Apr 10
Screw Fair. Screw Balanced While You’re At It.
This isn’t the place for politics, so suffice it to say that I disagree with the general ‘tone’ of the Fox news channel. Their easily mocked slogan ‘Fair and Balanced’ seems to be the topic of Moorgard’s most recent post, though, and it seemed appropriate here.
Raph made a statement in a post on his site, saying:
The days of letting facts be reported without comment seems to be dwindling… and while it opens up lots of questions about whether we’ll ever see truly unbiased reporting, it does mean that perhaps less facts will pass by unexamined. And that would be a good thing.
Moorgard responds (there, and on his own site):
Good lord, I’m not sure I could disagree more. How is the average person supposed to know what voices to trust? Part of the problem in today’s society is that media consumers latch on to magnetic voices and start believing everything they say rather than thinking for themselves. Cable news is a joke. The FCC only cares about censoring smut, not monitoring fairness. The media needs its Murrows, those select individuals who meticulously stick to the facts. The voice of true objectivity is often the most valuable voice of all.
As Moorgard himself puts it, I get ‘kinda fired up’ about issues like this, and so feel the need to put in my own two cents.
The fact that I get to raise my voice on this matter is of no consequence in the country we live in. I’m afforded the basic rights of free speech; moreover, I can be an asshat and say any damn thing on the internet I want. I have to face the consequences of my statements, of course, but with that caveat in place I can freely admit to my adoration of Seasons 3 through 6 of the Gilmore Girls … purely as a theoretical example.
In the gaming news space (the focus of my professional and private efforts for more than a year now), this has resulted in a very mixed bag. Unbiased reporting is far and away the preferred method of news consumption among the gaming hardcore. Sites like Kotaku and Destructoid fuel the interests of their readers with a little bit of personality to go with their crunchy news nougat. (It’s a lot like Fox News, actually, though I like Brian Crecente a hell of a lot more than Sean Hannity.)
Though I don’t have any hard numbers to prove this in front of me, comments and conversations would lead me to believe that more straight-laced news sites like Gamespot are feeling the heat. They’ve incorporated personality driven elements into their coverage (like the recent ‘four hours with Paper Mario‘), and are now pushing a reality television venture. The blogs of Stephen Totilo and N’Gai Croal have been getting a lot of positive attention, suggesting that even mainstream media sees the benefits of the personal touch to game news consumption.
Now certainly, I think hard news sites will continue to be a staple of reporting on all mediums, but I tend to agree with Raph that there’s going to be a lot more of this ‘reporting with a bias’ going on. I also tend to agree with Moorgard; the most well-funded voices are the ones that are heard the loudest. I’m a pretty cynical guy, but it’s hard not to be when this is one of the weightiest voices in gaming news. People have a hard time distinguishing the chaff from the wheat.
All that said … screw em’ if they can’t take it. The modern world is an informationally vicious place. I’m not really all that proud of this, but I don’t really read books anymore … yet I know I’m reading and learning more on a daily basis than when I was chewing through 300 pages titles in a single day. I think it’s unbelievably shitty that the average person can’t keep up with the sheer amount of information. I really do. I think it sucks that people just latch onto ‘magnetic voices’ and stick with them. But if that’s what people choose to do, that’s what they choose to do.
I choose to be informed. I choose to tap directly into the firehose at full throttle, and I love getting my information in opinionated chunks. To stick with game news, if a big announcement comes out I probably read the personal commentary on it from over a dozen people. I think that’s terrific! I come to my own conclusions, but at least I have something to compare it to.
To get a little GitS on you, if we’re going to be swimming in an ever-deeper ’sea of information’ we need to get used to it. Twenty years ago my parents lived in a comparative desert, waiting days just to find out what had happened in their own back yard. Whether you choose to stay in the shallow end of the pool and tread water with IGN and Fox News or head out and risk getting bitten by sources like Destructoid or Wonkette, at least you’re swimming.
