News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism 9781119706496, 9781119706472, 9781119706502, 9781119706519

Citation preview

News Media Innovation Reconsidered

News Media Innovation Reconsidered Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism

Edited by María Luengo

Universidad Carlos III de Madrid Madrid, Spain

Susana Herrera-Damas

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Universidad Carlos III de Madrid Madrid, Spain

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

This edition first published 2021 © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, except as permitted by law. Advice on how to obtain permission to reuse material from this title is available at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions. The right of María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas to be identified as the authors of the editorial material in this work has been asserted in accordance with law. Registered Office John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, USA Editorial Office 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, USA For details of our global editorial offices, customer services, and more information about Wiley products visit us at www.wiley.com. Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some content that appears in standard print versions of this book may not be available in other formats.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty While the publisher and authors have used their best efforts in preparing this work, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this work and specifically disclaim all warranties, including without limitation any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives, written sales materials or promotional statements for this work. The fact that an organization, website, or product is referred to in this work as a citation and/or potential source of further information does not mean that the publisher and authors endorse the information or services the organization, website, or product may provide or recommendations it may make. This work is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering professional services. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a specialist where appropriate. Further, readers should be aware that websites listed in this work may have changed or disappeared between when this work was written and when it is read. Neither the publisher nor authors shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Paperback: 9781119706496 ePDF: 9781119706472 epub: 9781119706502 oBook: 9781119706519 Cover image: © Busakorn Pongparnit/iStock/Getty Images Cover design by Wiley Set in 9.5/12.5 STIXTwoText by Integra Software Services Pvt. Ltd, Pondicherry, India 10  9  8  7  6  5  4  3  2  1

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

v

Table of Contents Introduction:  Journalism’s Creative Reconstruction: How Innovation in News Is Embracing Enduring Professional and Civil Values  vii María Luengo Journalism, Ethics, and Innovation in Times of Digital Turbulence  1 1 An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism  3 José Alberto García-Avilés 2 Democratically Engaged Journalists: Ethical Invention amid Unreasonable Publics  20 Stephen J.A. Ward 3 Journalism Innovation in a Time of Survival  40 Alfred Hermida and Mary Lynn Young News Ethics and Emerging Journalistic Narratives  53

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

4 Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism  55 María José Benítez de Gracia, Sara Pérez-Seijo, and Susana Herrera-Damas  5 Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games  73 Salvador Gómez-García and Juan Martín-Quevedo 6 Guiding the Adoption of News Storytelling Design Through Ethics: The Use of Stories in Google’s AMP Project  92 Mariché Navío-Navarro and Laura González-Díez

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

vi

Table of Contents 

Interrogating  Data, Algorithms, and Automatization Through Journalism Ethics  105 7 Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation: What the Panama Papers Have Taught Us About Ethics  107 Helena Cortés and María Luengo 8 Semi-automated Journalism: Reinforcing Ethics to Make the Most of Artificial Intelligence for Writing News  124 José Luis Rojas Torrijos 9 Ethical Challenges in Incorporating Artificial Intelligence into Newsrooms  138 Teresa Barceló-Ugarte, José Manuel Pérez-Tornero, and Pere Vila-Fumàs Journalistic Innovation at the Service of the Public  155 10 Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know  157 Michaëla Cancela-Kieffer 11 Ethical Dilemmas in the Personalization of News from Voice Interfaces  174 Luis Miguel Pedrero-Esteban and Beatriz Gas-Gozalbo 12 Transparency, Innovation, and Journalism  187 Rogério Christofoletti 13 Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation  202 Óscar Espíritusanto and Inès Dinant

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Conclusion  222 Susana Herrera-Damas

Index  228

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

vii

Introduction Journalism’s Creative Reconstruction: How Innovation in News Is Embracing Enduring Professional and Civil Values

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

María Luengo News media are suffering a Schumpeterian “creative destruction” (Schumpeter, 1975 [1942]). This has been the received wisdom among scholars and media watchers evaluating the impact of digital technology on journalism today. However, is “creative destruction” an appropriate term in this case? The use of it to explain this recent period of upheaval in journalism usually involves reductive techno-economic paradigms that overlook critical cultural and ethical dimensions. This collective book aims to understand technological innovation as “creative reconstruction” (Alexander, 2016). The idea of creative reconstruction was coined by cultural sociologist Jeffrey C. Alexander around 2014, after he and a group of cultural sociologists and journalism scholars expressed frustration at how academics and pundits were narrowly theorizing in purely technological and economic terms the current “crisis of journalism” and the consequent changes and innovations in news. This perspective was crystalized in The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered (Alexander, Breese, and Luengo, 2016), a book that shows how crisis and change in journalism are equally caused by cultural and ethical factors. The empirical investigations in The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered demonstrate that intense alarm over digital change implies the strength of both journalistic ethics and democratic values (Carlson, 2016; Luengo, 2016). The book argues that the compulsion to defend these ethical and civil commitments actually energizes a search for new organizational and technological forms. In line with this previous cultural sociological theorizing and research, this book focuses on the energizing of journalism’s ethical and civil ideals by looking at emerging journalistic practices and products such as 360-degree immersive journalism, newsgames, the automatization and personalization of news, artificial-intelligence news production, and data journalism. Our book theoretically and empirically explores new concepts, models, initiatives, and practices that show how forms of professional ethics that overlap notably with civil ideals—truth seeking, transparency, accuracy, accountability, and civic engagement, among other ethical values—are invigorating the innovative dimension of journalism. If Alexander, Breese, and Luengo’s cultural sociological perspective issued a significant challenge to the technological and economic view of a so-called “crisis” in the sector in a recent context of dramatic changes within journalism, this new collective book entails a fresh turn of the screw against reductive explanations, this time specifically within the area of news innovation.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

viii

Introduction

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Ups and Downs of Techno-economic Explanations It is becoming increasingly evident that new digital technologies and new forms of news production and distribution have gradually led to the emergence of innovative and consolidated journalistic organizations. Many pure digital media born more than a decade ago have survived the current crisis facing the news industry and now compete alongside major legacy media nationally and globally. On the other hand, many other initiatives have failed, and well-established national and local journalistic enterprises have cut jobs drastically or just disappeared from the market. And news media companies are continuing to suffer enormous hits to advertising as a result of COVID-19. Media experts and scholars explain the emergence of new actors (and the erosion and digital reinvention of old ones) in the Schumpeterian economic terms of “creative destruction” (Bruno and Nielsen, 2012; Schlesinger and Doyle, 2014; Nee, 2013; García-Avilés, 2016; Negredo et al., 2020). Schlesinger and Doyle’s exploration of how major UK media groups have responded to the crisis in printed newspapers draws on this economic pattern. They argue that, because of advancing technology, “the value of large, dominant incumbent firms that fail to transform themselves eventually becomes eroded and, in some cases, completely destroyed” (Schlesinger and Doyle, 2014, p. 2). In Bruno and Nielsen’s pioneering report on journalistic online start-ups in Western Europe (2012), pure digital media players, which are first tentatively located on the “creative” side of this Schumpeterian process, are also seen as subjects of destruction in the same way as inherited business models are. Explanations of the rise, survival, success, or failure of new players and the destruction of old ones seem to reflect a process through which new technologies and new markets cause the “mutation” of journalistic organizations (Boczkowski, 2004) and the whole media system from within. Just as technology and economics bring the “destructive” element, they also embody the “creative” one. Responses to the transformations of journalism include technological innovations, innovative ways to measure and analyze audience figures, and new business models (sources of revenues, ownership, and financial sustainability). The success or failure of new media are also measured and assessed according to technoeconomic factors. Through the process of creative destruction, technology and economics impose “a regime of trial and error and of making wagers,” as Jean-Gustave Padioleau puts it. The image of creative destruction establishes a present scenario and foresees a digital future in which new players are forced to compete with old ones, and new arrivals successfully win niche markets using up-to-the-minute technology. Padioleau observes that “under the guise of innovation, activities disappear to make room for newer, more ‘creative,’ more reliable/efficient ones. According to Schumpeter, creative destruction is at the heart of economic growth” (Padioleau, 2006, p. 110). Schumpeter’s economic reductionism parallels a narrow technological understanding of journalism innovation. Drawing on research on journalism in Canada, Hermida and Young’s thought-provoking Chapter 3 in this book examines whether legacy newsrooms’ defensive adoption of innovation “as a technological-led solution” to economically navigate financial turbulence has been to their detriment. By entering into “the cycle of the never-ending pivots in the search for the killer innovation that will save the media,” Hermida and Young say, journalistic organizations get trapped in it.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Seeing Creative Destruction as Creative Reconstruction

And in times of survival, they argue, few can afford to adopt the latest shiny new technology.

