controversial issue and you'll generally see that the 'sides' are not
having a debate in public, they're engaging in framing the issue in a manner.
The end up talking past one another entirely.

'Manufacturing Consent' is a funny book, because we read it when we're young
and naive and our eyes are opened to the reality of the world and the
perennial war of ideas. Because such activities are framed as nefarious and
related to questionable acts of intervention (i.e. US intervention in S.
America) ... we are 'shocked and outraged'. But I think looking at it from a
more mature, contextualized perspective, it doesn't seem 'shocking' it seems
really normal.

Ironically the real coup of Chomsky is to misrepresent the nature of 'mass
idea marketing' in a fair antagonist way that I don't think is really helpful.

Unfortunately - almost _all news_ is narrative-driven.

Certainly the entirety of cable news.

If you watch the local news, it feels dry and mundane, because it's generally
very truthful, and there isn't a lot of 'war of ideas' over the dog that
called 911.

But for everything in pop culture and politics, there's a way to frame the
subject in an ideological way (or in a manner that represents the interests of
some group like advertisers or powerful individuals etc.) which is what
happens all day long.

~~~
throwawayjava
_> ...we read it when we're young and naive and our eyes are opened..._

First, you're projecting.

Second, it's not at all surprising that you're young enough to have first read
_Manufacturing Consent_ when you were "young".

Third, books like _Manufacturing Consent_ and _Discipline and Punishment_ are
primarily sociological. They do have some normative content, of course, but
their primary goal is to explain how the world works.

 _> It's called 'PR', it's used all day, every day by most companies and
political organizations, social movements and even the government._

This is an over-simplification. Of course that's true. _Manufacturing Consent_
is not merely pointing out the existence of politics or merely making the
observation that political operatives attempt to use media to shift opinion.
It's a book about ____how____ that process works in the age of mass media and
in a democratic capitalist society.

The way in which cable news is used to warp people's perception of reality
seems pretty obvious in 2020, with hindsight.

And so _Manufacturing Consent_ might seem trite and obvious today. But the
book wasn't written in 2019. Or 2018. Or 2008. Or even 1998. It was published
in 1988.

Just to put that in context: it was written prior to 9/11\. It was written
almost a decade before Fox News was founded. It was written only shortly after
cable television was even invented. In 1988, "Cable News" as we know it today
didn't exist. CNN barely existed, and looked more like a combination of NBC
Nightly News and CSPAN. And most importantly, manufacturing Consent was
published at a time when most Americans really did believe that the nightly
news was a mostly unbiased source of information.

You might read it today and think "yeah, that's obviously how mass media is
used to influence how people think about the world". But that's very much
_not_ the reaction most people -- even, perhaps especially, hard-nosed
realists -- had when reading it in 1988.

~~~
jariel
It wasn't 'new information' in 1988, it was just news to the plebes, and it
was measured/articulated in some way.

This goes back far beyond the advent of 'cable news'.

For centuries, newspapers have been created, bought and promulgated mostly for
the purposes of making money and promoting the narrative of the owners, often
in the form of personal attacks.

Yes, I'm 'projecting' a little but this issue usually takes quite some time
and exposure to grasp as most people don't have any direct dealings with it.
It comes up way too often with young people referring to Manufacturing Consent
as some kind of revelation. The fact is it's a revelation to them, but not
objectively a revelation.

------
40acres
For me, Twitter has been the worst thing to happen to journalism. There are a
lot of downsides to strong institutions and gatekeeping, but when it comes to
journalism I always felt like I was reading The New York Times or The
Washington Post and not an individual reporter. The shroud of not getting an
up close an personal look put the institution at the forefront.

With social media, Twitter specifically, the journalist becomes the main focal
point -- unfortunately the biases comes out as we are all human and you begin
to get a closer look at how the sausage is made, how much "access journalism"
corrodes coverage, and particularly how non-diverse these institutions are
(everyone feels like they went to some Ivy or liberal arts college with
somewhat wealthy or well connected in journalism relatives). A majority of the
content is still really good (climate reporting, international politics,
'explainers' and data backed reporting are all excellent) from the big
institutions but I've totally avoided political and most opinion columns since
2016.

~~~
buboard
> unfortunately the biases comes out as we are all human

Can you point to an example of any recent article in any US paper that even
tries to be objective? Only the BBC pretends to strive for that nowadays.

