I've spent a fair amount of the weekend thinking about, CNN, reddit, and twitter coverage of the Boston bombs/standoff and I have a slow day of work so I have decided to do some writing instead. As some might see in other threads, I have to some degree attacked reddit coverage to defend mainstream coverage. In here I hope to explain why A) CNN is what it is and how people should watch it and B) why I am hesitant about new media journalism.

So first CNN. I say CNN, but really what I am about to write is true of all 24 hour news channels. What makes them what they are (and different from what came before) is that they are on 24 hours and solely focused on "news". Of course for some (MSNBC) "news" is a very vague topic, but at least for CNN and Fox News it seems news is very focused on current event coverage. This by itself is not new, but the fact it is on 24 hours makes it very different. CNN does not have the option to cut into currently playing segments with breaking news, it is always supposed to be covering breaking news. It does this because it is trying to grab the casual viewer who is flipping through the channels to find out what is going on. When Joe Schmo turns on the TV to see whats happening around a certain topic they will most likely stop as soon as they see a news channel covering it. CNN was not designed to be watched constantly, it was designed to grab viewers when they wanted to check the news.

This means that when things like the Boston bomber are happening, that CNN has to cover it constantly, with the goal of capturing as many casual viewers as possible. This also means that people are constantly watching the news, because they feel they need to be constantly update. Combine these two together and you get the annoyance of people hearing CNN say the same thing over and over again, filling empty air with blather because they have to be talking about the Boston bomber. The fear for CNN is that the second they stop talking about it, they'll miss people who just turned on their TV. Also, because they are live and 24/7 you are bound to get people saying stupid things (for example. CNN journalists here don't get the option to script out what they'll say. This is not to say they shouldn't be held to a high standard, but mistakes are bound to happen.

So yes, CNN is horrible to watch during long siege like events, but it is because CNN is not meant to be watch constantly. Do the healthy thing, and if you have to have it on, just leave it in the background (where it is supposed to be).

Now on to reddit/twitter coverage of it all. Part of this was great and amazing. But, users also need to be more aware that just because something appears to be true does not mean it actually is true. As annoying as CNN or others might be, they are held to a journalistic standard where they have to be able to defend what they are saying (not that they always get this right, and they should be ashamed when they fail). There is no equivalent standard on reddit, and even worse on reddit, there isn't even real reputation to be worried about. I think the best example of this great nuclear leak threadwhere a user created a freakout over a claimed nuclear leak, with constant updates throughout the day(s). Now, this was debunked, but just because something is proved to be wrong does not erase it from people's mind. My fear is that people who only hear bits and pieces getting a completely wrong impression about what is happening because of all the misinformation that was posted as well. And there was a lot of misinformation posted on reddit during the boston bomber.

reddit needs to be careful with how it covers these things. It needs to remember that not everyone will be following the entire thread and that there is a reason that mainstream journalism lags behind social media, because they should be waiting until they have multiple sources backing something. The point of journalism (in my opinion) is not to be first, but to be right.