Seeing Creative Destruction as Creative Reconstruction Padioleau (2006, p. 10) is critical of the use of the term “creative destruction” in describing the crisis facing the media, on the basis that it is misleading. Is creative destruction a deceptive label? This terminology focuses mainly on economics and ignores the critical cultural and ethical component when explaining current changes in journalism. This book aims to put current technological innovations of journalism into the broader context of professional ethics and civil values. It examines journalism innovation from the energizing of ethics, looking at specific arenas of such innovation, from new forms and narratives to processes and ways of dissemination. Without denying the tangible role played by digital technology and market conditions in reshaping the news today, this collaborative book takes a different angle to interpret recent changes in news media. Contrary to reductive techno-economic explanations, the contributors’ analyses of new journalistic forms and practices help show the power of journalistic and civil values for invigorating the profession. By looking at the ethical dimension of different initiatives and innovations in various countries, the chapters in this book seek to advance cultural and ethical insights into journalistic innovation. Alexander (2016, p. 2) points out that:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Recent technological change and the economic upheaval it has produced are coded by social meanings … Cultural codes not only trigger sharp anxiety about technological and economic changes; they also provide pathways to control them, so that the democratic practices of independent journalism, rather than being destroyed, can be sustained in new forms. Following Alexander, contributors to this book were invited to look at news media innovations from the ethical values that make technological innovation sustainable. The various contributions to this book make it possible to identify the ethical and professional codes that are invigorating the profession through digital technologies. The selected innovations are characterized by an online-only or online-first approach, conveying the news via websites, mobile apps, or social networks. They integrate expe­rienced journalists, journalistic entrepreneurs, reporters, and computer scientists. The ethical perspective deployed to cross-examine the different innovations discussed also serves as the basis for the theoretical argument behind this book: ethics and values can be envisioned as pathways to a creative reconstruction of journalism. This new conceptualization transcends the economic logic of a creative destruction, which, according to Alexander (2016), would result in the destruction of the economic foundations of journalism. “Journalism would become Exhibit A of capitalist ‘creative destruction,’” he observes [p. 7]. In this vein, in the following two sections, I wish to briefly draw attention to the performative power of journalism for innovative repair by looking at the professional and civil values that may be generating and sustaining new entrants in the news media digital ecosystem. To what extent does the ethics of

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

ix

x

Introduction

journalism prevail and foster quality journalism through innovation within new disruptive digital scenarios? How are these ethical values shaped by new journalistic initiatives? To address these questions, I first use some of the closing remarks of Breese and Luengo’s (2016) “News Innovations and Enduring Commitments” chapter as scaffolding to semiotically map the arena of news media innovation as a symbolic place where journalism’s entrenched ethical codes are being re-signified. Then, I apply this theoretical framework performatively to new journalistic forms and practices at the intersection between ethics and technological innovation. This last section will serve as a more explicit introduction to the specific content of the chapters.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Mapping News Innovation Culturally A cultural sociology insight into news media innovation allows us to reconsider how the core journalistic values of long-established new media organizations are now being re-signified by new technologies, work processes, and forms of news production and distribution. While the meanings of technologies and practices quickly change, the symbolic codes of journalism remain. Professional values such as “truth,” “accuracy,” “independence,” and “criticism” represent some of the cultural codes of professional journalism, while “falsehood,” “bias,” “inaccuracy,” and “dependence” often describe counter-values of professionalism (Breese and Luengo, 2016). When journalism entered the digital era, the printing press and legacy media had a monopoly over codes of professional journalism, whereas the Internet and new digital media have stood for opposing values. García-Avilés’s Chapter 1 reflects the way in which these values and counter-values of professionalism explain the initial uneasy relationship between ethics and digital technologies in journalism. From 2008, enduring journalistic values have been incorporated into a narrative of “crisis” (see Hermida and Young’s Chapter 3) shared by many practitioners, experts, and scholars (Alexander, Breese, and Luengo, 2016). The crisis narrative associated technologies, forms, and practices of traditional media, particularly printed newspapers, with professional journalism. Many forms, practices, and processes of well-established news organizations around the world had already become potent symbols of professionalism. Traditional media were “signifieds” (meanings) of a broader “signifier”—professional journalism. As Figure I.1 shows, there is an ongoing relationship between signified and signifier. What was signified becomes possible signifier. By combining signifier and signified, many traditional forms of journalism became signs (symbols) of core journalistic and democratic values. Based on this signification, digital technologies have been coded as tangible sites of the threat to the profession. Digitalization broke this monopoly power. In the recent context of rapid technological change and economic upheaval, new digital ventures have proliferated, and the pace of change in the signifieds associated with them has accelerated. The continuous work of re-signification progressively places digital technologies on the side of journalistic standards. As Breese and Luengo (2016, p. 284) explain, When blogs, Twitter, online-only news, live-streaming news, and other technologies enter newsrooms as new avenues for presenting news to the public, they tend to be greeted with anxiety. At first, mainstream journalists distance

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Mapping News Innovation Culturally

Independence Truth-seeking Fairness Accuracy Symbolic codes

Print / legacy media Signified Professional Journalism Signifier

Figure I.1  The “Crisis in news narrative:” print/legacy media as meanings associated with professional journalism.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

themselves from the technologies and related practices, dismissing them as antithetical to journalistic standards. Over time what had represented a threat to the news when it was “new” comes to successfully represent the civil codes of professional journalism. Matthias Revers’s (2016) comparative analysis of how Twitter was adopted by journalists from the official press corps in New York and Bavaria shows the different ways in which digital media encounter specific journalism cultures “which draw from entrenched symbols and sacred discourses of journalism” (Revers, 2016, p. 231). Revers explains how these symbolic codes stand for boundary work that protects the journalistic profession against “competing occupations” as well as “deviant insiders.” He conceives the amalgamation of digital culture and professional journalism as a “cultural performance” (Alexander, 2004), “in which collective representations of professionalism provide the symbolic strength and substantive basis for scripts to act professionally in concrete situations” (Revers, 2016, p. 232). This boundary process and cultural performance implies a symbolic struggle for newcomers to meet and assert journalistic standards so that they can be considered full players in themselves. New media have produced a discourse seeking to purify past negative characterizations that have positioned them as a threat to journalism. Thus, newly-founded ventures distance themselves from the polluting effects of the market and claims about the financial sustainability of their innovative business models. Once considered the cause of massive layoffs of journalists, falls in advertising revenues, drastic cuts in newsrooms, and other catastrophic consequences in the news business, digital technology is now presented as sustaining journalism. Online news start-ups, for example, have become for many the safety valve of journalism. Born-digital small companies successfully fill market niches of information, reaching where mainstream media cannot. The characterization of news websites, clicks, social networks, or web statistics has shifted from their being seen as sources of aggregative, superficial, sensational, and commodified news to their becoming tools for reporting original stories, breaking news, and conducting in-depth investigative journalism. Figure I.2 conveys this re-signification of the symbolic codes of professional journalism.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

xi

xii

Introduction

Figure I.2  The re-signification of professional journalism through new digital forms.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

