Newspapers and TV were much more limited and gated. I remember having no access to cable, and thus only 3 TV channels, and two "national" newspapers available easily.
So news was textual, and the TV news was only on at 7am, 6pm, 11pm.
Then came the rise of cable news, and 24 hours news. And they needed to have more news to fill the gaps.
So people turning molehills into mountains is a thing, misconstrued interpretation of actions, unproven allegations, and more is now far more common. And before a thing would vanish quickly from the news, but with 24 hour networks they would come back to it for months.
This took time to develop, so the 90s 24 hr news networks weren't like this instantly. They evolved into this.
Then came the internet. Twitter, facebook, etc. Now more news was needed.
From what I can see, this is a large part of the change.
And as an aside, quite literally "enemies of democracy" work to amplify this. And it's so easy to do.
Pick the nuttiest nut, the least tolerant of boneheads, and donate to their foundation or cause.
The nut doesn't need to even know, they are the ultimate "useful idiot", feed them and they grow into an influential nut.
Nation-states don't need to use bots, they can just donate to causes which cause the most internal friction. Then these characters run around, pointing out every flaw.
Comments
One thing though, one difference. The media.
Newspapers and TV were much more limited and gated. I remember having no access to cable, and thus only 3 TV channels, and two "national" newspapers available easily.
So news was textual, and the TV news was only on at 7am, 6pm, 11pm.
Then came the rise of cable news, and 24 hours news. And they needed to have more news to fill the gaps.
So people turning molehills into mountains is a thing, misconstrued interpretation of actions, unproven allegations, and more is now far more common. And before a thing would vanish quickly from the news, but with 24 hour networks they would come back to it for months.
This took time to develop, so the 90s 24 hr news networks weren't like this instantly. They evolved into this.
Then came the internet. Twitter, facebook, etc. Now more news was needed.
From what I can see, this is a large part of the change.
And as an aside, quite literally "enemies of democracy" work to amplify this. And it's so easy to do.
Pick the nuttiest nut, the least tolerant of boneheads, and donate to their foundation or cause.
The nut doesn't need to even know, they are the ultimate "useful idiot", feed them and they grow into an influential nut.
Nation-states don't need to use bots, they can just donate to causes which cause the most internal friction. Then these characters run around, pointing out every flaw.