Despite a change of leadership in the White House, as well as recent efforts by Big Tech to monitor social media and establish protocols to boost media literacy and fight disinformation online, journalists say the “fake news” problem isn’t going away and continues to plague the news industry, according to research released by Chicago-based B2B communications agency Greentarget.
Greentarget’s annual report, which surveyed journalists to analyze their sentiments surrounding the fake news phenomenon as well as what effects it’s had on their profession, found that journalists aren’t feeling much better than they were a year ago about the fake news phenomenon. 84 percent of journalists currently agree that fake news has negatively impacted their profession, compared to 80 percent who’d reported this sentiment for Greentarget’s previous report on the topic last year.
One in five journalists surveyed (20 percent) said they believe recent media literacy efforts have had no impact when it comes to lessening the spread of fake news, and only six percent think Big Tech’s monitoring of social media has had a significant impact on the problem.
Complicating the issue is the notion that journalists appear to disagree on the meaning of the term itself: 41 percent of journalists said that when they hear the phrase “fake news,” they consider the term to be a reference to traditional or qualified news sources, compared to 38 percent who said it refers to sites specializing in misinformation, disinformation and propaganda.
Journalists widely believe that false and misleading news is something they and their colleagues have an ethical responsibility to fight: 93 percent said journalists are best positioned to vet and identify fake news, compared to 85 percent last year. Unfortunately, only 39 percent believe their efforts have had a moderate impact on lessening the spread of fake news, and only 14 percent believe their efforts have made a significant impact.
Greentarget’s second annual Fake News report surveyed 103 working journalists online between July and August. More than a third of the journalists surveyed (35 percent) reported working in the profession for more than 20 years.
Trump Media & Technology Group today reported a $58.2M net loss on $4.1M in 2023 revenues, a disclosure that drove its stock price down 22.6 percent to $47.96.
Barry Pollack, an attorney at Wall Street’s Harris St. Laurent & Wechsler, has registered Julian Assange as a client with the Justice Dept. “out of an abundance of caution.”
Paramount Global to slash 800 jobs in what chief executive Bob Bakish calls part of an effort to “return the company to earnings growth"... Rolling Stone editor-in-chief Noah Shachtman is exiting at the end of the month due to disagreements with chief executive Gus Wenner over the direction the magazine is taking... The New York Times broke the $1 billion barrier in annual revenue from digital subscriptions in 2023... Press Forward is investing more than $500 million to strengthen local newsrooms.
The majority of news articles are read within the first three days of publication, according to a recent report.
The Los Angeles Times gives pink slips to 115 people or 20 percent of its newsroom staff... TIME is also laying off about 30 employees, which is approximately 15 percent of its editorial staff... The Baltimore Banner, which was launched by Stewart Bainum in 2022 after he failed to buy the Baltimore Sun, added 500 subscribers per day in the three days following Sinclair Broadcast Group's deal to purchase the Sun.
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Nov. 4, 2021, by Joe Honick
There can be not a single question of the dangers inherent in the phoney stuff being dished out as news and information from the well financed and powerful insistent outfits who put this crap on the internet, television and elsewhere. We saw some of it conspicuously and cleverly in the PR campaign stuff from the Trump election campaign, stuff that was massively repeated repeatedly to the point "big lies" became useful for getting believers, as we now see with such a vast percentage of Republicans believing the delusional one still to be president.
Fake or simply lies have always been with us just before, during and since WWll. With media staffs being chopped to bits, who and how will all that detective and enforcement work take place....especailly when survival for many generally decent reporters may be "encouraged" to join the nasties with money. After all, Murdoch happily flings millions to the questionable hate mongers like Carlson, Hannity and goodness knows how many other elsewhere?