New Journalistic Performances on Stage: Ethics Vis-à-Vis Innovation In Chapter 2, Ward offers the challenging notion of “democratically engaged journalism” to reconsidered journalism’s civil morals today. Ward contextualizes his conceptual proposal within a “toxic sphere of partisan, global media.” In many cases, digital technology has helped to feed our complex civil spheres with polarization and exclusion. In turbulent times of “irrational publics” (Ward, Chapter 2) and dizzying political shocks, the association of digital forms’ new meanings with the signifier of professional journalism must go through a cultural process in which moral values such as civil commitment, solidarity, social justice, dialog, and inclusion are highlighted (see Figure I.2). Contributions to this book show how, intermingled and reinforced by these civil and democratic values, truth seeking, fairness, independent reporting, and other enduring symbolic codes of journalism not only inspire new journalistic initiatives but also help to ensure journalism’s long-term survival. The journalistic innovations examined in this book raise the value of engagement. In line with other recent studies on journalism’s immersive storytelling (Jones, 2017; Kukkakorpi and Pantti, 2020), Benitez, Pérez-Seijo, and Herrera (Chapter 4) emphasize audience engagement as one of the specific characteristics that makes 360-degree video journalism disruptive and innovative, along with first-person experience, the illusion of presence, and empathy. However, as Benitez et al. show, to be successfully incorporated into journalistic practices and organizations, immersive journalism needs to reflect more than the audience’s emotional engagement. It needs to become civil engagement by the way in which narratives cathartically bring compassion and solidarity into the audience experience. Social connectedness goes beyond empathy, and the feeling for others and putting oneself in the place of another person represent more than a mere illusion of presence recreated by technological effects. To foster civil engagement, 360-degree immersive journalism must be based

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

New Journalistic Performances on Stage: Ethics Vis-à-Vis Innovation

on credible stories that preserve the accuracy and integrity of spaces, images, and sounds and that are constructed using a careful search and selection of news sources. The case studies in this chapter show the way in which successful journalistic approaches to 360-degree news have been guided by professional codes of transparency, truthfulness, and responsibility. Gómez-García and Martín-Quevedo’s Chapter 5 reflects a similar tension between the audience’s emotional engagement and accurate reporting of the facts. The authors describe successful performances of new forms of interactive journalism that incorporate gameplay. These performances involve an ongoing cultural struggle against the immorality of playing with real-world events, deaths, and suffering. In this struggle, entertainment and triviality give way to the design of relevant social and political simulations that progressively include more investigative sources and perspectives. Stories based on biased, personalized objectives, which guide the gamer by targeting groups and individuals, turn into innovative newsgaming projects that ensure transparency and responsibility without losing the engaging and emotional dimension of gameplay. New journalistic narratives may reflect how journalistic institutions are producing news in a more engaged way. In their analysis of “stamp story” formats, Navío-Navarro and González-Díaz (Chapter 6) argue that this new way of disseminating the news helps to reach and engage with, for instance, Gen Z and Millennial audiences immersed in a digital culture, by maintaining journalism’s complexity and interpretation. The use of big data has brought into journalism new ethical concerns in relation to transparency and the quality and bias of the data sets being used. These polluting effects of data available through digital technology, however, seem to have been partially overcome by some new forms of collaborative investigative journalism. Drawing on the metajournalistic discourses on the Panama Papers from different newspapers that investigated the leaked documents of Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca, Cortés and Luengo (Chapter 7) observe that data journalists place themselves on an unpolluted side of new investigative reporting, in which, far from activism, data serve democratic-accountability journalism. Other current ethical concerns specify the cultural performance of new journalistic forms, practices, and processes within the area of algorithms, bots, and automatization. Rojas Torrijos’s Chapter 8 focuses on the ethics of journalism generated by machines. Barceló-Ugarte et al.’s Chapter 9 explores the specific incorporation of artificial intelligence (AI) into Spanish public television’s workflows, emphasizing the ethical challenges posed by the different phases of newsgathering, documentation, writing, publishing, archiving, and audience analysis. As Chapters 8 and 9 explain, AI is changing the way in which news is created. Most of these changes—to give an example, in May 2020, Microsoft was accused of sacking journalists working at its MSN website and replacing them with AI software (Waterson, The Guardian, May 30, 2020)—are interpreted as threats to journalism. Yet layoffs of journalists by digital publishers are not the only reason for seeing automated technology as foreshadowing journalism’s extinction. A few weeks after the layoffs at Microsoft, MSN.com published a news story about the mixed-race pop star Jade Thirlwall’s personal reflection on racism; the story was illustrated with the wrong mixed-race member of the singer’s band, Little Mix. Thirlwall had been attending a Black Lives Matter protest in London. The anecdote triggered widespread criticism

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

xiii

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

xiv

Introduction

within the media of Microsoft’s employment of robots that cannot differentiate mixedrace individuals. More significantly, it echoed current ethical debates on alleged racist biases (and other types of human distortions) in AI software coding. Rojas analysis of some of the best practices of AI journalism shows that a “semiautomated” journalism, in which human reporters and robots work together, might help to overcome criticism focused on software’s biases as well as another ethical challenges that AI poses to journalism. The selected initiatives show how algorithms and bots are used by leading journalistic organizations to broaden news media coverage and enhance high-quality reporting on public-interest issues, such as police information on homicides (Los Angeles Times) or earthquake warnings (Los Angeles Times and Oregon Public Broadcasting). These journalistic projects bring to the forefront of news media innovation the combination of old and “new guiding principles” for a new digital era of journalism (McBride and Rosenstiel, 2014)—for example, verification, rigor, depth, civil engagement, or community. Taking the British Press Association’s automated news service RADAR (Reporters and Data Robots) as an example, Rojas Torrijos (Chapter 8) highlights the community value of algorithmic journalism, which is currently meeting “the increasing demand for fact-based news for local communities” by delivering datadriven localized versions of stories to the UK’s local newsrooms (PA Media Group, 2018). Likewise, in other countries around the world, semi-automated news is filling the gap left by the disappearance of local reporting, and consequently it is contributing to building a sense of community. The combining of speed and verification, as well as of reporting and investigation, and the providing of both public interest news and community-driven stories are, among other professional and civil values, the basis of journalism innovation achieved through AI. New semiautomated journalistic practices mirror the way in which journalism is, to quote Rojas Torrijos, “acquiring a new vision that can cope with change so as to make professional ethics the guiding thread that anchors and stimulates innovation” (Rojas Torrijos, Chapter 8). This book ends with a section devoted to the public. Contributions to this section revisit core ethical debates on big data (Cancela-Kieffer, Chapter 10), the personalization of news (Pedrero-Esteban and Gas-Gozalbo, Chapter 11), transparency (Christofoletti, Chapter 12), and verification (Espíritusanto and Dinant, Chapter, 13), posed by the previous chapters, to reflect on journalism’s mission to inform the public in times of post-truth, distrust of institutions, echo chambers, big tech, and social and political shocks. Christofoletti’s Chapter 12 questions transparency to rethink journalism’s professional culture. When promoting transparency, does journalism itself become more open and contextualize its own products, practices, and modus operandi? For Christofoletti, transparency in journalism “is not an end in itself, but a path” to replace arrogance with humility, narcissism with dialog, and to create and develop newsrooms that are more publicly exposed and more willing to review procedures. The author explores new civil and journalistic initiatives based on this new culture of transparency that are helping journalism to implement new trust-building strategies. By the same token, Espíritusanto and Dinant (Chapter 13) use verification and the question of how people can ascertain the truthfulness of a news story to explore innovative technological tools to empower citizens to fight against misinformation.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

