The Tortoise and the Hare 2.0 – Is It Better to be First or to be Right?
Blog originally appeared on the KVBPR Blog.
The meteoric rise of social media has changed a lot of the habits and processes used by today’s news media. There’s no longer time to do thorough research, check and recheck sources and closely edit every story. If you want to be relevant in today’s news world, you have to be first with the big stories.
The Nashville chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) recently hosted Kate Herman, president and publisher at the Nashville Business Journal, for a discussion on “The Changing Face of Media.” During the discussion she said that because of the 24-hour, up-to-the-minute news cycle that has developed from social media channels like Facebook and Twitter, accuracy in the news will be harder to achieve.
As a communications professional I can agree with her. There were quite a few examples of this jump-the-gun reporting in 2012, the most noteworthy being the reporting of the Supreme Court ruling on health care reform. Two major national news networks reported the individual mandate was deemed unconstitutional, when in fact it was upheld. They broadcast this result on TV, their websites and social media channels. They then had to back pedal on all of these same channels to correct themselves, but the damage had already been done. Their inaccurate information had been spread throughout the Twittersphere, leaving people scratching their heads when they heard conflicting reports.
And now they will be known for falsely reporting one of the biggest news events of the year.
As a news consumer, I find this lack of accuracy frustrating. Why do news networks want to be the first to report a story? So the public will see them as the go-to source for all of their news throughout the day, right? Is it worth gaining that status if you can’t get the news right the first time? How long will the public keep turning to you if you aren’t providing accurate information?
What do you think, is it better to be first or to be right?