All I know is what’s on the Internet: The crisis of news media in 2016

For many years, digital media and technology have continued to evolve with globalism at its core. Whilst the election of Donald Trump and Britain’s vote to leave the EU are undoubtedly backlashes against globalisation, this evolution has yet to falter. With both stories set to dominate news cycles for the coming years, it begs the question; just how has the media landscape changed over this tumultuous period?

‘Populism’ and ‘post-truth politics’ are the buzzwords attempting to sum up the new political precedent. Both Trump and the Leave campaign have engaged in pseudo-reality rhetoric to appeal to the emotions of the disenfranchised. Brexit’s biggest myth claiming that Britain sends ￡350 million a week to the European Union was believed by nearly half of the British public, according to Ipsos MORI. Despite promises to recoup that money to use on the NHS being a major part of the campaign, the entire claim was retracted the morning of the referendum result.

In a post-truth world the priority lies in traction. Once viral, it is usually too late to dispel misinformation. The media’s role here is paradoxical. As one of the key institutions rebuked by the anti-establishment post-truthers it exists as both an enemy and a vessel. Donald Trump’s ongoing feud with the media has existed throughout his campaign yet the same press coverage brought him to such political prominence.

For both votes, two popular (yet conflicting) narratives have been that the result is either a) due to classic newspaper-led propaganda, or b) due to the weakening influence of traditional media leadership. It’s true that as digital platforms and social media continue to emerge as a common news source, print now trails behind online and TV. However, it is not as black-and-white as these two schools of thought seem to suggest.

Information is more accessible than ever before. But in this new age of distribution, digital platforms are driving us all into echo chambers?—?potentially distorting our worldview. Tailored social media feeds constructed through human and algorithmic biases are constantly reinforcing our existing beliefs. Be it from filter bubbles and targeted messaging, to the content shared online within your network?—?social media companies are providing users with less and less information to challenge their existing views. Though this applies to all ends of the political spectrum, it begins to illustrate just how much the absence of impartial discourse polarises a “post-truth” society.

It has been a critical time in Silicon Valley. Facebook’s continued growth has now reached worryingly high levels. The social network’s third quarter earnings show a $7 billion revenue and 1.79 billion monthly users. In light of this, it’s extensive influence and relentless quest for control has called for major scrutiny. After a controversy-filled 2016, one thing is clear?—?the company that repeatedly claims not to be a media company is now of the largest and most powerful media companies in the world.

Facebook’s campaign for world domination can be seen through both their failed Free Basics venture in India (which was accused of digital colonialism) and their plans to work on a censorship tool in collaboration with the Chinese government to enable them to re-enter the market. But in the West, debate around censorship has been a consistent issue for the company all year (see Napalm girl).

Here you find the dangerous element central to their business model; Facebook only shows you what they think you need to know. Algorithms rank posts based on what they think you will find worthwhile. Once it was revealed that it was in fact human editors behind the ‘trending’ news section, the company fired the team, leaving the algorithm to run loose. Within days Facebook was trending fake news.

In August, The New York Times reported that Facebook had labeled users by political leanings. Users were identified as liberal, moderate, conservative etc. based on their activity on the site. Such activity could be as definitive as liking a politician’s page or as ambiguous as shared interests with other users who have self-identified their political beliefs. All this information is exploited to generate ad revenue with political campaigns using this data to target ads to specific demographics.

Facebook continued to claim to be apolitical when earlier this year it was accused of suppressing conservative news. But it is now impossible to ignore the influential role the site has in the distribution of political news and creation of political echo chambers. With research showing the service as the primary source of news online for its users, Facebook cannot continue to deny its involvement in creating a misinformed electorate.

Much attention has been paid to fake news and its potential impact on the outcome of the US election. False articles such as Hillary Clinton selling weapons to ISIS and the Pope endorsing Donald Trump etc. were shared by hundreds of thousands. Despite their untrustworthy and hyperpartisan sources, these stories outperformed real news on Facebook in the run up to the election. Investigations traced the fake news to Macedonian teenagers, profiting from the ad revenue. The culprits found Trump stories and right-leaning content to be the most popular.

With fake news now as valuable as fact, the echo chambers become even more self-serving. People look for evidence to support their views which becomes far easier with fiction available to credit. It’s not just the general public this new phenomenon applies to; even President-elect Trump has circulated incorrect articles and memes on his own social media accounts. When confronted he dismissively responded “What do I know about it? All I know is what’s on the Internet”.

Blaming the outcome of Brexit and the presidential election entirely on digital media would be counterproductive. Fake news pushers aren’t the only media outlets motivated by traffic. Well-established news brands can be seen using click-bait headlines and condensed articles to create a more ‘shareable’ news. One of the likely reasons fake news managed to be convincing to so many is that the visual difference between legitimate and fake news online is shrinking.

Scandal, controversy and falsehood dominated the discussion for US election and the EU referendum. Fear mongering was the weapon of choice for both sides of the Brexit debate. Clinton’s campaign was plagued with an email controversy that it was never able to shake. Donald Trump received more negative press coverage than anyone in modern political history, but also quantifiably more press coverage than anyone in political history. Traditional media were consistent drivers for this, leaving facts and informed discourse to fall into the background.

With this being said, these things are not new. Sensationalism has existed for decades and tabloids have swayed votes before. What is crucial here, however, is what it says about the current state of the media and the implications for the future. The mainstream media’s chase for ratings and obsession with being first, contributed to the normalisation of absurd behaviour and further spread of such messages. It’s regular use of false-equivalency to appear fair and unbiased will continue to undermine the truth and good journalism.

This year has been the culmination of years of news media attempting to get to grips with the social media age, and vice versa. Trust in the media is low and with the current rise of populism, this will not change if the press appears biased towards the establishment status quo. That will do nothing but drive people further online to unsubstantiated sources.

The relationship between politics and social media is stronger than ever. Both presidential candidates and the pro-Brexit camp chose to invest heavily in online campaigning at the expense of newspapers and television ads. Supporters of each campaign rallied in great numbers on Twitter, with the Trump and Leave backers the most active. The new focus on targeted advertising shows just how little political campaigns are concerned with persuading the mainstream.

Today, intermediaries like Facebook and Google play an increasingly important role in the dissemination of opinion and they, rather than the press, now establish the key gateways that impact the dissemination of opinion. The crisis in journalism and desperation of the mainstream press, leaves news outlets vulnerable to exploitation by post-truth populists as what is outrageous is newsworthy and therefore warrants free coverage. The trouble is now digital politics need only involve the mainstream media briefly, if at all.

Politicians no longer need the media on their side, they just need the media talking. Grassroots social media and digital campaigning is there to pick up the slack. The online echo chambers and circulation of fake news only help drive these political divisions in the public sphere. In late December, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg after relentlessly denying their position as a media company, conceded that Facebook was not a “traditional media company”. In response to the widespread criticism of fake news’ influence in the election (which Zuckerberg denied), he announced his company will work with third-party fact checkers to label ‘disputed articles’.

As the spotlight focuses on the intermediaries, whether it is Facebook, Google or Twitter; the responsibility of managing news content efficiently needs to become a priority if it is to become key to their business model and user experience. But as the television and news outlets still figure it out, the Achilles’ heel of Western political media today is that the mainstream press held accountable no longer have the power, and the tech companies that have the power desperately do not want the accountability.

This article was originally posted to Medium on 29 December 2016