I’ve been following, with interest, the recent flap sparked by this Jan. 12 column by New York Times public editor (ombudsman), Arthur Brisbane: Should The Times Be a Truth Vigilante?
Brisbane asked NYT readers: “I’m looking for reader input on whether and when New York Times news reporters should challenge ‘facts’ that are asserted by newsmakers they write about.”
This led to consternation from many Times readers, who believed this kind of revelation is part of the basic job of any news organization. GigaOm’s Mathew Ingram offered a good roundup of the flap, and at The Guardian Clay Shirky wrote an eloquent deeper exploration of the mindset disconnect between the Times and its readers.
Many people are debating the ethical implications of this issue. However, I’m wondering about the practicalities and possible opportunities.
If the NYT (or any news organization) does decide to point out when sources offer inaccurate “facts,” HOW might they accomplish that? Might there be good options, especially online, that could serve this purpose in addition to inserting relevant text into stories?…
I’m wondering about tools that might visually or otherwise flag to a web reader when a factual assertion has caveats — such as it’s probably not true, or could be stretching the point, or is a conflation, or lack corroboration or sourcing, etc.
It just seems to me that especially in digital media we might be able to do with some of the nuances of gradations of truth in ways that go beyond mere words on a page.
Your thoughts? Please comment below or e-mail me. Offer examples of potential strategies or tools, if you know of any. I plan to use this information in a post to the Knight Digital Media Center site, so expect to be quoted.
Thanks!
Hi Amy,
Good question, thanks for bringing it up.
TruthSquad.com provides a platform that could be used for what you’re looking for. We’re open sourcing the code at GitHub, if anyone wants to adapt it for the purposes you describe.
Also look up the work that Dan Schultz is doing at MIT with Truth Goggles, if you haven’t already. And Dan Whaley’s Hypothes.is peer annotation system also looks promising. Neither will be available for a year, but worth watching.
From my perspective the first question is “How do we define ‘fact’.”
Some possible answers:
- Convergent validity – look for agreement between two ‘different’ sources. Different meaning different agendas, different political philosophies
- Peer review
- Is it replicable?
- Is it statistically significant – meaning is the occurrence of an event something that would happen under average circumstances or is it so unusual it suggests there were one of more factors that truly caused it.
Organizational changes that could support greater confidence in the news:
- Use fact checkers
- Make it clear when information is based on a single source or is based on anecdote
- don’t run pictures, videos and diagrams from suspicious sources
- Fire reporters who knowingly falsified stories
- Turn credibility and availability of evidence into a marketing asset.
- Pay or come up with another incentive for readers who can PROVE a parts of a story are incorrect
I personally prefer finding ways to offer incentives for finding facts rather than punishing reporters. I think reporters are already under enough stress doing their daily jobs. And the point isn’t to shame people who make mistakes but to reward outside sources if they can prove what is true.
It also encourage the public to be more involved in the news and I imagine it’s cheaper to reward a citizen who can prove a fact than to have people on staff whose jobs are to do fact checking.
Some grist for the mill.