It's a topic that pops up in my mind about once or twice a month. I've come to subscribe to around two dozen YouTube 'channels' which feature British, Swedish, German, Austrian, Danish and Taiwanese 'alternate' views. Since I'm retired, I have the time to go and spend several hours each week....listening to alternate viewpoints.
Around a decade ago, I started to view certain publications, and certain news 'devices' as being limited in terms of scope and understanding. I started to out a red-pen and mark an article which had questionable facts. When you had three red markings, in my humble opinion....it was no longer a unbiased article, and represented just a slanted story.
In some ways, there was one single viewpoint being given, and all information equaled the support of that viewpoint. In simple terms, it was creating a propaganda-like tool....whether the news journalists believed that or not.
Others also found this troubling, and some started to create a chat forum or 'network' on YouTube to open up a dialog. Some have had trouble with social media accepting this, and some are finding police at their door to suggest authorities wanting them to stop or downsize their message.
So alternate media draws attention. It's not that they are legit journalists or really doing that great of a job. Some are just people off the street who just started asking stupid questions, and were willing to do it in front of a camera.
Some actually can take eight minutes to talk about one single issue and really sum up the problems in five or six 'bullets', which makes you wonder about legit news media, and why they can't drag themselves to just give you unbiased prospectives.
The thing I wonder about....the longer this goes on....the more popular these 'networks' will become, and the less trusting in national news agencies. You can see that already with the BBC, Germany's ARD, and with the public news sector in Sweden.
So I come to the obvious 700-pound guerrilla in the room....the internet. None of this would have occurred without the internet. Politicians now realize the guerrilla in the room, and the threat to their authority. Social media (Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook) is now a threat. If you can't cage up this guerrilla....what happens in the next decade?
The label of social media being controlled by the Russians? It's an interesting label. But in 2011 and 2012.....the Russians themselves were threatened by the social media device in their national election. So the idea that this is a one-way device? That's long-gone now.
In terms of the Pandoras Box open now? No doubt this is true, but what exactly do you want to do in resolving this? And would this resolution create a bigger and more intense problem in the long-run?
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