Book Review: News Quality in the Digital Age

Media is no longer the sole domain of specialists such as journalists and editors; technology, with its various dimensions and rapid developments, continues to impact the media landscape and change its contours to such an extent that it becomes challenging for individuals to keep up with all the changes it has introduced, some of which are fundamental to how news is conveyed, its transmission methods, and interaction styles. Hence, the book “News Quality in the Digital Age” emerged as a product of collaboration among researchers from various disciplines, including communication sciences, political science, and digital technology. Most of them primarily adopt quantitative methods in their analysis; the majority of the book’s chapters rely on statistics, numbers, and participant samples from different countries, such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and Nigeria.

The quality of news is central to this effort because it is the heart of the news process. Without quality, the news process becomes a waste of time, effort, and money and could even be detrimental to society and its cohesion, affecting the idea of participation, which is one of the noble objectives of journalistic activity and perhaps the reason why journalism is often called the “fourth estate.” A critical need arises to discuss news quality in this era, which can rightly be termed the “Age of Algorithms,” as their impact has reached a level that necessitates a complete redefinition of journalistic work. The influence of algorithms has continued to grow, leading to fierce competition and their involvement in geopolitical conflicts. Therefore, the book devotes an entire chapter to this subject—Chapter Three—which explores the relationship between news quality and algorithms, the mathematical structures and formulas through which platforms such as Facebook and “X” (formerly Twitter) determine the content that users can follow. Here, an attempt is made to answer the question: How do algorithms shape people’s exposure to news and information?

The book surveys a range of methodological approaches concerned with studying news quality and its dissemination methods. It discusses various issues and draws from numerous methodologies to provide students and interested parties with precise knowledge on evaluating the quality of news published by diverse media outlets for public consumption. Additionally, it addresses news that promotes democracy and that which seeks to undermine it. This includes the phenomenon of politicians and governments turning to social media, with former President Donald Trump as one of the most notable examples. This increases the dangers associated with these platforms, particularly if the media manipulation executed by individuals and institutions specialized in political consulting succeeds, resulting in those consultants being rewarded with government positions following a candidate’s electoral victory.

One phase in which media manipulation proliferated was during the COVID-19 pandemic. The seriousness of the pandemic was compounded by the fact that some social media activists had a stronger presence than official health institutions, leading to the emergence of a term specifically for this phenomenon: “Infodemic.” Consequently, large institutions like the United Nations, as well as Facebook and Google, paid special attention to the information pandemic, and universities established research centers to explore ways to mitigate the risks of media manipulation. The U.S. Congress is studying the idea of legislation that increases the platforms’ responsibility for what is published through them. The book also addresses the concept of “Internet Incivility,” or the absence of civility in the electronic media space, and highlights an interesting viewpoint: the necessity for policymakers, namely governments, to engage more effectively in the discussion about news quality. They tend to avoid this to protect democracy, but the paradox here is that their non-intervention in policy-making might lead to the erosion of democracy.

The book is composed of 13 chapters distributed across four sections. The first section is foundational, including an introductory chapter and a chapter on communication techniques and threats to democracy. The second section focuses on quality measurement criteria and their methodologies, consisting of four chapters. The third section emphasizes algorithms and news quality, also including four chapters. The fourth section deals with news quality, government, and media policies, containing two chapters and a general conclusion. However, the book does not address a topic that is less important than the others, which is closely related to news quality and is known in the media as “post-truth politics.” Here, facts have less significance than emotions and the manipulation of feelings. Since Donald Trump was mentioned at the beginning of this book, it is appropriate to note that he is a pioneer of these policies, which proliferate primarily on social media—a subject that this book seeks to scrutinize.

The book features contributions from twenty-four researchers, meaning that some chapters were authored by two or sometimes three researchers each. These contributors hail from around fifteen specialized institutions, including research centers, specialized media companies, and universities. Thus, the book amalgamates different aspects of theory and practice, bridging the classroom with the field in search of avenues to reduce the flow of false and misleading information. One distinguishing characteristic of this book is its examination of the relationship between news quality and artificial intelligence, especially the algorithms that significantly influence the news production process, and discussions revolving around efforts aimed at establishing public policies designed to save a journalistic ecosystem suffering from numerous gaps, according to Deborah Wenger from the University of Mississippi. The global community remains focused on enacting laws related to media flow, such as the “Digital Services Act,” which serves as the central framework regulating media and its operations in the European Union.

