This is good thinking, but I worry that implementation is going to run into major difficulties.
Having a journalist who does this has only a little value, but even having one journalist is actually kind of hard. The journalist will need to have support from his editor and the institution as a whole, both of which will need to accept the hit to respectability that will come from the perception that they promote cranks and conspiracy theorists. Hard to pull off. There are already people who are famous for interviewing contrarians and outsiders (this is Joe Rogan’s whole schtick), but that fact is precisely what keeps them from being taken seriously.
This sounds like a neat idea, and it would probably work for a small user base like LW or (tentatively) HN. But if it grew much beyond that size the political pressure on it would become extremely distorting. The object lesson of political fact-checking sites is illustrative here: there were a few weeks in which they were genuinely useful and non-partisan, before partisan tribal pressures turned them into a punchline.
Do the mainstream journalists only misrepresent “cranks and conspiracy theorists” and interview everyone else fairly; or is it more like they misrepresent pretty much everyone, but most people are misinterpreted in non-hostile ways so they don’t mind much (maybe enough to refuse another interview, but not enough to sue)?
My impression (and brief personal experience) suggests that a typical journalist pretty much misrepresents everyone and everything, but it is a misinterpretation in random direction, so usually not very bad, just… needless and confusing. More precisely, I believe that a typical journalist already has the whole story written before they interview you, and they are just fishing for a quote which taken out of context would support the story. However, their story usually does not needlessly make you a bad guy; it’s just a combination of their stereotypes, and minor exaggerations they believe will be interesting to the reader.
If this model is essentially correct, then you could have a journalist that only interviews non-controversial people, but builds a prestige of interviewing without misrepresenting (kinda like Joe Rogan, but avoids controversial people).
In Slovakia, there is a journalist who started his career just like this: he was writing blogs containing interviews with various people, providing the video within the text, so that everyone would see it’s the same, only perhaps edited for greater legibility. His blog on a major newspaper’s website was very popular; then the newspaper hired him. (He avoids interviewing too controversial people.)
I agree that journalists misrepresent everyone; I disagree that the direction is mostly random, and it’s not random precisely because “a typical journalist already has the whole story written before they interview you”. In politically-charged situations (a category which includes an ever-growing number of things), this means that an interviewee who is on the same side as the journalist will get favorable representation, while an interviewee on the opposite side will get unfavorable representation. When writing about topics on which there is no particular political orthodoxy, the errors will be mostly random.
You could interview fairly but non-controversially, but this limits you to areas where there is not yet any widespread controversy, a small and shrinking territory.
Also, wouldn’t avoiding controversial figures be the opposite of helpful if you are trying to get new information out. Seems to not solve the problem of getting legible expertise that is contrary to popular opinion into the marketplace.
Also, wouldn’t avoiding controversial figures be the opposite of helpful if you are trying to get new information out.
Uh, depends on how exactly you set the controvery threshold. I didn’t mean literally zero-controversy topics (these are quite rare recently), but rather something like: “Alex Jones—definitely no; Donald Trump—probably yes”. It would probably be better described as staying within the Overton window.
I mean, I don’t like Trump, but giving him dozen questions and then literally writing what he answered without twisting his words… that seems like, dunno, basic human decency. (Especially if I add the disclaimer “I interviewed, but his opinions are his own”.) Yet somehow journalists seem to fail at this.
Also, there are all kinds of information that journalists report on incorrectly, not just controversies.
It would probably be better described as staying within the Overton window.
It’s a different name, but by definition, this standard means you are not getting new, unorthodox opinions to the public.
OP was trying to figure out how to have respectability follow ‘rightness’. Only talking to people who are already respectable doesn’t help that at all.
This is good thinking, but I worry that implementation is going to run into major difficulties.
Having a journalist who does this has only a little value, but even having one journalist is actually kind of hard. The journalist will need to have support from his editor and the institution as a whole, both of which will need to accept the hit to respectability that will come from the perception that they promote cranks and conspiracy theorists. Hard to pull off. There are already people who are famous for interviewing contrarians and outsiders (this is Joe Rogan’s whole schtick), but that fact is precisely what keeps them from being taken seriously.
This sounds like a neat idea, and it would probably work for a small user base like LW or (tentatively) HN. But if it grew much beyond that size the political pressure on it would become extremely distorting. The object lesson of political fact-checking sites is illustrative here: there were a few weeks in which they were genuinely useful and non-partisan, before partisan tribal pressures turned them into a punchline.
Do the mainstream journalists only misrepresent “cranks and conspiracy theorists” and interview everyone else fairly; or is it more like they misrepresent pretty much everyone, but most people are misinterpreted in non-hostile ways so they don’t mind much (maybe enough to refuse another interview, but not enough to sue)?
My impression (and brief personal experience) suggests that a typical journalist pretty much misrepresents everyone and everything, but it is a misinterpretation in random direction, so usually not very bad, just… needless and confusing. More precisely, I believe that a typical journalist already has the whole story written before they interview you, and they are just fishing for a quote which taken out of context would support the story. However, their story usually does not needlessly make you a bad guy; it’s just a combination of their stereotypes, and minor exaggerations they believe will be interesting to the reader.
If this model is essentially correct, then you could have a journalist that only interviews non-controversial people, but builds a prestige of interviewing without misrepresenting (kinda like Joe Rogan, but avoids controversial people).
In Slovakia, there is a journalist who started his career just like this: he was writing blogs containing interviews with various people, providing the video within the text, so that everyone would see it’s the same, only perhaps edited for greater legibility. His blog on a major newspaper’s website was very popular; then the newspaper hired him. (He avoids interviewing too controversial people.)
I agree that journalists misrepresent everyone; I disagree that the direction is mostly random, and it’s not random precisely because “a typical journalist already has the whole story written before they interview you”. In politically-charged situations (a category which includes an ever-growing number of things), this means that an interviewee who is on the same side as the journalist will get favorable representation, while an interviewee on the opposite side will get unfavorable representation. When writing about topics on which there is no particular political orthodoxy, the errors will be mostly random.
You could interview fairly but non-controversially, but this limits you to areas where there is not yet any widespread controversy, a small and shrinking territory.
I hesitate to bring this up since politics, but in the US it is a very common perception that the media is liberally biased.
And the fact that certain stories are almost exclusively discussed in certain outlets based on politics makes me think that it is not random error.
https://ground.news/blindspot
Also, wouldn’t avoiding controversial figures be the opposite of helpful if you are trying to get new information out. Seems to not solve the problem of getting legible expertise that is contrary to popular opinion into the marketplace.
I like this!
Uh, depends on how exactly you set the controvery threshold. I didn’t mean literally zero-controversy topics (these are quite rare recently), but rather something like: “Alex Jones—definitely no; Donald Trump—probably yes”. It would probably be better described as staying within the Overton window.
I mean, I don’t like Trump, but giving him dozen questions and then literally writing what he answered without twisting his words… that seems like, dunno, basic human decency. (Especially if I add the disclaimer “I interviewed, but his opinions are his own”.) Yet somehow journalists seem to fail at this.
Also, there are all kinds of information that journalists report on incorrectly, not just controversies.
It’s a different name, but by definition, this standard means you are not getting new, unorthodox opinions to the public.
OP was trying to figure out how to have respectability follow ‘rightness’. Only talking to people who are already respectable doesn’t help that at all.