Whose Truth? Sovereignty, Disinformation and Winning the Battle of Trust by John T Watts presents an overview of the social of the current media landscape basedonn themes and insights garnered from the 2018 Sovereign Challenge Conference. The article is interesting not only because it showcases how it is that disinformation can have a negative impact on the way in which societies function, but also as it is in part a strong criticism of the incentives and key performance indicators of the current media environment in general. I’m going to review how the internet has changed the habits and incentivizes of stakeholders, and then relate this to the general political concerns that are the primary focus of Watts’ article. Also, for clarification, when I speak of news in this review I’m speaking of political news and not entertainment news, sports news, etc.
The erosion of professionalism in the online media space is not just a concern of Watts, but one voiced by literally every media analyst that I’ve read over the past several years. Having worked several years as a digital marketer, and as someone that’s heard fake news content sent via email chains and social media posts make their way into people’s conversations on and offline as well as their systems of belief – I find the trend to be a significant one to be wary of. People mistaking the name Nostradamus for Quasimoto because of Notre Dame is one thing, but people believing patently false information leads can lead to a low level of aversion to political involvement or high level reactions to fake stories that involve targeted murders of people – as demonstrated by a number of recent mass shootings. While these types of lies, misinformation, disinformation and outright propaganda are most prevalent on non-institutional web pages without the same pressures to maintain high publishing standards, the legacy news outlets have been affected pressures caused by the internet and new consumption habits as well.
One way of lowering costs to deal with declining sales and advertisements has been to decrease the number of professionals hired to vet stories or content at the same time that the amount of content produced and distributed is increased. This need to produce ever more content to compete with other news producers leads to a sort of race to the bottom. As trained journalists are expensive, those without appropriate training or professional adherence to specific standards take their place. Because of the “never finished” nature of a website – unlike print, it can be quickly amended with corrections – any errors discovered can be amended AFTER publication. Additionally, computer programs that have been fed learning material to read and rephrase other outlets news – like the Washington Post Bot the did just this – also helps with the increasing amount of news that is now being published without the going through the previously existent gatekeeper/editorial process.
The leftist media scholar Jodi Dean describes how this dynamic related to the political her article Communicative Captialsim: Circulation and Foreclosure of Politicsas such: “with the commodification of communication, more and more domains of life seem to have been reformatted in terms of market and spectacle. Bluntly put, the standards of a finance- and consumption-driven entertainment culture set the very terms of democratic governance today.”
Watts’ suggestion is to be both honest and hold news outlets and platforms more accountable:
“Advertisers would get greater return on investment if their message was attached to better quality material that properly engages the reader. Their brand can also suffer harm if it is associated with poor quality or misleading material. By demanding that their advertising is proven to be associated with high quality material, they will eventually realign some of the market forces and shift the incentives of the producers.”
This is not all that can be accomplished without veering into the delegation of increased powers for the state to regulate of the media, media platforms or the internet in general. Platforms themselves, like Facebook and Twitter, can start to place a greater enforce on enforcing their community standards. This has been seen of late in the wake of people spreading false news and hate speech as well as coordinated efforts of ideologically motivated actors to behave in such a way as to “hijack” the algorithm which decides to place content in people’s feed.
The internet is incredibly impressive for enabling individuals to find others with specific, niche, and in some cases fringe, interests and beliefs. Because of this, a multitude of internet enabled subcultures has developed, while already established ones grew larger. In many ways this is a positive as it grants people the ability to find those with similar affinities and engage with those digitally. However online subcultures also create “echo chambers where views are validated and reinforced, and individuals are incentivized within those subcultures to develop and amplify the core beliefs of the group” (Watts). After the recent shooting in Pittsburg, for example, I looked through a number of Facebook groups and I would normally never read and was frankly shocked by the hateful rhetoric in there. When I attempted to engage them, rather than any sort of genuine engagement with these people the discourse devolved to name calling, something I’d not experienced since middle school, and antisemitic comments.
The political concerns related to this are multitudinous. For a business enterprise one is how high profile cases could result in fees or penalties. Legal liability for activity that occurs as a result of such platforms at this point is low risk given the U.S. regulatory environment, however given European legislation it’s possible that this might happen in that United States as well – which would thus mandate that another layer of coders and censors seek to ensure that they are not subject to whatever the penalties associated with regulatory violations.
It’s because of this that after reading Watt’s article, it’s hard not to see that those who express alarm over this essay, such as Andre Damon, and about several Facebook Pages being unpublished not as reporters but as ideologues presenting a caricature of reality. For one, they ignore the legal context in which Facebook operates. Secondly, they write primarily on behalf of news institutions that have been breaking the terms and conditions of Facebook, Google and Twitter; have a prior working relationship with such organizations; or have an ideological affinity to such a degree that they refrain from a thorough investigation of the matter.
An issue of greater concern is how this new informational medium could potentially be exploited by para-state and state actors in order to suit their strategic geo-political plans. In the news there’s been an increasing number of cases of emotionally unstable individuals either self-radicalizing or coming under the influence of others to commit acts. Furthermore, misinformation affects many other patterns of thought and behavior – and while a certain receptivity to such thoughts is an obvious precondition to adoption – informational warfare is real.
One of the conclusions Watts makes is that in this age of informational, hybrid warfare it is important for the corrective solutions not to inadvertently feed into the narratives of would-be disruptive actors. Given that a permanent monitor of such behavior would be costly and perhaps send the wrong message to users, this is why Facebook has opened up awards for those that find them. I think this is a great message as it serves to show the power of community self-regulation. There’s a lot more to say about details and examples – but I think as Watts’ report is worth reading I’ll more or less end it here.
In closing, I’ll share a not so minor criticism that I have of Watts report: the poor operationalization of American’s trust towards businesses and government. Watts defines this solely as evidenced within the Edelman Trust Barometer and doesn’t provide any greater historical context – which is a problem. While Watts rightly argues that a shared interpretation of reality is one of the glues of a social order the changing perception of a social order should be contextualized. Ascribing the declining lack of trust to “generational aspects”, he ignores a number of major newsworthy, historical events, how it was that Americans experienced and thus interpreted them.
For example, there is the fact that Americans were sold a patently false narrative in the wake of 9/11 by the highest level of governance to initiate the war in Iraq that has cost trillions of dollars and the lives of hundreds of thousands of innocent people. Then there is 2008 financial crisis, which was caused by the adoption of the financial industry’s proposed regulatory changes; an underfunded and lax regulatory government apparatus; and widespread fraud that resulted in millions of Americans losing their savings yet no major criminal charges being filed against those that were involved. These are just two of many examples as to why a decline in the trust for such private enterprise and public office in general could occur – yet in Watts assessment of shifting views, they don’t get even a passing mention.
Winning the battle of trust requires honesty and transparency if it is to be a genuine win, and not merely a change of perception. An enlightened citizenry ought not to presume the offices of elected representatives or corporate board rooms are working in their interests. Though just personal anecdotes to illustrate this point, I can think of several teachers that have expressed to me that they were delaying retirement but at least three years in order to try to make up the money that was lost as a result of the financial crash. A significant number of American students that I’ve spoken have correctly pointed out that were it not for the money spent on wars in the Middle East that universal health care and federally subsidized college for all would not sound like Utopian ideals that merit pillorying by the Council of Economic Advisors.