I’m a futurist in most senses of the word, and as a result I love that we’re living in a time where we’re finally having to deal with the really strong waves of culture shock. Instant communications, blogging, and PC software are all harsh to some degree. Most people are grappling over things like stem cells or robotics … I’m really only cranky about the damned kids and their text messaging. Either way, it’s 2007. One of next year’s presidential candidates is using Twitter to get out the vote, and all of them have MySpace pages. I think we’re past worrying about accountability and fairness in the media. That ship has sailed.
Your choices are now clear: grumpily cross your arms and wait for ‘the voice of true objectivity’, or swim and hope you don’t get bitten. Have some water wings, and good luck.
3 comments3 Comments so far
that’s all well & good (so to speak) for those of us older than, say, 21, who have hopefully developed enough brains to sort through the trash to get to the treasure (and, of course, each person’s definition of those two is their own & no one else’s); however, for the generations that are yet to arrive, yours is a remarkably selfish & irresponsible position – without some appreciation for the importance of plainly finding and recording the facts, so that all is not simply opinion, we will eventually become unaccustomed, and even unable, to do so.
where would we be, for example, without the Dictionary?
if the only way i could define a word and its possible meaning was to go and ask any number of people what they think it means, it might be incredibly entertaining, but would it help me reach a real understanding of the word itself? perhaps.
when someone gives their viewpoint but are not encouraged to disclose why they feel the way they do, and are not held accountable for presenting the possibility that another viewpoint may be somewhat valid, then you have Fox News.
they might be right about everything they say, but how can i decide if i agree?
should i just use my gut (shout-out to Mr. Colbert), or my mind?
well, if there are other viewpoints that effectively counter the first, then i don’t really have any to compare it to.
on the other hand, if i am forced to wade thru a sea of opposing opinions, i may eventually forget what i was trying to understand in the first place.
forgive me for saying so, but it seems an important, and difficult issue, and your ‘answer’ to it seems flippant and underdeveloped.
and to think, this was about videogaming journalism!
As I said in the post above, I think there will always be a market for a ‘just the faqs, m’am’ kind of news broadcast. And I do mean market, because NBC, ABC … even the BBC has a slant to their news. It’s just less obvious than on, say, Wonkette.
I guess I don’t understand why it’s selfish or irresponsible to embrace the direction things are going to go anyway? We can stand here and shake our fist at the damn kids with their blogs and their opinions, but … yeah, that ship has sailed. My impression is that a lot of the folks in the ‘generations yet to arrive’ you mention are already getting their news from a very biased source: their pal’s MySpace page, or a buddy’s blog. This news, specifically, is a very focused news topic: George’s success in sports, or Virginia’s latest crush. Just the same, it’s priming them for expecting the same kind of tone from other information sources.
That’s a market, right there, and the nature of capitalism (and America in particular) is that if there is a market it will be filled.
To be kind of crass (and I certainly mean no offense) if you’re having trouble ‘wading through opinions’, then you need to stay in the shallows. Stick to one of the big news sites for your information, and don’t try heading out to ’sea’.
If you can handle the deep water, though, I say why the hell not? It’s pretty damned exciting out in the far end of the pool.
My problem with your vision of the Brave New World of News is the time investment required to go “swimming in the deep end.” It’s your job to trek out into the wild and wooly reaches of information on the Internet. You can afford to wallow in the many and varied Fonts of Opinionated Knowledge. Just by doing what you’re paid to do, you get exposed to enough differing points of view that you can piece together the nonsense into something that makes sense for you.
Me, it’s not my job to read everyone and their brother’s blog about all topics imaginable. The time in my day allows me to pick maybe one or two places from which to get news. Therefore, I’d like to find my news as unvarnished as possible. I don’t want to get all my news from someplace I completely disagree with, obviously. Neither do I want all my news from somewhere that is completely in accordance with all my personal opinions. That kind of thing leads to Dittoheads, for cryin’ out loud!
So I’d get off your high-horse about the shallows and the deep end. For many people, the choice between them isn’t a matter of personal mental and intestinal fortitude as you seem to indicate. It’s a simple matter of time. Plunging into the deep end is a luxury, sir.