Nevertheless, the book is predominantly focused on the geographical aspect, dealing with media in Western countries, with the exception of a chapter dedicated to media in Nigeria. This presents a gap related to its scope, as it concentrates on a specific region of the world, touching only lightly on other areas. Some may argue that this gap is justified since this region produces the knowledge that brings both solutions and problems, and thus they are addressing what their knowledge generates in terms of challenges. However, the counterargument is that every culture and every region has its specific needs. The question here is: what is our role in the Arab world in this regard? The answer is that the Arab region can benefit from the methods and approaches used to address these issues, adapting them as necessary rather than adopting them wholesale, and building upon them as needed.

  1. A Problematic Question How can society increase the flow and inverse impact of media misinformation—meaning a flow of accurate information and high-quality news? This problematic question branches into several others: How should high-quality news be defined? How can platforms be designed, or even redesigned, to meet this demand?

Currently, and from a practical standpoint, news consumers, platform owners, and legislators each define quality according to their perspectives, orientations, and the demands of their daily work circumstances. There is no doubt that “quality” is a notion that may be subjective, leading to increased challenges in outlining its parameters. Today, news spreads across numerous devices, and the process of disseminating information is affected by the activity of individuals lacking professional training, such as bloggers and citizen journalists sharing news through their mobile devices.

  1. Terminologies and Perspectives The introduction of the book pays special attention to three terms: “platforms,” “quality,” and “news.” A platform is defined as “an infrastructure that accepts programming and through which new programs are designed and managed.” One of its characteristics is that it is based on a technical social aggregation process, meaning that it is not purely technological but subject to the systems that create, manage, and make it accessible to those who wish to speak, share, and build social connections. However, these platforms—according to the text—are not as their direct definition suggests; they do not provide neutral or straightforward services like a train platform, rather, they are convoluted and multi-layered with complex attributes. Thus, the issue of news quality becomes increasingly complicated day by day, as editors Regina Lawrence and Philip Napoli observe due to the unique pairing of journalism and democratic society. High-quality news serves to encourage the public to play a conscious role in representative democracy.

Consequently, news quality can be viewed from three perspectives: First: the presence of specific elements in the content that can be measured, firmly establishing that the flow of information is healthy for the individual and society. Second: the purposes of news consumers and what they expect from it. Third: it relates to the infrastructure of information shaped by various media outlets that contribute to enabling collective knowledge and civic awareness or hindering them, yet quality news is described as “a dynamic construction without agreement.” Thus, an old question resurfaces: what makes content newsworthy? This is a central question in the book, considering the complex media environment today, where non-traditional media entities contribute to shaping public awareness through what might be termed “news-like content.” This is what the book aims to stimulate discussion about, rather than providing a definitive answer.

The book addresses the growing research on digital platforms and how they shape audience access to news and information. It issues a call to move beyond the prevailing structures in digital media toward issues such as media fragmentation, leading to a flow of information marred by various complications. There is a striking contradiction concerning social media, as “billions of users spend considerable time on social media, while most express distrust in the information they encounter on these platforms.” Therefore, it is crucial to focus on the infrastructure that shapes this information environment. To understand the challenges posed by the digital media environment to democracy, one must reconstruct approaches that emphasize the structural and perceptual elements in building the information system.

  1. Structure and Specificity of Digital Media There are two primary characteristics of digital media: The first is the vast extent of choices and significant fragmentation, which translates to a massive variety of information outlets available; for instance, the number of outlets accessible to a single household increased to 189 by 2013 and continued to expand with the internet’s prevalence. This led to further fragmentation referred to in the book as “ideological separation,” intensifying polarization, which structuralist theory argues has doubled due to the rise of politically charged echo chambers that block any perspective other than its own from reaching its consumers. The second characteristic relates to the structural design of digital media linked to polarization and misinformation spread. The speed with which misinformation proliferates is evident in digital media. Here, polarization and misinformation can mutually reinforce one another. In summary, both contribute to the formation of misconceptions, posing a threat to genuine democracy. Additionally, digital media platforms adopt a business model that prioritizes profit over content ethics.

