By: Bernard Savonet

Bernard Savonet — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 21:05:33 +0000

Good ideas, specially having the stream running permanently.
However the post concentrates on speed and dismisses checking the information.
As a former journalist, I am really scared at the way most people trust what they get from their screen: “it comes thru the Internet so it is true…”
So I personally believe that journalists, and specifically info on TV, MUST stick to their role of media-teers, and must help everybody to evaluate the information.
It was said that most Intelligence Agencies were rating the info they received, giving a grade to the information as well as to the source… computers canNot do better and we should take some ideas from there.
The common belief that a high-digged info can be trusted more than a less-digged one is somehow entrenched deep in our cells… until our brain questions that and sees that digg number is NOT a measure of trust, even if we think that it is nit manipulable.
If our only info sources were Tweeter… sure it would be fast… but would it be better?
I think that the main issue is the balance of power: if press is fast and trustable, we can trust it to deliver trustable info in due time; in some countries however, press is totally under government control, whether visibly or not. Even Western countries are not innocent of this problem.
So when the press and traditional info sources are not playing their roles, Tweeter and the like are great tools to provide “other sources”, forcing the info to reach a max of people… and somehow helping traditional media, even if they are in close control from some powers: these powers, whether they like it or not, will have to release some control if they want the media they control to keep some credibility…
We can see that info is coming now to us in several layers:
- speed and lack of control with tweeter, the blogs and the Internet at large
- more qualified and sourced information with traditional media on their internet sites, which can follow the speed of the stream BUT at the same time giving an evaluation
- printed form later, after some synthesis has been elaborated.

Comments on: Twitter and social media against traditional media: May not be the right debate, after all…

By: Bernard Savonet