References

In Chapter 10, Cancela-Kieffer argues that the only way for journalism to navigate a disrupted data-driven society is to fully embrace its core mission: “safeguarding ‘the people’s right to know.’” She advocates for creativity and for a “radical collaborative journalism” involving other disciplines—for example, mathematics and coding. She appeals to a journalistic culture of objectivity (the separation of facts from opinion) and self-criticism to combat subjectivity and self-defensiveness. Cancela-Kieffer argues that technology allows journalists to bring “personalized experiences” into people’s lives. “Small data,” a simpler and more local form of data journalism, she observes, has demonstrated the significant contribution that the “granularity” of data (detailed demographic maps of neighborhoods, crime statistics, sensors, etc.) can make to “uncover disparities and inequalities.” When journalists attempt to stand on the side of their public by choosing, preparing, and telling stories in a way that helps the public to be informed participants in democratic society, the ethics of news innovation become a real challenge. Too often media scholars offer only more reasons to despair. Overall, the reader will find grounds for optimism in these pages. This positive spirit was what inspired this collective book project. Some of the texts in this book were first drafted for the IAMCR preconference “News Media Innovation Ethics: Activating Human and Civil Rights Through Core Professional Values,” held at Carlos III University (Madrid, July 6, 2019). An enriching dialog between participants (including scholars and practitioners specializing in news media innovation) and organizers (the editors of this book) started before the conference and kept going during and after it. Our book reflects this continuous conversation as well as the further engagement with each contributor that was undertaken by the editors to unify the various texts around the aim, themes, and scope of the book.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Alexander, J.C. (2004). Cultural pragmatics: social performance between ritual and strategy. Sociological Theory, 22(4), 527–573. Alexander, J.C. (2016). Introduction: journalism, democratic culture, and creative reconstruction. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E.B., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered: Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 1–28. Alexander, J.C., Breese, E.B., and Luengo, M. (2016). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered: Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press. Boczkowski, P.J. (2004). Digitizing the News: Innovation in Online Newspapers. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. Breese, E.B. and Luengo, M. (2016). Conclusion: news innovations and enduring commitments. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E.B., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered: Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 282–289. Bruno, N. and Nielsen, R. (2012). Survival Is Success: Journalistic Online Start-Ups in Western Europe. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

xv

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

xvi

Introduction

Carlson, M. (2016). Telling the crisis story of journalism: narratives of normative reassurance in Page One. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E.B., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered: Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 135–152. García-Avilés, J.A. (2016). Developing an index of media innovation in a national market, journalism studies, Journalism Studies, 9(1) 1–18. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14616 70X.2016.1161496 Jones, S. (2017). Disrupting the narrative: immersive journalism in virtual reality. Journal of Media Practice, 18(2–3), 171–185. https://doi.org/10.1080/14682753.2017.1374677 Kukkakorpi, M. and Pantti, M. (2020). A Sense of Place: VR Journalism and Emotional Engagement. https://doi.org/10.1080/17512786.2020.1799237 Luengo, M. (2016). When codes collide: journalists push back against digital desecration. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E.B., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered: Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 119–134. McBride, K. and Rosenstiel, T. (Eds.). (2014). The New Ethics of Journalism. London: Sage. Nee, R.C. (2013). Creative destruction: an exploratory study of how digitally native news nonprofits are innovating online journalism practices. International Journal on Media Management 15(1), 3–22. Negredo, S., Martínez-Costa, M.P., Breiner, J., and Salaverría, R. (2020). Journalism expands in spite of the crisis: digital-native news media in Spain. Media and Communication, 8(2), 73–85. PA Media Group (2018). https://pamediagroup.com/ more-than-1000-uk-regional-news-titles-now-have-access-to-stories-jointly-written-byjournalists-and-ai-as-radar-launches-new-website Padioleau, J.-G. (2006). Les médias face à la destruction créatrice. Débat, 139, 109–121. Revers, M. (2016). Digital media and the diversification of professionalism: a US-German comparison of journalism cultures. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E.B., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered: Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 228–246. Schlesinger, P. and Doyle, G. (2014). From organizational crisis to multi-platform salvation? Creative destruction and the recomposition of news media. Journalism, 16(3), 305–323. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884914530223 Schumpeter, J.A. (1975 [1942]). Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy. New York: Harper & Row. Waterson, J. (2020). Microsoft sacks journalists to replace them with robots. The Guardian (30 May).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

1

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Journalism, Ethics, and Innovation in Times of Digital Turbulence

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved. News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

3

1 An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism José Alberto García-Avilés Universidad Miguel Hernández

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

An Ethical Perspective on Journalism Innovation Research into the evolution of journalism ethics from the perspective of innovation offers wonderful insights. Throughout the past decades, journalists have embraced the innovations implemented in many newsrooms and, at the same time, they have met the ethical challenges brought about by these innovations. In this process, we could establish a pattern. Initially, journalists tend to regard the new practices as a challenge to the established standards, that is, as something alien to the shared ethical guidelines and therefore, they tend to believe these new practices should be questioned on ethical grounds. This attitude often translated into a veiled rejection of those innovations that at first sight seemed to collide with the traditional professional practices. However, as the innovations gradually take hold in the newsrooms and the journalists accept them, ethical standards are adapted accordingly to this new reality. In the digital media ecosystem, the boundaries between producers, audiences, content, technology, and business tend to fade away as the platforms and algorithms increasingly gather and distribute information through multiple channels, with a massive offering of news and entertainment that is seamlessly integrated into people’s lives (Ruotsalainen and Heinonen, 2015). Traditional sources of income based on advertising show symptoms of fatigue, and the competition between legacy media and digital pure players increases, as the business strategies that worked for decades have become obsolete (Küng, 2017). After several stages of adaptation and integration into this digital ecosystem, the media are living up to constant change. However, what is new is not change itself but the pace and the degree of change in journalism: a constant and deep transformation accelerated by the simultaneous impact of different technologies (virtual reality, artificial intelligence, blockchain, voice, data mining, etc.) in the gathering, production, distribution, and commercialization of content. In addition, technological companies have burst into force, competing with the news outlets for users’ attention. These powerful players (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, etc.) monopolize a large percentage of advertising investment, as well as many successful live streaming platforms (Netflix, HBO, Disney+, Amazon Prime, Spotify, etc.). In this complex scenario, aggravated by the worldwide crisis of COVID-19, the media have less control over how and where their contents are consumed, while News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

4

1  An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

their relationship with audiences is weakened by a more interactive, horizontal, and collaborative communication. On the other hand, digital-only media have been able to fully understand the mobile, social, and global ecosystem and, what is more important, they have rapidly adapted to the consumption habits of hyperconnected users. Therefore, when facing disruptive competition, legacy media companies need to focus their strategies on sustainability, market penetration, and innovation. In this context, media innovation has been invoked as a “mantra,” which offers a solution to the complex industry problems. However, innovation advocates often lack a clear conceptual background about how innovations are differentiated from change, when exactly is something considered to be innovative, and at what level of analysis (individual, organizational, product, or process) does innovation lie (Prenger and Deuze, 2017). As both authors argue (p. 235), “epistemological challenges further amplify these wide-ranging questions, as innovation is invariably a moving object, raising the issue of how to adequately study something so dynamic.” Any kind of innovative journalism should also be an ethical one. Without the essential component of ethics, no journalism is capable of innovating because the very professional activity of reporting itself is based on the commitment to the truth. Accordingly, journalistic ethics and quality are synonymous terms since all quality journalism is necessarily ethical. In Tony Harcup’s words, “ethical journalism is crucial for the health and well-being of a society” (2006, p. 144). Journalism ethics is the result of multiple and complementary forces. Ethical reasoning is a unique and indivisible reality, which is individually, institutionally, and culturally based. Professional ethics cannot be isolated from individual or social ethics. When news organizations face ethical quandaries, they often implement regulations, norms, and codes that soon tend to become obsolete (Whitehouse, 2010). We can distinguish three problems when making ethical decisions in journalism: (a) Technological determinism: When focusing on the role of technology, we can easily exaggerate the influence technology as the driving force of media innovation and overlook the impact that emerging journalistic practices have on the development of innovative technologies. Technology plays a role in facilitating change, but overall, we do not find sufficient evidence to conclude that it induces disruption in journalistic activity. Technologies must also be balanced with prevailing standards that have guided the journalistic field, for these standards play a role in how journalists conceive of and perform their social roles (Singer, 2003). (b) What we might call “normative apriorism:” That is, to regard ethics just as the result of the application of a series of norms embodied in codes and regulations. Ethical guidelines often become an excuse for ineffectiveness and reflects managements’ short sightedness when facing the challenges of making the right decisions. A focus on prescriptive ethics tends to ignore that there are competing views on how to address moral questions within the context of ethical reasoning (von der Pfordten, 2012). Hence, an ethical examination should focus on the correlation of moral principles, rather than on the single norms and codes.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

