Is wide choice, wise choice? Essay Example

WIDE СHОIСЕ OF NEWS

Wide Сhоiсе of News

The social media platforms, websites, and blogs have taken the world by storm, and the most affected group is the generation Z who almost depend entirely on social media. More than 90% of first world countries such as the Americas, Europe, and Australia have access to internet and phones capable of browsing free sites, and therefore they can access information in an instant (Blair, 2017). Common social media platforms used in the modern days include Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Telegram where hundreds of millions of youths and millions of adults take time accessing any information they think can be authentic but sometimes maybe misleading (Blair, 2017). This paper will address Facebook as a social platform in spreading news and its role in spreading of fake news.

So far, Facebook is the largest social media platform where any person can access news although the primary aim is not accessing them but for entertainment purposes. The news gathered from Facebook is therefore incidental. Among the 50% adults using Facebook, 47% rarely access the news from the platform, and the number holds 30% of the total Facebook users (Blair, 2017). Most news consumers on Facebook access news anytime they log in to the social media platform, and the primary goal is not to obtain information from the source. The platform, therefore, forms a way of accessing news without actually seeking for it. Gruber-Muecke and Rau (2016) argues that “most people join Facebook to either chat with their friends and checking their profile updates apart from accessing news.” News that users find on Facebook is either through links where interested parties tend to open them due to curiosity and thus collateral. People are therefore exposed to news that others may fail to get. Some people depend on it because they lack an alternative to access news locally and globally, but the majority are dependent on other sources (Teixeira da Silva, 2017).

The largest group depending on Facebook is the young adults due to limited engagement with news from other platforms as seen in elders. Young people aged between 18 and 29 years’ accounts for 34% of news consumers on Facebook; thus, they deem it important (Teixeira da Silva, 2017). Therefore, the exposure is incidental nature and the number of times a person spends on the platform increases chances of accessing the information. According to Spinney (2017), approximately 67% of Facebook news consumers for more than an hour daily obtain news from the platform compared to 41% spending less than an hour in viewing the site. Entertainment news takes the day and therefore the primary reason to log in to Facebook by about 73% followed by public events and national politics (Richardson, 2017).

Facebook has managed to create businesses and individuals brand through advertisement and entertainment. The social network is so far global, and any person can access it because it is an open source requiring creating an account (Gruber-Muecke & Rau, 2016). No charges are incurred and therefore may people have taken to the social networking by storm where they can check on day to day news apart from watching television or purchasing magazines to read. It is easy to connect with friends, family members, colleagues and meeting new people where information sharing is accessible without restrictions (Richardson, 2017). Creating a profile and sharing information is very easy provided the user can use a computer or an internet accessible gadget. Finding like-minded people is easy when focusing on their interests and sharing updates, video chats and a private message relating to the global politics or local news. Furthermore, it is easy to take advantage of Facebook when advertising products so that the seller can maintain a good reputation with consumers identifying a product being advertised increasing its sales (Saez-Trumper, 2014).

Therefore, Facebook plays a significant role in transforming the globe through information sharing which is free of charge. Any person from all parts of the globe can easily know all that is happening throughout the world by logging into the platform and readily credible information from sources like CNN page or BBC (Allcott & Gentzkow, 2017). The possibility of finding reliable information in such groups in high compared to the pop-up advertisements guiding the user into unsecured locations that bias. Facebook news reaches a large number lacking access to a newspaper and therefore allowing them to have the understanding of the political arena locally and on a global scale. A person in Australia can access day to day events happening in the US, Europe or Africa by just clicking on a Facebook page created credible news agencies like the CNN but care must be ensured because similar pages are developed by other people and sometimes hard to determine the credibility.

Fake news and Facebook

Rumour mongers, racists, and haters terrorists are among the group that propagates propaganda on the social network with the aim of attracting people’s attention so that they can be perceived to be true. An example is the ISIS terrorist groups showing footage and images feeding the same people they have been killing. To some individuals who do not understand the gruesome events happening in the Middle East may think that the terror group is “moral”. However, the activities they conduct behind the scenes are evil, and therefore, their primary goal is spreading hate towards non-Muslims.

There exist risks resulting from the use of Facebook as a source of accessing news. Fake news is a term that has been in use as a catch-all phrase referring to anything resulting from a news article. The information is therefore perceived factually incorrect to hoaxes, online abuse, rumours, sarcasm and parodies and opinion pieces. Due to the openness of the social media platforms, it becomes hard to identify the right and wrong information posted on the website (Saez-Trumper, 2014). Therefore, freedom has allowed any person provided they have the right credential to display information the “right” to lie and no precise measures are taken. Advertisements are an example although not publicized. Saez-Trumper (2014) argues that the Ads that direct the user to certain websites are a challenge because they purport false information. The adverts are approved in minutes through “clickjacking” where the URL displayed on the site can be trusted and recognized by the user, but the link sends the user to the wrong page (Allcott & Gentzkow, 2017). These websites are malicious, and the landing page acts as the channel to distribute the malware from person to person.

