Did Tech Websites Exploit the Boston Marathon Bombing? 182
Nerval's Lobster writes "These days, when something in the world goes very wrong, it seems as if everybody learns about it first on Twitter and Facebook. In the minutes after homemade bombs turned the finish line of the Boston Marathon into a crime scene, terms such as #BostonMarathon shot to the top of Twitter's Trends list; across the country, office workers first learned of the attack when someone posted a message on a Facebook page. Social networks have become this generation's radio, the default conduit for the freshest information. As first responders treated the wounded and the minutes ticked past, news organizations began vacuuming up Twitter and Facebook posts from around Boston and posting it on their Websites, along with 'regular' text updates. A Vine video-snippet of a bomb going off near the finish line, knocking a runner off his feet, ended up embedded into dozens of blog postings. When a disaster strikes, and many of those same news Websites post 'live updates' that incorporate tons of social-networking posts, they face accusations of exploiting the tragedy in the name of pageviews and revenue. That's not surprising—long before 'yellow journalism' became a term, people have charged news organizations with playing up humanity's worst for their own gain. In the immediate aftermath of the Boston bombings, online pundits lashed out against Mashable, The Verge, Wired, and other publications that had posted live updates, accusing them of stepping outside their usual coverage areas for cynical gain. In the following piece, a number of tech editors-in-chief, including The Verge's Joshua Topolsky and Mashable's Lance Ulanoff, talk about their approaches to covering the tragedy."
There is no license to cover serious topics (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:There is no license to cover serious topics (Score:5, Interesting)
The idea that tech blogs can cover stories about tech, but should leave coverage of serious political and human issues to the "big boys" of traditional media, is ridiculous.
Right. But the idea that tech blogs should stick to tech stuff isn't. People categorize information because it helps them manage the information overload of their daily lives. I go to tech sites to read about tech things. When I want politics, if ever, I go to a political site. When I want entertainment news, if ever, I go to an entertainment website.
This categorization of information works very well and helps reduce clutter and overload. It also allows specialization in coverage. Tech blog writers have no special credentials for politics or entertainment news, so why should they pretend they are the best source of information about either? And why should a tech website be wasting bandwidth/storage/author time covering something that is being covered better somewhere else where those who want such coverage can easily find it themselves?
It's not like people who read tech blogs are incapable of going to general news sites when they want general news, is it? Do technical people have some limit on how well they can navigate the net?
Don't care... (Score:5, Interesting)
If The Verge, Slashdot, Wired or, heck, Gizmag want to write about the explosion - it is their 1st Amendment right to do so. Same goes for the National Enquirer, STAR, or any of the other tabloid journals. This isn't any different than WSJ, NYT, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, LA Times, Al Jazeera, etc. can write about tech items, happiness, tragedy, cat getting stuck in a tree or anything else considered newsworthy.
Each outlet will be judged by how well they do their job, and will receive an appropriate reputation.
Since our news organizations are a combination of subscriber and advertiser revenue based, they have to write according to their generating said revenue.
We can either just deal with the situation as it stands or have state-run news organizations. I really don't think anyone would be comfortable with the latter as even approaching truthfulness or integrity in the long term.
If the 'Big Boys' don't like the upstarts encroaching on their turf - all I can say is.. too bad.
Re:Lots of misinformation (Score:5, Interesting)
Where were you ? I for one was lurking on a very busy IRC channel before going to the University. Them someone posted `WWWWTTTFFFF!!!!!`, a few seconds later he said that a plane crashed in the building, and a minute later he started sharing (yeah, we then had to send it to other people manually ..) webcam snapshots. That was pretty much a social network at work.