Citizen journalists are increasingly important members of the news media ecosystem. They often provide the first photos and video after a disaster and firsthand reports from war zones too dangerous for journalists.
Category Archive: News Literacy
The first step is to realize that an algorithm is determining what news you see (and what you don’t). That is true on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Google News, Apple News, Google search and many other news websites.
Raw information can be very valuable. Often when news breaks, tweets and other social media posts with photos, video, and eyewitness observations are the first indications of what has happened. However, raw news is UNVERIFIED.
News can be entertaining, and entertainment can be newsy, which makes it increasingly difficult for news consumers to tell the difference. Shows like “The View” often blur the line between journalism and entertainment.
It’s not easy, but verifying information in places where it is logistically and politically difficult — and sometimes dangerous — is the job of foreign correspondents.
It may look like the news outlets are unfairly ganging up on the vaping industry, but in fact, journalists are behaving rationally and responsibly in their sweeping coverage of this story.
“Exclusive” is probably the most overused word in the news business. Journalists love to invoke it and do so liberally because it drives traffic to a story and confers prestige on the reporter and news outlet.
This is a great question, not least because each of us is part of the answer—simply by participating in this news literacy course.
The reason lies largely in the question itself: speed and accuracy are critical in the news business. Unfortunately, they are often in conflict with one another, and accuracy is sometimes sacrificed in the name of being first.
These are dangerous times to be a journalist.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, 15 journalists have been killed so far this year while 56 were murdered last year. Even more disturbing, the number of journalists killed in retaliation for their work, known as reprisal murders, nearly doubled in 2018.
