Quote:
Originally Posted by Cowboy89
I think the real problem is that we rely on the media to form opinions on just about anything. At my company whenever we release a quarterly report the media seems to really jump on and magnify issues that have little importance and totally miss what really needs to be taken away (both negative and positive).
The real problem is that the person or people who write the stories, interview people, and then tell the world are probably the ones that know the least about what's going on. You have to actually be in the trenches, on the street and part of what's going on to understand and even then the intellectual or physical bias of the person sinks into the coverage. This is why I take anything that comes from any news source (independent or mainstream) with a grain of salt.
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And I'd add to that the complete assault on the term "fact" in the last decade and what it means to accountability and trust in the medai.
These guys earn salary like anyone else ... they can't afford to be last to the trough with news items and with that you get mistakes. It's not the Times versus the Post anymore, it's the Times versus cable news, local news, and internet blogs to be the one to release stories.
The problem with that is you get two handling of a fact.
1. A person says something somewhere quoting someone else (usually the net) and voila it's a fact ... when really it's never been anything more than an urban legend that's been passed on over and over again.
2. You get filters. Some media agencies will jump hard on a fact (and they're all guilty of it) that fits their desire for a story, but ignore the fact if it doesn't fit with their preconceived belief in the topic.
The result is a victimized average Joe who's likely quite tired of it all.