Re:All models are wrong, but some are completely wrong
by hutzlibu on Sunday April 05, 2020 @05:09PM
(#22788749)
Well, also as a journalist you can not get away with making up stories. There was a recent case of a high class journalist, who did that and was caught.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claas_Relotius
But he did so very brutal so to say. The problem with journalism is mostly not straight lying, but missleading and bending the truth until it fits the agenda. So a classic journalist should not have another agenda than the truth. But this type seems to be very rare today.
Re:All models are wrong, but some are completely wrong
by DangitBobby on Sunday April 05, 2020 @06:23PM
(#22789239)
What you're saying is probably broadly speaking true for journalists in general. But what many people actually consume news-wise can only be compared on the surface to actual journalism. Consumers of this material have no interest in determining if what they're reading is true, and there are no consequences for those spreading misinformation while pretending to be journalists. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22784665
Re:All models are wrong, but some are completely wrong
by em500 on Sunday April 05, 2020 @06:49PM
(#22789387)
Best we can tell, Bloomberg's Chinese Big Hack story was completly made up, but it doesn't appear anyone involved suffered any consequences.
https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/10/04/editorial-a-year-...
Re:All models are wrong, but some are completely wrong
by MaxBarraclough on Monday April 06, 2020 @06:26AM
(#22792356)
> The problem is that these incentives for academics aren't created out of purity of heart, but because of the system to which they belong; you will no longer be highly read and cited once it is clear that your results can't be trusted.
That's a feature, not a bug. A system which depends on people being saints, isn't going to work.
> changing what kind of news people want to read is surely even harder than changing what kind of news journalists write and publishers publish
Agreed, I think that's the root here.
The problem is that these incentives for academics aren't created out of purity of heart, but because of the system to which they belong; you will no longer be highly read and cited once it is clear that your results can't be trusted. Unfortunately, this seems not to be true in journalism—you can purvey intentionally, and explicitly, wrong information, and it will still be consumed actively by those whose biases are confirmed by it. We can discuss how to change that, but changing what kind of news people want to read is surely even harder than changing what kind of news journalists write and publishers publish.