~~~
Knulp
Thing is objectivity can't be reached and Lehrer's says it : the only thing
yyou can do is try and be fair. It's a big misconception that medias were
objective before. Newspapers have always had political leanings (clear and
revendicated as the identity of the magazine) and that just never stopped. To
say a media isn't objective with their political coverage is actually the norm
and what should be expected. Now if a media trumps a fact in favor of an
argument in a paper that explain science, that's wrong. But actually I don't
think any media does that (never on purpose. And mistakes usually are
corrected).

~~~
thu2111
_To say a media isn 't objective with their political coverage is actually the
norm and what should be expected._

I think that depends where in the world you live.

In the UK all news broadcasters are required to be neutral and objective by
law. They aren't and the relevant regulator is MIA, probably because it's
staffed with people who agree with the broadcaster's biases. But it's
certainly not the norm there that "people" say media isn't objective. Lots of
people still like to claim the BBC at least is objective, despite reams of
retired or former journalists going on record to say it isn't.

------
specialist
Lehrer's Rules are solid, ethical, and actionable. I agree 100%.

Alas, they are completely moot in today's ad-supported automated outrage
machines. And I'm fresh out of goodwill.

Until we decide that discourse is more important than profits, forge a new
consensus, we have to treat reporting like the replication crisis in science.

Just two rules apply:

Sign your work.

Share your data.

The corollaries are just as simple:

Unsigned, unsourced statements are gossip.

Unsupported data is propaganda.

------
12xo
Attention is the currency of media. Modern, mainstream "news" programs are not
journalism per se, they are just conduits for advertising dollars.

The sad part is that concocting sensationalism is extremely profitable,
especially politics. And when you can create the controversy and then charge
outrageous amounts of money to the very people to whom you poke, you control
the discourse and you make a lot of money, which in America is power.

Modern, mainstream "news" is just like fast food. If you care about your body
and your health, you will not eat the stuff. But most people dont care, dont
mind and dont even think about it. Its cheap, tasty and convenient.

------
djinnandtonic
13\. Acknowledge that objectivity may be impossible but fairness never is.

The worst problem with journalism today, encapsulated in a single sentence.

~~~
bsder
Personally, I think a bigger journalistic sin is:

> Assume there is at least one other side or version to every story.

A journalist should _check_ whether there is another side that they missed.
However, there sometimes isn't. Sometimes the other side is simply flat-out
wrong. More often, the "other side" is maliciously wrong.

This journalistic assumption that there are _always_ multiple sides that are
on equal footing needs to _DIE_.

~~~
teflodollar
But stories do have multiple sides, even if one side is flat out wrong.

I don't think anyone on the right or left would say that the present problem
with Journalists is that they present both sides too well.

That's not to say that there's never a correct position. Assuming there is
another version is different from assuming all versions are on multiple
footing.

~~~
bsder
My standard argument about this is: vax vs anti-vax.

There are _NOT_ two equal sides. There is a correct side and an outright
_fraudulent_ side and bunch of easily swayed morons.

Journalists tend to cover this with "balance" instead of calling one side
flat-out wrong. "Fair" means occasionally calling out liars and pissing people
off.

------
jellicle
Somewhat amusingly, the list highlights the Achilles heel of journalism by
omitting one simple rule: "tell the truth".

Not lying is not at all the same as telling the truth.

Modern journalism, at best (very rarely seen), tells you something that is,
narrowly taken, true. Even this version of journalism does not attempt to tell
you what the actual truth of the matter is.

Narrowly true statement: "Republican Senator Blarg said today on the floor of
the Senate "these charges are nonsense, fake news, totally made up"."

That's a true statement! It was said! But it's also misleading about the whole
matter to convey it to your readers.

Telling your viewers the real truth of the situation: "The charges levied in
the Senate are obviously accurate and serious, but Republican Senators are
lying about them in an attempt to obfuscate and downplay the situation."

------
kristianc
Many journalists seem to have discovered that becoming noisy, performative
blue tick ‘personas’, acting out journalism on Twitter, and saying things like
‘this, literally this’ a lot as a substitute for actual analysis is also good
for their careers.

They act out this status-dance of pretending to loathe every second of life in
the toxic digital hellscape that, in the talk tracks and visibility it gives
them is actually very beneficial for their careers.

They couldn’t actually admit it’s been good for them though, as that would
mean admitting profiting from the algorithmic, privacy problem-invested
landscape that they barely understand but have made their careers criticizing.

But of course, everyone’s at it! So the only way to get ahead is more
paranoia, more angst, more toxicity. Once you’re bought in, you can’t go back
to tacking to the middle. So we get an arms race of performative angst and
hyperbolic statements.

Before you know it, you’re claiming that Slack notifications give you PTSD
symptoms:
[https://twitter.com/pfpicardi/status/1220738739514814467?s=2...](https://twitter.com/pfpicardi/status/1220738739514814467?s=21)

The problem is that that is antithetical to the real work of journalism -
which should be about seeking truth without fear or favour.

~~~
mc32
The problem is that on Twitter they’ve become more like activists rather than
journalists/reporters.

Maybe one day actual journalists will come to the conclusion that tweeting is
antithetical to journalism and may only use it as a tool of discovery rather
than engagement.

