Albeit the ubiquitous and public institution has weathered criticisms by academia in the past citing the platform for unreliable references and is constantly under siege by vandals and revisionists, Wikipedia’s record for dealing and dispatching with fake-news (following
Cunningham’s Law) is far better than that of other social media networks. Without question consumers of such streams of likes and like-mindedness ought to be encouraged to be more savvy, critical and literate when it comes journalism.
Like the argument espoused by
Big Thinker Katherine Maher, social media users would be as quick to extinguish a self-serving falsehood as an encyclopรฆdist in many cases but the difference in virality and endurance is not in giving users a means to conduct fact-checking but diverges much earlier—in the sequestered and opaque (probably even as unclear to the merchants of doom that profit from them) decisions of algorithms and market-models to promote one particular news item to one particular individual over another. Each user experience (UX) is of course unique and personal and no two people would be able to share that same tailored barrage of content, unlike being spectators at a sports event or rally or even being exposed to a suite of commercials on television. Until
social engineers and mediators can be more forthcoming about the profit-motives and why, to the best of their knowledge, one headline, advertisement was served to you instead of another.
Like the argument espoused by Big Thinker Katherine Maher, social media users would be as quick to extinguish a self-serving falsehood as an encyclopรฆdist in many cases but the difference in virality and endurance is not in giving users a means to conduct fact-checking but diverges much earlier—in the sequestered and opaque (probably even as unclear to the merchants of doom that profit from them) decisions of algorithms and market-models to promote one particular news item to one particular individual over another. Each user experience (UX) is of course unique and personal and no two people would be able to share that same tailored barrage of content, unlike being spectators at a sports event or rally or even being exposed to a suite of commercials on television. Until social engineers and mediators can be more forthcoming about the profit-motives and why, to the best of their knowledge, one headline, advertisement was served to you instead of another.
