Lefsetz: Fake News

This is not a Facebook failure…

This is a failure of mainstream media, looking for a scapegoat to take the blame for missing Donald Trump‘s election by so much.

People believe what they want to believe. If they didn’t get it from Facebook, they’d get it from the person next door. This is not limited to the digital age. Do you think no one got it wrong back in the pre-media days?

Of course they did. Society runs on gossip and shading and he who can garner the most attention wins in the end.

And mainstream media has squandered its power and lost eyeballs in the process.

Let’s start with television news.

It’s biased.

Forget network news, it’s a joke. Appointment television in an on demand world is akin to pay phones in an era of mobile handsets. Only a tiny subset of Americans are gonna tune in at 6:30. As for the local news, that’s been a joke for decades, just ask Don Henley, all bubble-headed bleach blonds joking with their compatriots with news a secondary item. If it bleeds it leads and if you’re interested in murder and cat rescues you might be satisfied, otherwise you’ve tuned out.

And speaking of satisfaction, the anchors left at CNN are so self-satisfied as to have you wondering who these people are.

Who made Wolf Blitzer king?

If you think the man has gravitas, you’re probably still paying fealty to your second grade teacher – give me a break.

As for Fox News and MSNBC… They’re on either side of the political spectrum. And like CNN, they too have horrific ratings. They reach only a tiny sliver of the public. As for reporting? CNN has some trucks, but it’s really just all personalities all the time on these outlets. Unless it’s a visual crisis you’re better off going elsewhere.

Which in this case means online.

But what about the newspapers you say?

There are three, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post.

The others left standing are barely more than pamphlets with news holes so small you could drown them in the bathtub. Forget mixing metaphors, the truth is the biggest metro papers not only have fewer foot soldiers, they’ve got a tiny audience to boot.

Is it any wonder that when they eviscerate the product people abandon it?

We keep hearing we should support newspapers when the quality and breadth is so damn low, and is circling the drain. 

If you want to set fire to your money donate it to your local newspaper, which is being sold or going out of business or ceasing print publication as I write.

As for the WaPo… It’s been vastly improved by (Amazon head) Jeff Bezos‘s investment. Not that anybody outside of D.C. knows that.

And the WSJ? It’s a mainstream paper now, the right wing paper of record, Even the NYT does better and more in-depth business coverage.

And the NYT? It’s the best we’ve got, but its image has taken a hit from the right wing and it’s letting down the left wing, Is it any wonder its influence is waning?

The people are pissed and nobody in media seems to get this.

All it wants to do is blame them for being stupid and falling for these inane stories. It’s not that people are stupid so much as they’re FRUSTRATED!

No one is listening to them and no one is helping them out. D.C. is gridlocked and the rich don’t care about them, so they hold on to anything that justifies their position. But the truth is even without this false information they’d still hold the same position. Do you really think that if everybody read the NYT the country would believe Obama was born in America?

THEY DON’T WANT TO BELIEVE HE WAS BORN IN AMERICA!

And it’s people like Trump spreading the lie! And they’re racist, they don’t want a black man in office, so they’re looking for disqualifiers.

Do you want to get your information about the internet from enterprises that completely missed it?

That’s right, it’s the newspapers and TV outlets who are complaining about fake news. These same outlets which had no real response to disruption.

And if you know anything about disruption, you know it continues. And you can’t foresee the next chapter.

Right wing talk radio dominated.

But then left wing websites made inroads.

And now we’ve got this fake news “crisis.” Wherein social media is spreading falsehoods that you want to believe.

Unless you don’t.

You can’t change people’s minds. They’re just looking for further information to bolster their position.

The problem isn’t fake news, it’s those who control the real news (the government).

THEY’RE OUT OF TOUCH WITH THE PEOPLE!

I’ll even go so far as to say Twitter hate is not the problem people think it is.

What Twitter hate has done most is make people abandon the service. There was a natural reaction. This is a TWITTER problem, not a societal problem. Grow a thick skin or get off.

As for kicking people off, they can just start anew with a new name, right away. Self-correction works best. Too much hate on Twitter and it dies.

As for hate in public…

The guy who won endorsed it. Built his whole campaign upon it. And now you expect it to instantly disappear?

I don’t think so.

Once you try to control progress, once you try to steer people where you want them to go – you’re into social engineering – you’re in trouble.

The problem in our country is not fake news.

It’s income inequality. 

It’s the inability of the underclass to make a living. It’s the elimination of jobs by technology. People are hurting as a result and all those who can make a difference are doing is pointing fingers!

How about the NYT, WSJ and WaPo get it right, for a start?

As for Fox and MSNBC, they’re not growing. If they were on to something they’d be burgeoning, but they’re not.

How about a credible outlet that serves up news people can relate to?

They call that Vice in case you haven’t been paying attention, but the paradigm would be reachable by the usual suspects if the fat cats took off the power suits and went into the field with their iPhones to get the real story.

The story is out there.

Hell, anybody who wrote anti-Trump stuff felt the blowback. But the faceless newspapers did not. Because we live in a star economy and they don’t want any stars, they want the institution to maintain.

But institutions are challenged in this new world of disruption. We’re looking for leaders, who will take a stand. And who can believe in the nitwit reporters with all their false equivalencies, so busy trying to be fair and balanced that they’re anything but.

We’re in trouble, no doubt.

But it’s not because of fake news it’s because of so-called “real news.”

Those in charge of it got it wrong, had no idea of the temperature of the country – couldn’t see what was really going on. And instead of taking a long hard look at themselves they’re blaming the geeks, Zuckerberg and the Google Twins. Hippies didn’t cause change, they were an EXPONENT of change.

I don’t expect every reporter to get it right every time.

But I do expect them to try.

And I do expect them to look at themselves first.

America, what a country, no one wants to take any blame. They’d rather just point their finger at someone else, say it’s their fault.

Hogwash.

Fix the problem, not the penumbra.

Give people something to believe in.

Then fake news won’t even be an issue.