I can even put that into perspective. The first time I deployed to CENTCOM (2004) there were more than 3500 US journalists already there (and there are many foreign journalists there too). The first time I went to Afghanistan (2009) I met one of the major CNN politics correspondents and his producer on a flight. You could honestly make the argument that with so much coverage putting your life on the line for a story that somebody else probably already has may not be worth it.
In that context war and combat were the big sellers and got the most coverage, because you just had to be in the right spot at the right time. There is little or not investigation. The best news coming out of there had nothing to do with combat action, but rather things that demanded real investigation. The hard work of journalism. These stories were extremely rare, in comparison.
The other major issue is allowing an audience to dictate your subject matter, which is my interpretation of crowdsourcing. I would say this is the quickest way to defeat your primary mission of objectivity and shortest path to bias. The big challenge here is how to determine what qualifies as a story worth publishing, particularly for an international audience.
One way to limit bias is to disallow opinion pieces and editorials. Fox News is, on occasion, a great source of journalism, but journalism doesn't drive its ratings. Editorial pundits do, and a clear bias is the result.
Out of sincere curiosity, what have been their journalistic achievements?
Also, their bias is not out of a need to make money. It's not incidental. It's an open, well-funded attempt to push the country to the right, and it worked.
They do really good stats. CNN frequently uses Fox stats.
> Also, their bias is not out of a need to make money. It's not incidental. It's an open, well-funded attempt to push the country to the right, and it worked.
I completely disagree. The pundits make money from advertising sales. The greater their following the more they can charge for ad time slots. Fox claims to be the highest rated and most watched televised news. It isn't about setting a political mandate. It is all about making money.
Moderates were pushed to the right after Obama's time in office just as they were pushed to the left after Bush's second term. Now, it seems, many voters are being pushed to the left since Trump has entered office. There isn't a conspiracy here.
EDIT: Rupert Murdock was a Hillary Clinton supporter.
In that context war and combat were the big sellers and got the most coverage, because you just had to be in the right spot at the right time. There is little or not investigation. The best news coming out of there had nothing to do with combat action, but rather things that demanded real investigation. The hard work of journalism. These stories were extremely rare, in comparison.
The other major issue is allowing an audience to dictate your subject matter, which is my interpretation of crowdsourcing. I would say this is the quickest way to defeat your primary mission of objectivity and shortest path to bias. The big challenge here is how to determine what qualifies as a story worth publishing, particularly for an international audience.
One way to limit bias is to disallow opinion pieces and editorials. Fox News is, on occasion, a great source of journalism, but journalism doesn't drive its ratings. Editorial pundits do, and a clear bias is the result.