The book discusses the current challenges in defining news that has been reshaped by the changes introduced by new media and social media platforms, concentrating on measuring news quality. It emphasizes the divergence between the standards upheld by social media platform companies and those of high-quality news. Digital media has not yet reached a level of design that enables it to provide high-quality news because its structure was initially aimed at promoting the popularity of content at the expense of quality. According to a survey by the Pew Research Center, “one in four adults in the United States gets news from social media platforms like Facebook and YouTube.”

Social media’s popularity arises from its diverse approaches to handling news, where ordinary people can create their news, encounter what their friends publish, and receive recommendations from algorithms. They can also engage with the news through comments, sharing, and liking, regardless of the damage these features inflict on the idea of credibility. While people’s sharing may provide feedback and suggest that it contributes to enhancing democracy through equitable opportunities in sending and receiving, it may also lead to market-driven journalism that reduces news quality; social media does not aim to disseminate high-quality news but rather to maximize user interest and engagement.

Quality is defined as “a trait or service or effectiveness that has high value in a certain community or group.” The definition of quality boundaries is related to context and field and is contingent upon individual preferences and tastes. Yet, because journalism is supposed to elevate democratic values and monitor institutional work, and because it is expected to provide the public with accurate information, discussions about accuracy, comprehensiveness, transparency, objectivity, authenticity, and diversity—concepts central to the news process—gain particular importance when discussing quality. Since the concept of quality, in its inception, is associated with goods, the book refers to the marketing world in the product evaluation of news.

In the marketing realm, three types of goods prevail, depending on how difficult it is to assess the quality of a product or service. The first type encompasses goods that are easy to evaluate before use—those that are simple to inspect, such as furniture and tablets. The second type pertains to goods that require experience for evaluation, like food and films. The third type consists of goods that cannot be evaluated before use or immediately after; they require time, such as legal and educational services. In light of this classification, journalism includes the last two categories, indicating that testing and waiting are essential. This, in turn, presents a challenge; by the time an opportunity for evaluation arises, the time may have passed.

  1. Thresholds and Three Proposals There are two approaches to determining news quality. The first examines blatant false content that is detrimental to societal or democratic health, termed the “minimal threshold.” The second involves elevating this threshold through a rigorous assessment of journalistic values and professional standards. One example of this approach is the awards conferred to institutions that prioritize news quality, such as the “Pulitzer Prize,” which has been awarded since 1917 to journalistic entities demonstrating high quality and professionalism. However, a weakness of this approach is its focus on mainstream institutions, like the “New York Times,” which has won the Pulitzer Prize more than any other.

To tackle the problem of low quality, three proposals arise: The first suggests activating algorithms to prioritize the public good. The second proposal involves creating tools that enable users to evaluate news. For instance, the “X” platform has launched what it calls “Birdwatch,” allowing ordinary users to identify and report misleading tweets. The third proposal advocates for long-term support for public media provided by governments, institutions, and technology companies. The question here is: Who ensures that government and corporate sponsorship of public media benefits the people? It is essential to note that quality also begins from within media organizations; hence, there is a term today known as “quality journalism,” “in-depth journalism,” and before that, “interpretative journalism,” which focuses on providing a journalistic product to counter false news and media manipulation.

The gap between commercial standards, if one may say, and news quality from the user/citizen perspective constitutes an important subject in the book, and it seeks to answer the question: How does the public decide whether an online story deserves the label of “news”? The discourse here concerns “news-ness,” or “a specific media content regarded as news by recipients.” But how can the recipient determine what constitutes news? The answer lies first in the medium. A printed newspaper is more likely than a social media site to contain newsworthy content. Andrew Flanagin and Miriam Metzger note that one determinant of news credibility is the nature of its publisher (e.g., whether it is a radio station, television, magazine, or newspaper). Therefore, a news item appearing on the Associated Press website tends to have credibility. However, the same news shared via “X” may be subject to skepticism. Nevertheless, the medium itself is not a decisive criterion for determining the quality and credibility of news; a reputable media outlet can slip, even if temporarily, into a political polarization battle favoring one side over the other.