~~~
coldtea
> _The problem is that on Twitter they’ve become more like activists rather
> than journalists /reporters._

The upside though is that it's easier to tell they're activists / non-
objective on Twitter - compared to supposedly 'serious' outlets pushing all
kinds of agendas as "objective" journalism.

------
fnord77
most of these seem like a good personal ethos to have, even if you're not a
journo

------
salimmadjd
Even the "newspaper of record", the NY Times has lost its journalistic
process.

This is just one recent example that comes to mind. See why Harvard Professor
is suing the NYT [1] for completely twisting his post about MIT and Jeffrey
Epstein [0]

I found this so outrageous how NYT would completely twist words and not make
the appropriate corrections when given the evidence.

[0]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D135DBWfabM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D135DBWfabM)

~~~
sgustard
> "Lessig’s defamation suit covers a September 2019 article titled “A Harvard
> Professor Doubles Down: If You Take Epstein’s Money, Do It in Secret.” He
> claims the headline misrepresents his interview, where he condemns the
> donation, but says that “if you’re going to take the money, you damn well
> better make it anonymous.”"

If you see the egregious defamation there, then you're a more nuanced reader
than I am.

[https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/13/21063873/jeffrey-
epstein-...](https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/13/21063873/jeffrey-epstein-
lessig-nyt-defamation-lawsuit-mit-joi-ito-donations-interview)

------
macspoofing
If you take the present journalism climate as the norm, these rules are
radical. Can you imagine CNN reporting on Trump voters and following rule #6?
Or reporting on Trump and following rule #5, #11?

~~~
pjc50
#5 and #7 are a problem - they can be exploited by bad actors. That's how you
get the "views on shape of Earth differ" reports.

~~~
proximitysauce
It's the job of journalists to vet the stories. No journalist ever has or ever
will suggest that the earth is flat. That's a strawman.

~~~
nickloewen
The concern as I understand it is not that a journalist would just straight-up
defend a conspiracy theory. Rather, the concern is that if you give any
airtime to conspiracy theorists, even in the form of a debate, some
viewers/readers will conclude that there must be _some_ nugget of legitimacy
in the conspiracy (why else would it be on the news?). Indeed, conspiracy
theorists have relied on this to gain support, especially before they had the
internet, when strategically baiting the media was the only way to get their
bullshit noticed.

~~~
proximitysauce
A far greater concern than conspiracy theorists getting taken seriously are
actual conspiracies perpetrated by mainstream media outlets. I gave two
examples elsewhere in the thread: Weinstein and Epstein. Those aren't
"conspiracy theories", they're know and active conspiracies. There were a
multitude of opportunity to report on them but the stories were actively
stifled for personal and political gain.

------
baby
In their current form, medias:

1\. do not care about creating panics or damaging society

2\. are incentivized to provide click-baity to-the-minute reporting.

How to fix this?

Maybe regulation, even though dangerous in this freedom of speech territory.

One thing I was thinking (inspired by one of Andrew Yang's point) is to have a
press tax to fund a delayed international news outlet.

It changes the incentives: the media has no funding issue and is not
incentivized to attract more readers; and it changes the impact: delaying each
piece of news to wait until more information is available is good.

~~~
throwawayjava
We already have some obscure bureaucratic infrastructure in place from the 70s
called the "public broadcasting service". It's funded and everything. Could
just re-purpose that I suppose.

Perhaps the public broadcasting service could have a nightly program that
dedicates an _entire hour_ of primetime to this type of reporting. And we
could even name it in Lehrer's name! Of course in that case we should also
give MacNeil credit as well. So perhaps the show could be called something
like the "MacNeil-Lehrer News Hour"!

;-)

~~~
baby
I’m not native so I’m not sure I got your comment :D

~~~
throwawayjava
You suggested a tax-funded news outlet that could focus on publishing well-
sourced stories instead of keeping up with the hourly news cycle.

What you are asking for already exists [1]. In fact, the article we're
commenting on is about the guy who co-hosted it [2]. Up until a few years ago,
the program was even called the "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer" [3].

[1] [https://www.pbs.org/newshour/](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Lehrer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Lehrer)

[3]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PBS_NewsHour#The_MacNeil/Lehre...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PBS_NewsHour#The_MacNeil/Lehrer_NewsHour_and_The_NewsHour_With_Jim_Lehrer_\(1983%E2%80%932009\))

------
celticmusic
probably a silly complaint, but it would've been really nice to put the
asterisk on the left side of the numbers so that one could immediately see by
scanning which are the refined 9.

