Accessing information has never become so easy, each Facebook post, Instagram story and television show contains information that readers/audiences decide on its relevance or importance.
When exposing yourself to information it is important that you as a reader use a critical eye and consistently check for sources, thus acknowledging the ownership of the information to ensure its validity. This cautionary habit allows readers to avoid generated stories by unreliable publishers that swarm the media with 'fake news'. As a light reader of new articles I find it best to use BuzzFeed News for its convenience and focus on trending issues.
BuzzFeed News started in 2012 as an extension from the BuzzFeed a company founded in 2006 by Jonah Peretti and John S. Johnson that become known for its pop culture articles and online quizzes. It has now expanded to providing coverage to a plethora of topics including politics, business, trending issues, animals, DIY's and spread to using multiple media platforms to widen its audience such as different global offices hosting multiple Facebook, Instagram and YouTube pages.
The division of BuzzFeed News started in 2011 with Ben Smith being appointed position as editor-in-chief and as of July 2018, BuzzFeed news claims they have 200 reporters and editors across BuzzFeed offices around the world. It’s the chief editors and ultimately the publication guidelines and legislation that will restrict what is being issued. Thus, the ownership of the publishing site must have reliable guidelines to present its readers with trustworthy information.
As a consumer of BuzzFeeds’ publications it is important I remain impartial when reading its publications, reasons being BuzzFeed though having credited journalists, they also remain consistent with bias and opinionated articles. MediaBiasFactCheck draws attention to the emotionally loaded language BuzzFeed utilises in its headlines. Whilst also creating a valid connection between the lack of explicitly labelling opinion pieces making it difficult for readers to tell the difference between straight news content and editorials.
With all that in mind, I’ll remain using BuzzFeed as a news-source as I can self-assuredly read whilst being aware to recognise the bias nature of some articles. It’s also important to understand news from online web-publishers have the potential to be un-reliable, due to their ownership and their lack of publication parameters and maintenance of ‘fake news’ sources.
When reading for the purpose to gather factual information, no matter the publisher it is crucial to be analytical to recognise the distinction between an opinion piece and a news item. That being one is meant to persuade and the other to inform.
In my opinion, the news sources you use is only as reliable and/or as unreliable as you allow them to be as the choice of publisher, journalist and article contribute to its validity.
Until next time,
References:
https://www.allsides.com/news-source/buzzfeed-media-bias - Accessed 8th April
https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/buzzfeed/ - Accessed 7th April
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BuzzFeed#News- - Accessed 8th April
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/buzzfeednews/about-buzzfeed-news- - Accessed 6th April
https://www.buzzfeed.com - Accessed 6th April
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