Digitalization, among other things, has led to the emergence of a new feature in the news process: the introduction of comments accompanying published news, affecting both news quality and reception methods. The book explores the specific element of comments in electronic news and how they can shape perceptions about news quality, particularly rude comments, which influence both news quality and the spread of bias. Institutions employ two mechanisms for generalizing comments: the first via human selection, and the second through algorithms that rely on the number of likes and shares for each comment. Given that it is crucial to assess news quality from a user’s perspective, this requires examining comments, especially if they have the power to influence the recipient’s judgment of the news and its quality. However, how can one verify quality and its components in this case—neutrality, plurality, objectivity, and precision? Given that comments are user-generated, studies have shown that recipients “cannot evaluate news quality accurately.”

Incivility is defined as “a deviation from traditional ideals in public discourse,” meaning it violates reciprocity rules and disrespects citizens’ rights or poses a threat to democracy. There is a discussion here that incivility in comments may have reduced perceived news quality among consumers. Moreover, there is a relationship between comments and what is termed “obtrusiveness”; involved issues are those that intrude upon everyone’s space and influence their perceptions of news quality. The book concludes that rude comments on social media diminish news quality, no matter how few they may be.

  1. Alternative Evaluation Standards The book employs empirical methods to explore how people evaluate the quality of electronic journalistic narratives. It addresses what is known as the “Roper Question,” which investigates news credibility standards depending on whether the news comes from a radio station, television, magazine, or newspaper. However, this criterion, introduced in the mid-20th century and still in use by the century’s end, no longer suffices due to the complexity introduced by the internet and the communication revolution. Hence, other evaluation standards have emerged, such as those proposed by Matthias Kohring in 2007, where he and his colleague Jörg Matthes designed a four-point scale based on trust:
  2. Trust in topic selection.
  3. Trust in fact selection.
  4. Trust in accuracy of description.
  5. Trust in journalistic evaluation.

Other researchers have suggested alternative criteria, including presentation methods, transparency, balance, and entertainment value. Not surprisingly, the latter criterion was produced by the American Press Institute in 2016, where entertainment holds significance in American culture. A third group added additional criteria such as news comprehensiveness, completeness, and accuracy. There is also the matter of gathering negative information; the Pew Research Center considers this promising in evaluating news stories, although it also acknowledges that news evaluations here are low.

The book analyzes how algorithms, utilized by news organizations like the “New York Times” and social media platforms such as “X,” can negatively impact a fundamental dimension of news quality and its flow—namely local news. Research indicates that the “New York Times” has decreased its focus on local news for New York City over the past two decades in favor of national and global news. For instance, in 2000, local news in the paper received 200,000 words per month, whereas before that, it received a million words. This trend is associated with the rise of social media platforms that address local news, as newspapers cannot compete with these platforms either in terms of speed or the continuous flow of news consumption by the public. The book discusses news flow models, such as the two-step flow, where news is published through a medium and then disseminated by opinion leaders. There is another model, as Philip Napoli notes, which operates on five steps:

  1. A news organization produces the story.
  2. The organization curates the story and shares it on social media.
  3. Social media filters the story toward news consumers.
  4. Some immediate consumers share the news within their networks.
  5. Social media filters the reshared story towards indirect consumers.

The concept of curation plays a central role here as each news recipient broadcasts the story to others through infinite networks of immediate and indirect consumers.

Types of Control The book focuses on users’ abilities to contribute to the design of algorithms, examining whether their limited capacity to control what platforms display can transform into an effective means for citizens to influence their news environment. It highlights the paradox where consumers encounter a constant influx of information aligning with their existing orientations due to algorithms’ control over responding to news consumers’ desires on social media platforms through what is termed the “Filter Bubble.” Thus, informing the public about how algorithms work could empower them against confining themselves to exposure only to their echo chambers. This concept is referred to as “empowered users,” defined by the potential for control and theoretical agency the user is presumed to have within information systems based on recommending what news is presented. These are known as “recommender systems,” a rising phenomenon in media research. Here, the concept of the user as a participant in the communicative process is discussed through their engagement with comments and more, although this usually remains regulated by what the platforms provide.

However, the question persists: how can users take control? They have two forms of control: overt and covert. This refers to customization based on personal desires and recommendations. Customization, as a form of overt control, allows users to set their preferences, while covert control offers little more than feedback. The discussion concludes that participants rarely engage in the control process; even when they do, they don’t sustain that engagement. Thus, their effectiveness regarding news quality diminishes.