------
degosuke
I wonder whether the improvements in machine learning would ever be
sufficient, so that for an article we could generate a quick report of how
many points from the list are "checked".

~~~
lando2319
Journalists pick and choose facts to support the narrative, I don't think
having them "checked" would matter.

What you want to know is the facts that go against the narrative that aren't
mentioned.

Then take a holistic view.

~~~
bilbo0s
Exactly.

Something that gathers all of the known facts in one place for review. That
used to be what journalists did, not so much any longer.

------
MarioMan
These are excellent rules, but they’re useless without sites and journalists
that follow them. Does anyone here have some recommendations worth reading?

~~~
throwawayjava
You can watch the Macneil-Lehrer News Hour (now rebranded as just PBS News
Hour), the program that Jim Lehrer hosted for the better part of his
professional career and the reason people care about his opinion on
journalism. It still runs every night:
[https://www.pbs.org/newshour/](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/)

------
proximitysauce
It's much more rare though and it's almost entirely absent when looking at
political coverage. Two journalists I can think of off the top of my head who
have acted with outstanding integrity in recent years are Ronan Farrow and
Julie K. Brown (broke the Weinstein and Epstein stories respectively). Part of
what makes their journalism so strong is that they had to fight _the entire
industry_ to get their stories out.

Political coverage is a nightmare though. Just yesterday George Stephanopoulos
was caught on camera acting in an extremely partisan manner [1]. This happens
on both sides of the isle regularly at this point (the White House itself is
hardly faultless). It's only ratcheted up since 2016 where it seems the press
took it up themselves to "save" us, where the definition of save seems to be:
push their own political opinions.

1\.
[https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1220758756071497728](https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1220758756071497728)

~~~
fenomas
> caught on camera acting in an extremely partisan manner

I'm sorry, but even as political talking points go this makes no sense. He
made a "cut" gesture during a live feed, but live news broadcasts cut from one
feed to another dozens of times per hour, and the feed he was motioning to cut
wasn't of any particular importance to either party (it was a Trump lawyer
listening to someone off-camera asking a question). That's hardly "extremely
partisan".

------
MaupitiBlue
Reading his rules, it’s hard not to agree with Bob Woodward that many
journalists have become “unhinged” over Trump.

~~~
0x445442
You forgot to put journalists in quotes.

------
qrbLPHiKpiux
> No one should ever be allowed to attack another anonymously.

This is the entire internet.

~~~
0xcde4c3db
I think Lehrer's point here is that journalists often speak to sources "off
the record", and that this is often used to fuel conflict instead of
illuminating the situation.

------
bilbo0s
Interesting that none of the rules of journalism include just reporting facts.
In fact, it says that journalists should be disciplined for "reckless"
reporting of any fact.

It kind of explains why we live in the fact light environment of quotes and
spin. Presumably, if a hard fact proves unpopular with a large enough group,
then those facts, even when backed by hard evidence, can likely land you in a
lot of trouble.

A bit understandable I suppose? I mean, if talking bad about Trump or Obama
increases the number of shooters in your Walmarts and churches, then yeah,
probably should be careful about doing that. At the same time, if you have to
walk on egg shells around people so emotionally invested in a person, or
place, or subject that they're going to shoot up anyone who disagrees with
them, then your journalism on that issue is not likely to be very "good" in
any case.

~~~
macspoofing
>Interesting that none of the rules of journalism include just reporting
facts.

Facts are not enough because in order for 'facts' to be useful they have to be
embedded in a larger structure - like a theory, or ideology, or narrative, or
whatever.

Here's a fact: "Sun rises in the East, and sets in the West". This fact is
compatible with heliocentric and geocentric models. The fact on its own
doesn't tell you which is which. It doesn't tell you the context, nor the
other facts that may have been omitted or superfluously included when
reported, and proponents of both theories can use it to justify their
position. This is why there can never be such a thing as "journalism that just
reports the facts".

~~~
bilbo0s
> _This fact is compatible with heliocentric and geocentric models. The fact
> on its own doesn 't tell you which is which._

But the fact that the Earth revolves around the Sun does tell you which
"model" is actually a fact. That's the point.

You're making an argument about which facts should be reported? The sun rising
in the east? Or the phases of Venus? Or both? Or both and more?

But stating that you need an ideology or narrative to support your facts is a
bit nonsensical in my own opinion. There really is only one conclusion that
can be drawn from the totality of the facts. To state only a single fact, and
then say, "here is an ideology or narrative so you can understand the fact I
just gave you." Really is just stating an ideology or narrative.

Think of it this way, if you still need a narrative, then you didn't give
anyone all the facts.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Nobody has time to read all the facts.

Nobody has time to report all the facts.

Nobody _knows_ ALL the facts.