An Ethical Perspective on Journalism Innovation

(c) Relativism: There are no universal or absolute ethical principles, so that performance depends on the conditions in production, social, cultural, political factors, etc., as well as the personal approach of everyone. Since this view considers that ethics is purely subjective, based on individual interpretations, any decision can be ethically correct if one justifies it according to their own beliefs.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

My proposal about the ethics of journalistic innovation relies on three essential aspects that shape professional decision-making: the ethics of the ends, the ethics of the procedures, and the ethics of the values, following insights from scholars such as Friend and Singer (2007), von der Pfordten (2012), Ward (2018), and Ward and Wasserman (2010), among others. The ethics of the ends are based on the question: Why do I do this?—that is, what do I intend to achieve with this project, product, or service? It could be a matter of investigating an issue, exposing corruption, expanding knowledge, acting in a responsible manner, or being accountable to society. Ethical goals could be related to the right to information, formulated in article 19 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The ends also relate to freedom of expression, the right to privacy and honor, professional secrecy, and public service, and they deal with ethical problems such as sensationalism, misinformation, and data manipulation (Suárez-Villegas and Cruz-Álvarez, 2016a, p. 7). Procedural ethics focus on the question: How do I do it? What processes do I follow to carry it out? The ethics of the procedures raise the constant and recurring question of whether the end justifies or not the means that are used (von der Pfordten, 2012). Journalists’ practices include verification processes, collaboration with third parties, confidentiality with sources, digital image manipulation, etc., which demand transparency and accountability. The ethics of values, ultimately, raises the question: What principles guide my work? The list of values is very broad: truth, respect, trust, credibility, justice, accuracy, equanimity, solidarity, dignity, honesty, professionalism, impartiality, etc. According to the work of Kovach and Rosenstiel (2001, p. 24), based on interviews with hundreds of journalists in the United States, these principles should rule in the profession: Seeking the truth; loyalty with citizens; a verification discipline; independence in regard to those who are informed; exercise control of power; become a public forum for criticism and commentary; offer suggestive and relevant information, as well as comprehensive and proportionate; and respect the individual conscience of the professional. How can we evaluate the ethical consequences of innovations? Moreover, how can media ethics help us in this task? The report “Good and bad innovation: what kind of theory and practice do we need to distinguish them?” by Geoff Mulgan (2016) deals with the ambivalence of innovations. For example, the use of surveillance technologies to increase productivity and safety in the workplace also can generate a high level of stress in the workforce, as well as limitations to their privacy. Examples of negative innovations, such as concentration camps for mass extermination, can be extreme but most innovations have both positive and negative consequences. We can better address this ambivalence if we define the concept of innovation in journalism and its practical implications.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

5

6

1  An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism

Defining Journalism Innovation Scholars are paying a growing attention to the culture of innovation in news organizations (Dal Zotto and van Kranenburg, 2008; Küng, 2013; Sádaba, García-Avilés, and Martínez-Costa, 2016). However, the literature on media innovation tends to focus on adoption, implementation, and diffusion of products and technologies, with little emphasis on the design, development, and management stages of innovation (Dogruel, 2014). Research has largely ignored the question of how journalists learn in the newsroom and how they implement innovation (Porcu, 2017). The role of newsroom managers in innovation strategies is usually invisible and empirical measurements of in-house innovation within the media are scarce (Bleyen et al., 2014). As Weiss and Domingo (2010, p. 1158) put it, a deeper theoretical framework is needed regarding “the actors, dynamics and factors involved in the processes, theories that acknowledge the changing nature of journalism.” Innovation “combines discovering an opportunity, blueprinting an idea to seize that opportunity, and implementing that idea to achieve results” (Anthony, 2012, p. 17). Translated to the media industry, this means that innovation must involve something more than the repetitive cycle of everyday news production. For this study, we define journalism innovation as:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

the capacity to react to changes in products, processes and services using creative skills that allow a problem or need to be identified, and to be solved through a solution that results in the introduction of something new that adds value to customers and to the media organization. (García-Avilés et al., 2018, p. 29) This definition, provided by a group of researchers from the Miguel Hernández University, was applied to the design of the Journalistic Innovation Index of Spanish media (De-Lara-González et al., 2015). We further analyzed how many newsrooms disseminate these innovations and what factors accelerate or slow their implementation (García-Avilés et al., 2019), also in particular case studies such as digital-only news outlet El Confidencial and the Spanish public broadcaster RTVE innovation lab (Zaragoza-Fuster and García-Avilés, 2020). The brakes on innovation are mostly cultural, rooted in the newsroom as systemic practices and preferred work patterns (Ess, 2013). There is no successful single recipe of media transformation and adaptation to the new realities. Going from products to services, from hardware to software, and from audience to users, includes changing mindsets, unlearning the trade and experimenting with bold ideas (Storsul and Krumsvik, 2013). The individual mindset determines what ideas lead to innovation in the newsroom: “Inventions within a variety of newsroom structures support the general truth that innovation and change usually start with the ideas of individual creators” (Gynnild, 2014, p. 720). Experimentation produces mixed results on what works or could work when it comes to creating commercially successful services and products. A holistic perspective on innovation must include the pre-phase of the innovation process, considering for example goal setting, customer research, or observation of competitors (Dal Zotto and van Kranenburg, 2008). Taking a step further, Bleyen et al.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Innovations and Journalism Ethics: 2000–2020

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

(2014, p. 48) established a typology of media innovations based on five categories: business model, production and distribution, media consumption, inner form, and core product. The first three categories are related to innovation processes, and the latter two highlight product innovations, such as a groundbreaking television news program or an original podcast. Therefore, media innovation encompasses complex processes that involve people’s motivations, strategy, structure, administrative processes, and systems that could create value for the organization, because the characteristics of the media sector differ from those of other industries (Küng, 2017). Specific features include the perishable commodity of the news product, creative employees, intricate organizational structures, and a public service role, among others. As Sádaba, García-Avilés, and MartínezCosta (2016) argue, strategic innovation leads to better services and increased responsiveness to users and, therefore, an increase in sales, subscriptions, or audiences. In Pavlik’s words (2013, p. 190), “innovation is the key to the viability of news media in the digital age.” Innovation does not only relate to products and technologies but also relate to the reinvention of social processes and the creation of services that improve people’s lives (Fagerberg, Mowery, and Nelson, 2005). Innovating consists of providing a novel solution for a problem that is more effective, efficient, or sustainable than existing solutions. Innovation should not be reduced to technology. In fact, non-technological aspects such as storytelling, creativity, commercialization, or interaction with audiences are important areas of journalism innovation. If innovations emerge only through the reaction to the threats from the instability of the news market, technological disruption, and the competitive commercial environment, the change could be slow and erratic. However, when management takes the lead, innovations increase in number and quality. Incorporating new practices and experimenting with different ideas is essential for innovation to flourish in media companies (García-Avilés et al., 2019). We argue for a holistic approach to research in this field by considering many aspects that influence journalism innovation processes, being aware of the conflicting tensions that emerge.

