How Do I Break into Journalism?

Since 2001, the "Journalist" magazine has launched an annual fake news review report for the 14th time. In 2014, China's journalism industry had many bright spots in the process of transformation and development, but confusion and panic spread irresistibly.

2014 Top Ten Fake News

Compared with 2013, the influential case of false news in the past year does not seem to be so prominent, but the overall number is still quite large. Overall, the fake news in 2014 showed the following characteristics:

First, the situation of false news cases is fragmented, and there are fewer influential cases.

Second, fake news has a short life span and is often quickly discovered and exposed.

Third, fake news in the Internet environment presents a high degree of media fusion.

Major events are short board

Case: Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 missing

[Publication time] From March 8, 2014

["News"] After the Malaysia Airlines MH370 passenger plane lost contact incident, due to the absence of authoritative information sources, information from the central media to local media fluttered inconsistently. The more typical and widely spread rumors are mainly divided into several categories:

Survival of Miracles At 14:28 on March 8, the Chengdu Weibo Weibo drew eyebrows with several exclamation marks: "'Land !!!!' The general manager of Malaysia Airlines spoke at the scene, and the flight has been confirmed in Nanning, Vietnam. The area landed. "That night, media reports said that MH370 was found by a Philippine maritime ship on a search and rescue mission. When the aircraft was found, the fuselage was severely damaged, but it did not disintegrate, and the casualties may be far lower than previously expected;

Search Progress According to reports, on the morning of the 8th, two search and rescue vessels of the South China Sea Rescue Bureau of the Ministry of Transportation departed from Xisha and Haikou at 10:49 and 11:30 respectively, and went to the South China Sea for search and rescue.

Cause of the accident: The two lost the flight and used an Italian passenger and an Austrian passenger's passport to mix on the plane, resulting in a terrorist attack on the flight. At a press conference held by Malaysia Airlines, Malaysian Transport Minister Hishamuddin said four passengers were suspected of using false information to board the plane, including two previously exposed Austrian and Italian passengers.

Plane crash category-"Yangcheng Evening News" and other media Weibo released news that according to CNN reports, Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 has been determined to fall 100 kilometers north of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

[Truth] The "Practical Truth" section of the People's Daily Online released the "Review of False Rumors of" Malaysia Airliner Lost Connection "on March 10, clarifying 7 fake news about lost passenger connections.

"Vietnamese search and rescue personnel found the missing passenger plane signal" is false. Postmenstrual period

When we took stock of the false news cases in 2014, we felt a bit lucky. On the one hand, there were not many cases that had a large impact and serious consequences this year. In the Internet information environment that has been disturbed, the demand for real information from all sectors of society Much higher than in the past, and the tolerance for fake news is very low. The false news was soon revealed and corrected, and the life cycle was extremely short, so it was difficult to have a bad impact. On the one hand, we always felt a sense of helplessness. Although the cases selected each year for the past 15 years are different, the reasons for them have always been so few that have been said for more than ten years. Looking at the case of false news in 2014, the main reasons for the appearance of false news are as follows:

(1) Poor verification of facts.

(2) The professionalism of journalists is insufficient.

(3) Marketing planning behavior is prevalent.

We are currently facing an environment of information overload. How to remove the existence of information from the huge information flow? One path is to continue to maintain and improve the ability of professional journalists to produce high-quality news. The "next generation of journalism" faces a more participatory news audience. How to serve this media literacy group and also for journalism The author put forward higher requirements. The other path is to improve the discernment ability of the information receivers themselves, and promote journalists to improve the quality of news. The two paths are actually mutually reinforcing and mutually reinforcing.