Are Social Media Platforms a Reliable News Source?

As social media progresses, it is now becoming the new way individuals obtain all their updates about what is going on in our world. Actually, scratch that, what is going on in THEIR world. The Netflix documentary, Social Dilemma does a great job in explaining how the algorithms in social media work. Our biggest battle is finding out what information is true…

The way our phones or social media platforms are designed, are to cater to our interests. Sounds harmless, however, when we think about this, it is allowing us to stay in our own little bubble without learning about other opinions and news.

Take this Tweet for instance. This is a snippet from the Social Dilemma, where the discussion of how fast fake news and true news travels. Humans gravitate towards fake news more then real news and this is still a behavior that is difficult to explain, but the idea is that thee truth is boring.

Now why would these systems and platforms allow for so much fake news to be spread? How is there no regulation? The tweet below made a great point that was brought up during the documentary.

We can see how there is a problem with social media and how it is being used. However, how can we lessen our intake when we are using our social media platforms to see news?

This tweet above shows how Australians like to obtain their news. This is interesting to see because of the trends in what platforms are highly used.

Another point to make is how the transition from print online news happened. Over the years social media platforms have taken over the way users around the world connect and research.

What’s more, news published by the media was now open for discussion. People could Tweet about it (and a tweet doesn’t just reach your friends list, but the world). They could add comments underneath articles, send articles to their friends with the click of a button. They could even influence all their friends on Facebook by sharing a certain article. You no longer had to write to the editor and hope for a featured opinion. Your opinion could now be everywhere.

If you feel like you have been finding yourself on social media more than you’d like, try the challenge above to help with any negative feelings. Social Media has been an extraordinary advantage, but it is wise to take a step back and see how it’s been used to manipulate or benefit big companies. It’s also a moment for us to realize how much we spend on there. There is so much information out that it is hard to determine what news is reliable or not, it’s up to us to make the best decision and to recognized when we could be wrong.

By the end of the day though it boils down to all of us to take responsibility for where we get our information, how we process it and what we choose to share on social media. Top of Google, or top of your Facebook feed, doesn’t always supply the truth. And if we want to help the general public to become aware of this, we have to educate them. We could….tweet about it… Or why not write a blog?

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