Innovations and Journalism Ethics: 2000–2020 In 2000, I began to explore the consequences of the digitalization of television newsrooms in the work of broadcast journalists. Between 2007 and 2014, I studied the convergence models implemented in several European media outlets. Since 2014, I research journalistic innovation, to find out where and how it occurs and what kinds of changes it brings about (De-Lara-González et al., 2015; García-Avilés et al., 2018). According to our findings in the Spanish market, most innovations take place in the areas of product and service, content distribution, and interaction with the audience. Most innovative initiatives were “incremental”: smaller advances or gradual improvements of existing products or services. A few “radical” innovations occurred, mostly within online-only sites. The number of technology-related innovations outweighed the non-technological, leading us to conclude that “while innovation is not necessarily associated with technology, it is an important driver of change” (GarcíaAvilés et al., 2018, p. 38).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

7

8

1  An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism

Taking one further step, we analyzed how media companies implemented innovations in four main areas: production, distribution, organization, and commercialization (García-Avilés et al., 2019). Each area has its own goal within the company: launching innovative products, improving the distribution channels, innovating in the work structure and newsroom organization, and incorporating new sources of revenue. Within different historical media contexts, a combination of internal and external forces helped bring about change and resulted in the innovation of digital journalism. A recurring theme in my conversations with journalists over the years has been the reaction to change. I have often discovered an attitude of distrust by most professionals. Before each wave of changes, many journalists invoked news quality and ethical principles to justify their willingness to stay out of innovation, because they regarded innovations as a problem, something that demanded a lot of time and work, or that could threaten their job stability. It is interesting to find out that journalism has traditionally been a profession reluctant to embrace change. In this study, necessarily short due to space limitations, I present in chronological order some the ethical implications derived from the adoption of innovations in digital journalism.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Emergence of Journalism in the Internet Between 1995 and 2000, thousands of newspapers and television channels worldwide launched their websites and began generating content to feed them. The initial concerns of journalists with the advent of the Internet focused on privacy, falsehood, and loss of autonomy (Deuze and Yeshua, 2001). The new medium was quickly associated with a high potential for spreading falsehoods involuntarily or deliberately. It was difficult to differentiate the truth in the Internet content, since anyone could easily replicate the credibility indicators without taking any responsibility. Many journalists feared that instant dissemination of information would undermine the processes of journalistic verification that protects them against errors and lies, so that they would be accountable for their ethical standards (Eberwein, Fengler, and Karmasin, 2019). The value of professional autonomy also went into crisis. Journalists defended their role as “independent gatekeepers,” based on their ability to make their own judgments about what news is and, therefore, reinforce their public interest service (SuárezVillegas and Cruz-Álvarez, 2016a). The argument was that a careful selection of news by professional gatekeepers would make it easier for citizens to receive truthful and relevant information on the issues that are supposed to be essential for democratic functioning: politics, international relations, economics, the performance of institutions and social agents, etc. However, from the beginning, the ability of users to select and access content directly was evident; journalists were losing their monopoly as providers of information in society, which caused them considerable frustration (Boczkowski, 2004).

Convergence and Multimedia Content There were two main trends at the beginning of the new millennium: experimenting with convergence by combining news, products, and processes in separate newsrooms of print, television, and online media; and producing multimedia content for several

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Innovations and Journalism Ethics: 2000–2020

outlets (Singer, 2006). Convergence soon became a buzzword that shook most newsrooms: editors asked newspaper reporters to record videos at the scene or to make their own summaries of the news for radio or television. Managers commissioned broadcast journalists to write articles for the newspaper and to promote the stories included in the print media. Thus, journalism became “convergent” and journalists more versatile, as they had to generate content simultaneously for several platforms (García-Avilés, Meier, and Kaltenbrunner, 2016). Regarding the production of multimedia content, there was a lot of resistance by journalists. Some of them admitted that this was due to fear of the unknown. However, others justified their fear on ethical grounds, emphasizing the detrimental effects on the news quality, the limited time available to produce more pieces, and the increasing pressure to develop pieces for radio, website, print, and/or television. Work overload often reduced journalistic quality and increased tensions among staff in multimedia newsrooms (Carvajal and García-Avilés, 2008).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Blogs and Bloggers As the self-publishing platforms were easier to use, horizontal communication channels proliferated, and all kinds of blogs rapidly incorporated the voice of citizens into journalism. Bloggers claimed the professional territory of journalists: selecting events and topics for the audience and commenting on relevant issues through content aggregation. This led to further tensions between the possibilities afforded by innovations in news production and the normalizing force of established newsroom routines (Mitchelstein, Boczkowski, and Wagner, 2017). Professionals quickly drew the frontier between journalists who valued equity, accuracy, balance, and other ethical criteria, and content providers with their opinion blogs, which lacked a professional status (Singer, 2003). One of the ways in which journalists differed from bloggers was their independence, based on neutrality, impartiality, or objectivity. Bloggers, on the other hand, published their personal views and raised ethical problems. “It is not a fair, impartial or objective journalism, nor does it intend to be. As they do not adhere to journalistic norms, bloggers do not have to be objective or politically correct,” protested one newspaper editor (Carlson, 2007, p. 268). The success of bloggers posed the question of which characteristics defined a digital journalist (Hayes, Singer, and Ceppos, 2007). An ethical problem that journalists frequently criticized was that the material published on blogs was not verified and, therefore, was not reliable. An editor summed up this concern: “If something appears in The Washington Post or The New York Times, I know it has been reviewed by someone whose profession requires them to have it checked. With a blog, you have no idea. Bloggers don’t know how to verify the facts. Calling a blogger a journalist is like calling a photographer anybody who takes a snapshot” (Carlson, 2007, p. 274). Criticisms related to impartiality and verification pointed to the emergence of a norm that was especially suitable for digital media: transparency. It was important for the disclosure of a blogger’s background, their personal interests and financial ties. Although the norms of objectivity and balance made it difficult for some journalists to adhere to blogging, blogs became an acceptable innovation by 2012 (Mitchelstein, Boczkowski, and Wagner, 2017).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

9

10

1  An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism

User-Generated Content Journalists had to face the consequences of user-generated content (UGC) and its influence on their professional routines. The spread of UGC implied that journalists could lose control over what they published, even as authors of the news and it soon threatened editorial values and news standards (Paulussen and Ugille, 2008). Ethical concerns about UGC focused on three aspects: accuracy, credibility, and civility. It increased the difficulty of verifying the information and checking whether something was true or were mere rumors or lies spread by people over whom journalists had no control. News professionals saw that their credibility was in the spotlight. Some experts criticized that users, unlike journalists, did not feel responsible for what they published and did not report accurately (Noguera Vivo, 2012). Legal concerns about the use of UGC in the media, such as copyright ownership, were mixed with ethical ones. However, making sure that the material external to the newsroom was “legally safe to publish” consumed considerable time and energy in most newsrooms. According to one British editor, comments are “subject to lawsuits for defamation, slander, libel, or the prohibition of spreading the name of the victim of a violation: reading these things and supervising them involves tons of work” (Singer, 2003). In this way, journalists struggled to ethically accommodate the opportunities for dialog presented by UGC, while safeguarding their credibility and sense of responsibility. News professionals showed concerns about the value of user contributions, as well as the consequences of uncivil comments on personal and institutional credibility (Singer and Ashman, 2009, p. 18). However, criticism of the use of UGC in the newsrooms was not universal; many journalists expressed support for user contributions (video, pictures, news tips, etc.), although warned about the actual costs versus the ideal benefits. As Singer (2003) points out, most media outlets established an ethical framework about the problems raised by this innovation and many newsrooms drew a line not to be trespassed.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Social Media Platforms such as Twitter are essentially microblogs, but unlike users’ comments and other UGC that are produced after the journalist has published the story, social media material is a potential journalistic source (Noguera Vivo, 2012). Journalists initially disdained the potential of social media in their job because instant information combined mass distribution with an easy publishing process and the absence of editorial supervision. “A toy for boring celebrities and high school girls” is how a columnist described Twitter in 2009 (Hermida, 2012, p. 168). Social media challenged traditional journalistic values such as impartiality and accuracy. According to one study, a high percentage of tweets by journalists themselves contained at least some expression of opinion and used them to share information about their work and their personal lives (Suárez-Villegas and Cruz-Álvarez, 2016b). Therefore, prestigious news outlets such as The New York Times, the BBC, and The Washington Post, issued guidelines about the use of social media by their employees. New ethical concerns arose as misinformation and fake news became a problem. Newsrooms used with caution the available content in Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or Instagram, and most journalists adopted social media more

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Innovations and Journalism Ethics: 2000–2020

quickly and with fewer complaints than the previous innovations (Suárez-Villegas and Cruz-Álvarez, 2016b). Citizens and social media users were excluded from meaningful participation in the media ethics discourse. However, as Ward and Wasserman (2010) argued, new technologies and platforms were democratizing media globally and were rendering journalistic practices more flexible and fluid, facilitating an “open media ethics.”

