this post was submitted on 10 Dec 2024
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. A showerthought should offer a unique perspective on an ordinary part of life.
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If an article hasn't cited any sources, then, imo, it isn't news — it's just conjecture.
News are those sources for a lot of situations. Someone has to create the primary source at the point of something happening or existing. That's a news article. This can later be cited by somebody else "As reported by Reuters at xyz...". There exist other sources of course, which are, kinda, The News™️ in their respective areas of events. Scientific findings usually have published works as their primary source. Computer vulnerabilities use CWEs or something equivalent once made public.
What source could a reporter sitting on a street in a civil unrest cite? Signed, ID-verified, named and double-checked-against-birth-certificate statements from people around him?
News isn't a primary source. In most cases its a secondary source. They ask the primary "what happened" or get a press release from wherever and report on that.
They can be a primary source if they are live on location recording something as it happens. In that case, only the video (or written account) and individuals are primary sources, the second it goes through the studio's writers it becomes a secondary source.
Journalist is defined as anyone who writes for public news media. If op writes an article an publicly posts it, they are a blogger. If they post it anywhere that can be considered a news site (IMO, if their a own site is a news site, it counts), they are a journalist.
A good journalists is one who takes in many primary sources, maybe fills the gaps with some other secondaries and informs the public with the most informed information they have. Unfortunately corporate news has become an echo chamber of secondary sources with no one independently looking at primary sources. If it ain't cited don't trust it.
If the OP of the shower thought, basically fact checks someone else, then they are doing the work of a journalist. However simply doing a bit of work does not earn you the title, just like replacing a light switch at your house does not make you an electrician (even if you do it better then some of the "professionals")
Hm, I'm not sure that that's a fair comparison. If it is assumed that an electrician must be licensed in order to practice as one (and assuming that they can only call themself an electrician if they practice as one), do journalists have similar requirements? I may simply be ignorant, but I've not found any examples that a journalist must be licensed in order to practice. Such licensing feels like it would start infringing on fundamental rights.
No you don't need a license to be a journalist.
My thought was more about the scale of the project. For a journalists, just fact checking someone online doesn't make you a journalists. If you went out to fact check something at the source, compiled a bunch of evidence and presented it publicly, then you'd call your self a journalist.
Back to the electrician (ignoring license requirements), swapping out a light switch isn't much, but if you learned how to rewired a whole house, install panels, ceilings fans, etc - you'd call you self an electrition.
And you're right, the electrician is kind of a bad comparison.
I agree — it fits by definition ^[1]^, at the very least.
References
Presumably the event was recorded, or the thing existing measured. Imo, these recordings and measurements would be what's cited and reported on as novel information in a news article. I could possibly be convinced otherwise, but I think that the mere action of recording, or measuring isn't news on its own — it must be published.
In that case, imo, the initial reporting would be the research paper, and the literal root source would be the data that they collected.
Imo, footage, audio, etc.
....yes...but you do understand a journalist is someone who writes/reads news right? They're not just sat around with sources for no reason, those sources are specifically so they can report news...that's the point. What do you think a source is!?
I'm not sure I understand your point. Essentially the only point that I was making was that for what's written to not be considered conjecture, any claims that it makes must be cited ^[1]^.
References
Your original post asks if you're a journalist for fact checking articles, we got to these comments from that.
Where do you think sources end? If I mention that biden is currently president, do I need a source linked? If 1+1 is 2, do I need to provide a source? Do I need to source the definitions of every word? Do I need a source that vaccines don't cause autism? That 5g doesn't cause COVID?
It's hard to discuss this without knowing what text you're referring to, and if I go back to check if you mentioned it I'll lose my comment because I'm using an app. Some things don't need sourcing because they're accepted facts, like who the president is, basic science, simple maths, etc, but most important, the things that an article should always cite are the claims the article itself is making. I wouldn't cite sources for 5G not causing covid, for example, unless the article was specifically about that.
For anything practical, I don't think it's possible to give an exact answer to that — in practice, I think that, at the very least, making a conscious effort to maximize accuracy and minimize bias would go a long way. Imo, it gets tricky rather quick when debates of the veracity of sources themselves begins.
In an ideal world, imo, yes, those all would be cited.
It think it, at least, depends on context. Personally, I strive to cite any claim that I make.
How come? If one's knowledge of a topic derives from a location, I think one should cite that location when discussing that topic, otherwise it's just conjecture.
Same reason I don't provide a source magic and wizards and fairy tales not existing. Anyone stupid enough to believe obvious rubbish doesn't care what your source is.