Today I read an article from the New York Times by Somini Sengupta entitled, "Ebola Presents Challenge, and an Opportunity, for U.N. Leader." The article focused on how U.N. secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, is taking steps to help the U.N. play a greater role in the ebola epidemic, while at the same time pointing out the U.N.'s limitations in this humanitarian endeavor. The article drew on multiple sources which consisted of leading experts in the fields of international relations and humanitarian crises. These sources included Jean-Marie Guehenno (president of International Crisis Group), Margaret Chan (director general of the World Health Organization), and Samantha Power (American ambassador to the U.N.). With the exception of Samantha Power, I had not been familiar with many of the experts who were cited in the article, so I did a quick Google search of their names and was able to find multiple other sources that could corroborate their positions and credentials. All of the sources the author used were highly credible owing to the credentials they possessed and the experience they had in international humanitarian crises of similar size and scope as the current ebola epidemic.
While the article contained comments from leading experts in the field, I was unable to find an actual list of sources that could help verify that the comments included in the article were in fact what each expert actually said. While the New York Times has a relatively positive reputation with regard to its reporting, this still shows how in a world of unrestricted Web publishing, a comment from a source could potentially be modified or taken out of context, and the audience would have little way of knowing. Without an actual list of sources detailing who said what and when, the audience simply has to put their trust in the credibility of the author and the reputation of the news source, which falls short of what is needed to determine whether a piece of information is in fact true.
References
Sengupta,
S. (2014, September 19). Ebola presents challenge, and an opportunity, for U.N.
leader. The New York Times. Retrieved
from
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/19/world/africa/ebola-presents-challenge-and-an-opportunity-for-un-leader.html?ref=world&_r=0
I think this is a very strong post and agree that when a story is run across the AP it makes it difficult to vet sources. It helps when certain sources are referenced so that additional research can be done to verify the credibility of the source. I also think you bring up a great point that when sources are not named or just named as experts in their fields and then used as a reference it makes what they are saying seem less credible and make them seem not as reliable as compared to sources who are actually named and can be vetted. It would be nice to see exactly what makes a person an expert on the subject matter that they claim to be.
ReplyDelete- Betsy Devillier
You are right that the audience doesn't know the content of the entire interviews and must trust that the quotes are accurate. However, that has been true from the beginning of journalism, and now, mistakes are much easier to report and correct. Does that make you feel more trusting of the news?
ReplyDeleteA long time ago, I was working with someone who made a comment, that for some reason I cannot forget. We were talking world news and he mentioned that he never trusts news that is coming from something other than a newspaper. I never quite understood his theory, and now I don't know if it could be truth. I think that maybe back then it could have been a valid comment. Now, I think that every news source is fighting to stay alive. Comments are coming from everywhere and news is news no matter if it is on TV or in the paper. What you have to do is be sure it is real! As you mentioned, without a proper resource page, it is hard to believe what you are reading. It is hard to read something, that is very convincing, and not believe it. I am sure there are people out there that read from a newspaper and take its worth as gold. Even on Facebook, people believe everything that is posted. It is important to research the research!
ReplyDeleteShannon