Journalistic Production for the Internet Digital journalism is instantaneous. Journalists publish news content as it happens, in a 7/24 cycle, with short time to check it. Journalism tends to be increasingly opinionated because the news content is presented from the “ideological trench,” and is becoming more entertaining, including a mix of spectacle, sensationalism, and clickbait elements. In addition, news content is gathered and distributed in social media, where sources, journalists, media consumers, and citizens participate almost at the same level. Journalism innovations facilitated the production of content in multiple formats, contributed to forge a more attractive and accessible journalism for a greater number of people and, at the same time, broadened the focus of the ethical issues raised in the newsrooms. Table 1.1 summarizes some ethical issues debated by journalists between 2010 and 2015. Table 1.1  Ethical issues for news professionals who work in digital newsrooms. Production stages

Ethical issues

Access-observation

●● ●● ●●

●●

Selection-filtering

●● ●●

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

●● ●●

Processing-editing

●● ●● ●● ●●

Distribution

●● ●● ●● ●●

Interpretation

●● ●● ●● ●●

Verification of what is published on social media. Check the information with two or more sources. Journalists should not publish personal opinions in social media. Fight against misinformation and lies. Verify the accuracy of UGC. Label external content as such. Pressure to promote topics that increase online traffic. Transparency in accessing news sources. Rejection of excessive multiskilling. Convergence as a costsaving operation. Low quality in production of multimedia content. Separation between advertising and editorial. Value the journalist’s byline. Obsession to beat the competition. Immediacy of live coverage. Use of clickbait. Value of input from the users. Moderation of comments and insults. Correction of errors. Transparency.

Source: Author

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

11

12

1  An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism

Thus, the ethics of traditional journalism, with values based on the accuracy, rigor, precision, and verification, was gradually extended to digital journalism, where collaboration with users, transparency, and immediacy predominate (Suárez-Villegas and Cruz-Álvarez, 2016a).

Immersive Journalism Immersive journalism tells stories through virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), or 360-degree video and allows the user to become part of the story through a great variety of experiences. These formats raise important ethical issues (Pérez-Seijo and López-García, 2019), such as: ●●

●●

●●

●●

To what extent producers can modify the recorded content, altering elements of reality or making up scenes, so that the story works better. Users’ exposure to content of a sensitive nature, including the use of violence, emotional abuse, obscene language, or explicit sex scenes. The manipulation of emotions that influence the users and arouse feelings of adherence or rejection to ideas or institutions. Business interests of companies that produce VR content or finance immersive experiences.

VR environments could become incubators for manipulation and propaganda, and for this reason, being unaware of the journalist orchestrating highly persuasive content could undermine the credibility of VR narratives (Kool, 2016). The use of VR technology raises complex ethical questions that require careful consideration by the producers of these formats to preserve journalistic standards (Pérez-Seijo and López-García, 2019).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Journalism and Big Data Big Data refers to the ability to process large amounts of information, analyze it, and draw relevant conclusions. Big Data raises their own ethical dilemmas about user privacy, information security, and data manipulation, among other issues, when journalists decide how to incorporate the use of massive data into their stories. The process of making public a large volume of data helps rethink their ethical quandaries, as many journalists have embraced such openness as a professional norm, facilitating public scrutiny of complete data sets and open programming code (Lewis, 2015). This trend can improve some journalistic processes, as Lewis (2015) states, by integrating principles such as transparency and participation in newsrooms. The use of massive data raises ethical dilemmas associated with the collection, analysis, and dissemination of such information. Just because a content is publicly accessible does not mean that the journalist had permission to make it public for everyone (Lewis and Westlund, 2015). Problems often arise with public data provided by governments and institutions or gathered through techniques such as crowdsourcing or data scraping. Such problems can go unnoticed, either by the size of the data involved or by its public dissemination, so journalists must weigh the benefits of publishing open data against the risk of personal injury, especially when private information can be easily shared (Lewis and Westlund, 2015).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Newsrooms as Communities of Practice

Automated Journalism Artificial intelligence (AI) systems are tools built by people to meet human needs and purposes. Data mining algorithms can influence the way journalists cover any topic, ranging from voting patterns to the spread of COVID-19 or the consumption of supermarket products. In addressing how journalists interact with AI, there is an opportunity for hybridization in the development of processes that involve journalists and technology. Algorithms often complement, but rarely replace the journalist. According to some studies (Dörr, 2016), an algorithm could replicate only 15% of the reporters’ time and 9% of the editors’ time. To date, most news-writing robots have been used to provide news on topics such as stock market quotes, earthquake alerts, and sport. In the United States, The Associated Press leads the use of robots in business and sports news. The automated Heliograf system writes stories for The Washington Post, while the Swedish multimedia group MittMedia produces pieces written by robots on real estate issues, among others. Newsrooms are increasingly automated to track down breaking stories and trending issues. The rapid development of machine learning is likely to make journalism more speedy, efficient, and cost-effective (Diakopoulos and Koliska, 2017). We must consider whether automated journalism can play a role of responsibility as humans do. There are concerns regarding the algorithmic strategies, personalization of contents, filtering, and transparency. As computers assume greater prominence in the evaluation of the news, encouraging a certain type of selection and consumption, how are they “taught” to act ethically? Is there an “algorithm ethic?” Ethics must unravel numerous dilemmas about the selection, interpretation, and anticipation of news content, including how algorithms structure reality through machine learning. Therefore, it is necessary to study the codes, the “black boxes” of the algorithms, to discover “the power structures, biases and influences that computational artifacts exert in society” (Diakopoulos and Koliska, 2017, p. 815).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Newsrooms as Communities of Practice Professional news practices, such as the proper transcription of a statement, the verification of the source of an amateur video, or the double-checking of the information provided by a source, always have an ethical dimension (Suárez-Villegas and CruzÁlvarez, 2016a). In this sense, the coherence of journalistic practices differentiates the professional activity from the amateur level. There are few shared values about the professional practices in journalism. The ethical decision depends on each professional, who is solely responsible for their own actions. Companies carry out the reporting activity, but specific individuals, men, and women with their beliefs and ethical convictions, are the ones who produce the news. Journalists are continually transforming their traditions in the newsgathering, production, and distribution processes. News practitioners follow the criteria about what they consider appropriate, true, and fair, according to newsroom standards and professional culture. Through a process of trial and error, journalists incorporate the innovations as appropriate practices or dismiss them as unacceptable. The application of

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

13

14

1  An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism

ethical standards, in short, determines the very nature of the journalistic activity as a professional practice in the full sense of the term. Professions can become “communities of practice” whose members share a common identity and goals. According to Alasdair Macintyre (1984), the effectiveness of a community of practice depends on the degree of cohesion among its members. In any professional community, Macintyre (1984, pp. 65–67) identifies three main characteristics:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