The book addresses the daily work of journalists, using the case of several individuals working in a media outlet that employs artificial intelligence in Nigeria and sub-Saharan Africa as a study subject to understand how they write for AI and how AI-contributed news shapes their understanding of journalism. The discussion reveals that media organizations valuing reader loyalty and trust focus on adopting algorithms with a personal dimension, enabling them to achieve diversity and understand users’ stances while acting according to their suggestions. However, this focus on the personal aspect may lower the level of diversity that these organizations strive to achieve, as each user retreats to their own preferences and arranges customizations according to their aims. Thus, what algorithms provide does not align with what is suitable for diversity and orientation.

The book calls for greater collaboration between journalists and artificial intelligence specialists to improve news production systems, indicating that one area for cooperation could be in developing publication standards, categories of acceptable information, feedback methods, and evaluation processes to build effective news production systems that ultimately uphold journalism and genuine democratic values. Researchers focus on the following values: accuracy, news comprehensiveness, independence, avoiding exclusion, participation, representation, diversity, circulation, and tolerance. It discusses Australia’s unprecedented effort to establish a rating system stipulating what essential responsibilities major companies, such as Google and Facebook, have regarding the news content they publish. However, this system is criticized for not providing a clear definition of quality, resulting in ambiguity when distinguishing between high-quality journalism and public-interest journalism.

The book also traces the political dynamics surrounding the policymaking process concerning news quality in three countries: the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, including the different stages of news production, distribution, and consumption. Here, it summarizes that policymakers tend to shy away from the concept as a guiding principle in favor of politically charged terms, such as public-interest journalism. While the book emphasizes the need for government intervention, it does not overlook the risks of such involvement in democracy; hence, politicians in the three countries have avoided delving deeper into news quality issues. However, the belief is that government intervention is necessary, at least to a degree, to reinforce the principles of professional journalism within reasonable limits.

Conclusion Since the dissemination of news is a right of the reader, and its quality aids consumers in forming sound viewpoints, it represents a concern not only for specialists but also for legislators, researchers, reformers, educational systems, and everyone involved in the well-being, safety, prosperity, and democratization of society. There are multiple avenues to enhance the quality of news, and it is crucial for numerous stakeholders to collaborate actively with their efforts, research, and activities to ensure that news creators and managers of large platforms have no escape from adhering to the agreed-upon values and standards regarding news quality and implementing mechanisms that guarantee a news transmission process beneficial to the democratic process and conscious political participation. Countries would do well to regulate platform behaviors and operational mechanisms within their territories through laws and regulations and taxes that align with the objectives of those nations and their communities. However, all this might not yield results unless bolstered by activating and generalizing the ethics of information consumption, so that consumers are shielded against bias and are vigilant about the operational dynamics of algorithms while being equipped with sustainable critical thinking—a matter that, despite its importance, the book does not address. Thus, it is essential to stress the significance of digital media literacy that provides consumers with the analytical and deconstructionist tools necessary to analyze information, seek it in its appropriate contexts, and interact with it professionally and objectively.

As laws do not contain clear definitions of journalism, news, and quality, governments enact laws based on certain understandings and have yet to keep pace with the technological revolution that significantly influences communication tools. Thus, the importance of individual ethics emerges. The book’s concern for democracy is evident; effective democracy is built on accurate assumptions, which can only be achieved through precise information. In the Arab context, the need for accurate information may be even more critical, as democracy is not fully realized. Thus, inaccurate information could exacerbate the obstacles impeding efforts toward democracy and plurality, underscoring the importance of civil society institutions taking a proactive role in promoting a culture of accuracy and transparency in information dissemination, contrasting with the situation of countries where democracy has stabilized.

Book Information

  • News Quality in the Digital Age
  • Edited by: Regina G. Lawrence and Philip M. Napoli
  • Series: Media and Power
  • Publisher: Routledge, United Kingdom
  • Publication Date: 2023
  • Language: English
  • Edition: First
  • Number of Pages: 216
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SAKHRI Mohamed
SAKHRI Mohamed

I hold a Bachelor's degree in Political Science and International Relations in addition to a Master's degree in International Security Studies. Alongside this, I have a passion for web development. During my studies, I acquired a strong understanding of fundamental political concepts and theories in international relations, security studies, and strategic studies.

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