Blog Transparency

by Don Harkey

There was an interesting article in the Life of Jason blog a few days ago on media ethics. I'll let you go to his site (after your done here) and read about the tea party event sponsored by KSGF. The article made me think about blogs and the purpose behind the blogs.

With the transformation that is occurring in the media, there are some concerns that sources of news will have less accountability to their readers/viewers. Many people claim to get their news from sources such as "the Daily Show" on Comedy Central or from a variety of blogs. The question that arises is whether or not these sources of information are impartial or even accurate.

Impartiality and even accuracy aren't as important as they used to be. Let me explain.

First of all, impartiality is NOT a requirement of the media (whether professional or independent). I once heard a media ethicist on the radio say that the media does not need to be impartial, they just need to be transparent. In other words, it is OK if Dan Rather REALLY wants Al Gore to win an election, it is just important that he is straightforward about it. KSGF's slogan is "Doing What is Right". Gee... I think they are aiming at delivering a conservative right-wing agenda.

The second part is accuracy. When media outlets begin reporting more on opinion, they tend to focus less on confirming facts. This is a natural transition, but it is easily countered by a simple fact. Information is readily available and people should simply not believe everything they read. When the major source of news was limited to a newspaper and 3 TV broadcasts, accuracy is tricky because the average media consumer can't check on the information easily. Today, it doesn't take much to at least put a question in your mind about a given fact. Snopes.com alone has gone a long way in convincing me that I will not be shot in Springfield if I flash my lights at a gang member and that tiny poisonous spiders do not live under my toilet seat. (Yes... I do feel relieved thank you very much!)

My message for people who follow blogs is to keep a heads up. Who is writing the blog? Why are they writing the blog? Is their information accurate? Take all of this into account and filter out the true value in the writing, whether it is opinion or entertainment or true expertise on a given topic. Its OK if the blogger has an agenda as long as the blogger is up front about it.

This is the true power of reading blogs. You can get a wider view of what is going on. You can collect more opinions on current events. You can begin to question the "conventional wisdom" that is out there and use the amount of information to form your own opinions. You can pull multiple accounts of an event and then gather your own view of what probably really happened.

I think that while newspapers and TV media pride themselves in accuracy, gathering news and information from multiple sources (including blogs) only improves the overall information accuracy and gives you a wider perspective!