In June 2014, two leading media in America reported that three-year-old Victoria Wilcher, who suffered facial scarring, was kicked out of a KFC because she was a frightening customer. Later, KFC announced that no evidence had been found to support the story. This phenomenon is largely a product of the increasing pressure in newsrooms that care more about traffic figures.
Brooke Binkowski, an editor, says that she has seen a shift towards less responsibility in newsrooms. “Clickbait is king, so newsrooms will uncritically print something unreal. Not all newsrooms are like this, but a lot of them are.”
Asked what the driving factor was, a journalist said, “You've a strict editor and you've to meet your targets. And some young journalists are inexperienced and will not do those checks. So much news reported online happens online. There is no need to get out and knock on someone's door. You just sit at your desk and do it.”
Another journalist says, “More clicks equal more money. At my former employer in particular, the pressure was due to the limited resources. That made the environment quite horrible to work in.”
In a Feb. 2015 report for Digital Journalism, Craig Silverman wrote, “Today the bar for what is worth giving attention to seems to be much lower. Within minutes or hours, a badly sourced report can be changed into a story that is repeated by dozens of news websites, resulting in tens of thousands of shares. The rumor becomes true for readers simply by virtue of its ubiquity.”
And, despite the direction that some newsrooms seem to be heading in, a critical eye is becoming more, not less important, according to the New York Times' public editor, Margaret Sullivan. “Reporters and editors have to be more careful than ever before. It's extremely important to question and to prove before publication.” Yet those working in newsrooms talk of doubtful stories being tolerated. In the words of some senior editors, “a click is a click, regardless of the advantage of a story”. And, “if the story does turn out to be false, it's simply a chance for another bite at the cherry.”
