With the advent of citizen journalism and free, easy-to-use online publishing tools, media consumers have an infinite number of places to go for information. We can read blogs, subscribe to podcasts, follow people on Twitter and tune in to YouTube. But even with these changes in our midst, I’ve been under the impression that one thing remains true, and that’s this: Mainstream media outlets are still held to a higher standard of truth and accuracy than that guy who writes a blog from his basement.
But maybe not so much.
If you missed the news about Entrepreneur magazine this year, Folio blogger Dylan Stableford provides a good summary:
http://www.foliomag.com/2009/do-publishers-owe-it-their-readers-ensure-accuracy-what-they-publish
And as he notes, in the court documents, Entrepreneur argued that it is “under no duty to provide information with care to its readers.” Hmmm. Maybe the magazine is just trying to save itself legally, but I still can’t help but question whether I will continue reading this publication.
Ultimately, though, the question is: How do we know which media outlets we can truly trust? Can you trust any of them? Share your thoughts … The conversation is open.
I will check the folio article when I get a chance. And I know it may not relate directly to this, but I find bias a big factor in what media information I trust.
Since accuracy relies heavily on perspective, doesn’t that make ALL medias biased, “mainstream” or not?
And if ALL media outlets are biased, doesn’t that mean the LEAST trustworthy ones are those claiming to NOT be biased (a common claim especially made by large mainstream media outlets)?
Although blogs are seldom good primary sources of information, I generally tend to trust them because I know the author’s biases BEFORE reading their posts.
As for major mainstream media, I tend to follow the BBC, alJazeera and Xinhua on a regular bases to counter the subtle bias American media doesn’t even realize it dispenses.