This week’s reading, Managing News as a Conversation, in Journalism Next by Mark Briggs discusses the socialization of news and how that’s good for journalists and journalism. Briggs says among others, retired washingtonpost.com editor, Doug Feaver supports “the anonymous, unmoderated, often appallingly inaccurate, sometimes profane, frequently off point and occasionally racist reader comments that washingtonpost.com allows to be published at the end of articles and blogs.” Look at comments sections of washingtonpost.com and your favorite news site. Do you agree these comment sections advance conversations among members of the public? Do you think these public comments can have a chilling effect on the work produced by journalists? Explain your answers.
Don’t forget to post your responses by Tuesday 11/19 @11:59p.
I think that the comment sections on websites such as washingtonpost.com or other news websites are a good way to advance conversations among members of the public. I think that these comments encourage debate and expression among people. It encourages them to become educated on political and other important news issues. I think that the comment section allows for average people to inform and express their opinions. I view it as practicing the First Amendment to the fullest of its potential: Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Press. I think that the comment section can have negative and positive effects on the work produced by the journalist. It allows for a journalist to get feedback on their work and see who is responding to what articles. This will give them more insight into what the public is reading and interested in. However, I think that the comments could lessen the impact of an important point or article. I find the comments sometimes more interesting and entertaining the actual article. I would get the jist of what the article if about and not read it in its entirety. Then, the sometimes uneducated comments and opinions are what I would skip to for amusement. I agree with Briggs and I think that the socialization of news is a good thing. However, the public must understand that getting information from these comments is far from credible. For the journalist, it is good feedback, and for journalism, it allows people to actively participate and share their opinions.
As I’ve said in the past two weeks, I do not think that open comment sections on news sites are productive. It is not good for journalism OR journalists.
As I looked at washingtonpost.com, most of the comments don’t address the journalist in any way, which was expected. Furthermore, it was just a for users to spew their opinions, as I saw NO open minded conversation. The public does not take advantage of these comment sections to advance conversation, but rather to further cement their own personal beliefs and support those that agree with them.
I did, however, see one beneficial use to comments. In a story on a shooting, the reporter had incorrectly identified the borough where the shooting had occurred and two citizens corrected him. Yet, the story was not corrected yet. If it isn’t corrected, it just goes to show that journalists are not paying any attention to these comments, and their only purpose is to give audiences a motivation to read stories. Frankly, I see them merely as a gimmick.
Overall, I think the socialization of news is good for journalists and journalism. There will always be negative and antagonistic people making ridiculous comments, but that’s bound to happen when everyone is free to speak. I looked over the comments sections of a few articles from different news websites; some of them were intelligent and insightful, some were reactionary, and a few were xenophobic, racist, conspiratorial, etc. The comments sections can still be useful, but I’m not sure if journalists actually engage with their audiences in the ways that Briggs describes. Virtually all of the online comments I’ve read are directed at the article, an issue, a scapegoat or another commenter, rather than the journalist who wrote the article. I don’t imagine that many journalists really respond to the comments about their articles. The good side to this is that online comments definitely don’t have a chilling effect on the work journalists produce. Most journalists won’t care what random, anonymous readers have to say about their articles; it’s not going to stop them from pursuing a story. Positive comments from informed readers may even help journalists get ideas for new stories and different angles to cover. The popularity of comments sections on news sites shows that the public wants to participate in discussion and production of journalism. This explains why the use of user-generated content has risen. News organizations can incorporate user-generated content into their stories, but the comments sections usually aren’t the best places to draw this content from.
I feel as though interaction with journalists and their work via comment sections is a way to increase readership and promote visitors to one’s blog or website. However, their relevance to the news itself is debatable.
One argument often used is the idea that occasionally a journalist will have a factual flaw in their story that someone in the comments will point out and correct. However, this could also be done via personal letter or email to the journalist, and the chances of the journalist actually scrolling through hundreds of comments to even find it in the first place is unlikely. So for me, that argument falls through as being faulty.
Another thing they say is that it encourages engagement with the article, but even speaking for myself, the draw is not in what the journalist has written but rather what the commentators say. If there is a controversial article – whether it be about Miley Cyrus or marijuana legalization – I will read a few lines, then instantly scroll down to read the arguments about Obama, racism, and the existence of God that people are inevitably having in the comments. It serves as a distraction, and the noise the commentators make usually outweigh the journalist’s sole voice of authority.
I do think that comments allow for people to feel more engaged in what they are reading and result in more views and more readers. However, I am very tempted to put a comments section in the same category as clean formatting, an attractive page design, and informal writing styles: useful to gain traffic, not necessarily a reflection on the quality of journalism itself.