An example of a scenario is the BBC evening paranoia displaying a grisly warning in a game changer between Trump and Brexit. The aim was to target and delude voters, and it was done by recruiting political advisors. Trump upcoming during the presidential race turned the fake news into success by creating excuses of litany lousiness defeat allowing large numbers of Americans to vote for him (Plana & Barac, 2017). More so, there are strange things happening today, and an example is trump administration where members maintained a terror attack and “Bowling Green massacre” in Atlanta and Sweden, but the incidences never happened. They later corrected the misinformation in a swift manner although hard to erase throughout the historical myths. What happens today forms a collective memory that is carried into the future shaping the way we think (Plana & Barac, 2017).

The primary goal of the vicious terror attack aimed at imposing travel ban in seven selected countries. The social network is, therefore, able to share our memory requiring an individual limited conform towards extensive collection regarding whether the advertised news is right or wrong (Clark & Zhou, 2015). Another example is the new fact checking system concealed as Newport Buzz article under Facebook in the form of fake news; users were warned against sharing the information, but unexpected scenario happened when thousands went ahead sharing the information claiming that it was aiming at silencing the blog (Clark & Zhou, 2015). They, therefore, shared the blog, and the Winthrop article was comparing it to the information that brought Irish people into the US as slaves. There is, therefore, need to learn before acting based on the information perpetrated on Facebook because significance fake news are presented on the platform. Facebook will always be there, and fake news will follow, but people have a duty to determine the right and the fake ones.

In conclusion it is indeed true that social media has created an efficient and cost friendly site where through technology, anyone in any location on the earth can access information based on global and local politics together with economy and entertainment. However, we should not be so dependent on a social media platform like Facebook which is “too public,” and there are high chances that the proposed news although somehow right can be misleading. Fake news can lead to global wars, and there is need for Facebook management to come up with strategies that allow sieving of information before it gets into the wrong hands. More so, it’s true that some people from the highest level of government posts “fake news” with the aim of either driving people away from a certain scandal or to see their reaction in case such event happens. “Fake news” will always be there and we as consumers have a duty to think further before acting towards everything posted on social media networks.

The managing body should also play a significant role ensuring that its customers and global users are protected because electronically, information can be transferred from one person to another in seconds having disastrous outcomes. Political field, entertainment, and advertisements are the most affected, but much focus should be put in the political arena because any miscalculation may lead to global shake through war or economic disasters. Users are therefore advised to look for news from different sources apart from the social media platform and compare it gauging the credibility.

References

Allcott, H., & Gentzkow, M. (2017). Social Media and Fake News in the 2016 Election. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 31(2), 211-236. doi:10.1257/jep.31.2.211

Berghel, H. (2017). Alt-News and Post-Truths in the «Fake News» Era. Computer, 50(4), 110-114. doi:10.1109/mc.2017.104

Blair, M. K. (2017). Using digital and social media platforms for social marketing. Oxford Medicine Online. doi:10.1093/med/9780198717690.003.0012

Clark, C., & Zhou, S. (2015). Fake News? A Survey on Video News Releases and their Implications on Journalistic Ethics, Independence and Credibility of Broadcast News. Media Watch, 6(1), 16. doi:10.15655/mw/2015/v6i1/55376

Gruber-Muecke, T., & Rau, C. (2016). “Fake It or Make It” – Selfies in Corporate Social Media Campaigns. Social Computing and Social Media, 417-427. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-39910-2_39

Plana, J. C., & Barac, A. (2017). Good News, Bad News, but Not Fake News. Circulation, 135(15), 1413-1416. doi:10.1161/circulationaha.117.027552

Richardson, N. (2017). Fake News and Journalism Education. Asia Pacific Media Educator, 1326365X1770226. doi:10.1177/1326365×17702268

Saez-Trumper, D. (2014). Fake tweet buster. Proceedings of the 25th ACM conference on Hypertext and social media — HT ’14. doi:10.1145/2631775.2631786

Spinney, L. (2017). How Facebook, fake news and friends are warping your memory. Nature, 543(7644), 168-170. doi:10.1038/543168a

Teixeira da Silva, J. A. (2017). Fake peer reviews, fake identities, fake accounts, fake data: beware! AME Medical Journal, 2, 28-28. doi:10.21037/amj.2017.02.10