Where do you get your news: CNN, Fox News, or Facebook? A recent study shows that 43% of Americans get their news from Facebook: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/05/16/facts-about-americans-and-facebook/. This raises a big concern for ethics, because users can post whatever their heart desires: whether the news is fake or real. Eli Saslow’s paper, “How Lies Become Truth in Online America” shows a great example of the negative affects of a user corrupting the media by posting what he believed was extremely ridiculous news on a liberal satire page that acquired a great deal of attention by conservatives. After gaining popularity, his intention was to reveal to the conservatives who believed him that the news that was being spread was fake and point out how gullible and impressionable they were. Unfortunately, after being revealed that the news on the page was fake, many people still believed the news was real. Why? Because this was just one of many ridiculous fake news sites that they had seen.
Fake news is spread all over the internet especially through social media sites like Facebook and the effects are massive and range from political views, the spread of deadly virus’s, the death of celebrities, and even fake music festivals. Because of how easy it is to create fake news and publicize it using social media, should there be a filter on what is allowed to be posted?
In 2017 a music festival known as Fyre Festival was founded by CEO Billy McFarland and promoted all over social media. By advertising specifically to social media influencers such as Kendall Jenner, Bella Hadid, Haliely Baldwin, and Emily Ratajkowski, McFarland was able to gain popularity for his event and rounded up roughly 5,000 people. The event was scheduled to take place on April 28-30 and May 5-7 of 2017, and tickets sold from $500 to $12,000 depending on the package purchased. Where these A-list celebrities were promised bahamian style sushi, local seafood, and villas to stay in, to their surprise they were left with cheap sandwiches and tents to live in - some which weren’t even assembled.
Many people were attempting to leave but were left stranded at the airport with no food and water, which shows the extreme negative effects of false advertisement. This shows just how easy it is to spread fake news through social media and emphasizes the importance of ethical values when using social media as a platform to share news.
This article is very well written, and the surprising study results at the beginning does well to hook the reader in. The examples used are good examples for showing how fake news can be easily spread around social media, but I believe it may be helpful to make it a bit more clear what you are arguing for earlier in article so the examples can clearly be connected to the argument in the readers mind.
ReplyDeleteThis article is really informative. I feel even I get most of my news from Facebook and instagram but I never thought 43% of Americans get their news from Facebook. I really liked how you used the different font for the para next to the facebook picture. I would recommend tying the paragraph about fyre festival to the one above it. Also, it might be helpful to expand on your idea that "should there be a filter on what is allowed to be posted?"
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