We need to go back to the regulated news model. I.e. when independent news organizations were mandated for broadcast channels.
Dry facts.
Balanced commentary.
They're doing it wrong if it's not boring, because it shouldn't be playing your emotions.
If the for-profit sector wants to continue to air partisan-pro-wrestling-masquerading-as-news... fine. But the average viewer/reader needs to have an easily accessible and comprehensive alternative.
Most countries have some form of this, but it needs to be recognized as a critical democratic institution in a post-gen-AI world, and funded as such.
There was never a regulated news model in the USA. For a while we did have the "Fairness Doctrine" under which the FCC required some radio and TV broadcasters to present balanced viewpoints as a condition of spectrum licenses. But that never applied to print media, cable channels, or online services.
If you want non-profit, government funded news then NPR and VOA exist. The quality is generally pretty good, although they're not free of bias either.
This perception of a dichotomy in news is a brain worm that needs to be excised from everyone's mind.
What's the "balanced" commentary for something like the JFK assassination, for example?
LHO was the lone gunman who shot the president because LHO was a communist.
LHO was the lone gunman who shot the president because LHO was crazy.
LHO was the lone gunman who shot the president because the CIA paid him to (and then killed him).
LHO was a patsie and the president was shot by a second gunman from the grassy knoll because the CIA wanted to invade Cuba.
Off the top of my head those are the stories that would need "balanced commentary".
News organization don't need to be unbiased and they don't need to be balanced. What they need is a to stop catering to rabid political fanbases who've got involved in the team sport of politics not out of some sense of civic duty to their fellow man but out of loneliness and a need to belong[1]. News organizations are the mirror reflecting us, not the other way around.
Balanced means making the strongest argument in favor of a position.
Or, as the HN guidelines put it: "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith."https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Balance critically does not mean making disingenuous straw man or strong man arguments to advance a specific agenda.
Which is the guise it usually appears in today.
E.g. 'parineum is against balance in news because they believe there is one truth and other ideas shouldn't be given merit'
vs
'parineum is concerned about the de facto realization of balance as a covering for expressedly partisan viewpoints, themselves stemming from and catering to the polarization of a poorly informed audience'
One of those presupposes the answer. The other makes me curious and has multiple answers.
Making a bad argument on behalf of a group you dislike isn't balance. Making the strongest argument and debating it is.
Comments
We need to go back to the regulated news model. I.e. when independent news organizations were mandated for broadcast channels.
Dry facts.
Balanced commentary.
They're doing it wrong if it's not boring, because it shouldn't be playing your emotions.
If the for-profit sector wants to continue to air partisan-pro-wrestling-masquerading-as-news... fine. But the average viewer/reader needs to have an easily accessible and comprehensive alternative.
Most countries have some form of this, but it needs to be recognized as a critical democratic institution in a post-gen-AI world, and funded as such.
There was never a regulated news model in the USA. For a while we did have the "Fairness Doctrine" under which the FCC required some radio and TV broadcasters to present balanced viewpoints as a condition of spectrum licenses. But that never applied to print media, cable channels, or online services.
If you want non-profit, government funded news then NPR and VOA exist. The quality is generally pretty good, although they're not free of bias either.
Even if this were mandated/accomplished, it still wouldn't solve the coverage bias issue, which is a large part of the problem.
Absolutely, but not-for-profit and for-profit have substantially different starting levels of bias.
That not-for-profit still needs to guard against it isn't a reason that we can't immediately improve on the low bar that is for-profit news.
This perception of a dichotomy in news is a brain worm that needs to be excised from everyone's mind.
What's the "balanced" commentary for something like the JFK assassination, for example?
LHO was the lone gunman who shot the president because LHO was a communist. LHO was the lone gunman who shot the president because LHO was crazy. LHO was the lone gunman who shot the president because the CIA paid him to (and then killed him). LHO was a patsie and the president was shot by a second gunman from the grassy knoll because the CIA wanted to invade Cuba.
Off the top of my head those are the stories that would need "balanced commentary".
News organization don't need to be unbiased and they don't need to be balanced. What they need is a to stop catering to rabid political fanbases who've got involved in the team sport of politics not out of some sense of civic duty to their fellow man but out of loneliness and a need to belong[1]. News organizations are the mirror reflecting us, not the other way around.
[1] https://www.realclearpolicy.com/articles/2020/03/20/the_lone...
Balanced means making the strongest argument in favor of a position.
Or, as the HN guidelines put it: "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Balance critically does not mean making disingenuous straw man or strong man arguments to advance a specific agenda.
Which is the guise it usually appears in today.
E.g. 'parineum is against balance in news because they believe there is one truth and other ideas shouldn't be given merit'
vs
'parineum is concerned about the de facto realization of balance as a covering for expressedly partisan viewpoints, themselves stemming from and catering to the polarization of a poorly informed audience'
One of those presupposes the answer. The other makes me curious and has multiple answers.
Making a bad argument on behalf of a group you dislike isn't balance. Making the strongest argument and debating it is.