(a) The need for learning how to carry out that activity in a professional way. (b) Excellence provides the participants with the goal of their activity. (c) The learning process, based on decision-making and the assessment of actions, products, and people, allows practitioners to evaluate their own performance and to reach excellence. In fact, the profession of journalism is an example of practice in the sense referred to by Macintyre (1984), since newsrooms can be regarded as communities of professionals, made up of journalists who share their own standards and procedures for producing information, according to the criteria that emanate from newsroom managers and employees (García-Avilés, 2014). News standards are passed on from one generation of journalists to another, through professional practices. Journalistic ethical standards cover practical issues, such as how to edit an online news video or how to produce a VR report. Each of these activities can adapt to the ethical criteria of that community of practitioners. In these communities of practice, “a philosophy of moral values guiding journalists is shaped by the journalist or journalism organization’s need to be perceived by its audience as contributing to the public discourse by supplying factual, reliable, and meaningful information” (Hayes, Singer, and Ceppos, 2007, p. 265). Learning and knowledge sharing foster innovation in these professional communities. In this sense, the communities of practice share ethical norms about the acquisition, production, and distribution of contents, in order to illuminate “the ethical conscience of the professional who applies the norms to the specific circumstances of each case” (Jiménez, 2016, p. 26). Journalistic ethics also translates into the “good practices” which take place during the decision-making process in the newsrooms (García-Avilés, 2014). The issues discussed allow for shared and transparent results, so that the public can learn about the decisions taken in producing the news and their justification. For this reason, journalists should be held accountable for the procedures they use in newsgathering, production, and distribution, to provide a responsible journalism that serves the public (Eberwein, Fengler, and Karmasin, 2019). This approach contributes to updating the standards of professional excellence and ethical values in the innovative practices, which often are not included in traditional codes. Throughout this process, journalists can engage with users who share a similar concern for news quality. As former La Vanguardia’s ombudsman Roger Jiménez (2016, p. 31) emphasizes, some readers “use the news content with a critical mentality, raise the finger when they perceive biases, systematic distortions or silences, prosecute the selection and placement of photos, and censure the prejudices that can slip into the stories.” Thus, media managers must take advantage of the readers’ contributions because they are an ethical asset for their news operations.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Conclusion: The Strategic Value of the Ethics of Journalistic Innovation

Ethical debates should incorporate all the issues that arise from innovations in news product and service, process of production and distribution, use of technology, social media, misinformation, etc. In Ward’s words (2014, p. 468), “traditional media ethics is strong on abstract principles that cover all forms of journalism—such as acting independently and seeking the truth. But it is weak on specifying guidelines and protocols for different forms of media.” In conclusion, newsroom ethics should respond to the current challenges faced by digital journalism and the mechanisms by which news is produced.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Conclusion: The Strategic Value of the Ethics of Journalistic Innovation Ethics is the attempt to discern the “right action.” This means deciding what actions are justifiable in the interest of individuals and society, given that many decisions involve values, ends, and procedures that may conflict (Ward and Wasserman, 2010). Digital media ethics (DME) has become a subdomain of applied ethics for those who use digital technologies in their daily lives (Ess, 2013). DME addresses the ethical problems caused using technologies implemented in developed countries, such as cameras, smartphones, drones, bots, voice devices, navigation systems, biometric health control devices, and “the Internet of things.” These multiple contexts of use broaden the range of ethical challenges that arise from technologies, far beyond the comparatively reduced circle of problems facing journalists or computer professionals. DME can draw clear approaches to aspects related to privacy, copyright, and technology, which help establish an accepted set of ethical practices. Some problems include “online death” (related to websites on suicides, and issues about censorship, “right to be forgotten,” etc.); issues arising from the use of massive data, such as preventive surveillance or the use of robots, from lethal weapons to “sex-bots” (Ess, 2013). In addition to applied ethics, DME incorporates the ethical perceptions both of communities of practice and the users, whose experience contributes to the design and use of information and communication technologies. This field of ethics is increasingly hybrid and multidisciplinary—it includes contributions from engineering, economics, business, statistics, etc.—and fosters a collaborative attitude, addressing problems collectively, seeking solutions through trial and error, and making decisions in an interactive, instantaneous environment (Friend and Singer, 2007). The ethics of innovation bring about tensions between the different elements that make up the work of journalism: privacy and freedom, integrity and commercialization, participation and control, immediacy and rigor, technology, and humanism. Some journalists use ethics as a defensive weapon when they describe an innovation as an attack on basic principles or a threat to journalistic integrity. Instead, journalists can strive in the digital setting and, at the same time, preserve the fundamental values of the profession (Friend and Singer, 2007), putting the focus on decision-making that is consistent with the ethics of the ends, the procedures, and the values. Not all ethical problems will be quickly or easily solved. Nevertheless, trying to reach widespread solutions on issues such as privacy, the fight against misinformation, or manipulation in VR environments, together with proposals on more complex issues,

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

15

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

16

1  An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism

will allow to rebuild journalism ethics. “Even if journalists agree to be responsible, even if they embrace principles like truth-telling and verification, they will still not be spared the task of rethinking their norms” (Ward, 2014, p. 461). The new epistemology of media innovation ethics must consider how technologies can be used to advance the communitarian mission of journalism. News professionals in their communities of practice might contribute to project solutions, as they become part of the strategic process of newsroom innovation. Managers should have clear ethical standards and to be able to communicate them effectively to all members of the news organization, both vertically and horizontally, identifying ethical patterns that run across different media innovations, and the factors which shape change at distinct periods or in particular settings. The media crisis arose from the penetration of digital technologies and the collapse of previous business models. However, the crisis is economic, not journalistic, the problems that journalists fear mostly coming from the pressures that arise from the lack of funding, not from innovation. Media companies have laid off staff and have cut budgets, and their journalists often lack the resources to maintain the quality of their work, as legacy media see their traditional business model crumble and many digitalonly outlets fail to achieve an economically sustainable model. When journalists try to improve the prevailing news standards and practices, they feel they can make a difference in the ethics of professional journalism. In that sense, dissatisfaction with the current situation is a key prerequisite for ethics. Within innovative newsrooms, there can be a productive energy, if there is a strategic need for change, for better ways to innovate. Therefore, dissatisfaction with the status quo and market turmoil can also be one of the driving forces for a disruptive ethics culture in which journalists take a proactive role (Ward, 2018). The ethics of innovation, as a strategic asset for media companies, could contribute to overcoming the crisis aggravated by the COVID-19 pandemic: advertising downfall, uncertainty about business models, the growth of misinformation and, ultimately, the loss of relevance of journalism in society. In many newsrooms worldwide, innovative journalists are transforming news procedures as they face new challenges in all kind of professional situations, strengthening the public service function of journalism in democratic societies. News organizations need an innovation strategy grounded on the fundamental values of ethics, which will help build a sustainable future for journalism.

References Anthony, S.D. (2012). The Little Black Book of Innovation: How It Works, How to Do It. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press. Bleyen, V.A., Lindmark, S., Ranaivoson, H., and Ballon, P. (2014). A typology of media innovations: insights from an exploratory study. The Journal of Media Innovations, 1(1), 28–51. Boczkowski, P.J. (2004). Digitizing the News: Innovation in Online Newspapers. Cambridge: The MIT Press. Carlson, M. (2007). Blogs and journalistic authority: the role of blogs in US election day 2004 coverage. Journalism Studies, 8(2), 264–279.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

Carvajal, M. and García-Avilés, J.A. (2008). From newspapers to multimedia groups: business growth strategies of the regional press in Spain. Journalism Practice, 2(3), 453–462. Dal Zotto, C. and van Kranenburg, H. (Eds.). (2008). Management and Innovation in the Media Industry. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar. De-Lara-González, A., Arias-Robles, F., Carvajal-Prieto, M. and García-Avilés, J.A. (2015). Ranking de innovación periodística 2014 en España. Selección y análisis de 25 iniciativas. El Profesional de la Información, 24(3), 235–245. Deuze, M. and Yeshua, D. (2001). Online journalists face new ethical dilemmas: lessons from the Netherlands. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 16(4), 273–292. Diakopoulos, N. and Koliska, M. (2017). Algorithmic transparency in the news media. Digital Journalism, 5(7), 809–828. Dogruel, L. (2014). What is so special about media innovations? A characterization of the field. The Journal of Media Innovations, 1(1), 52–69. Dörr, K. (2016). Mapping the field of algorithmic journalism. Digital Journalism, 4(6), 700–722. Eberwein, T., Fengler, S. and Karmasin, M. (Eds.). (2019). Media Accountability in the Era of Post-truth Politics: European Challenges and Perspectives. London: Routledge. Ess, C. (2013). Digital Media Ethics. Cambridge: Polity. Fagerberg, J., Mowery, D. and Nelson, R.R. (Eds.). (2005). The Oxford Handbook of Innovation. New York: Oxford University Press. Friend, C. and Singer, J.B. (2007). Online Journalism Ethics: Traditions and Transitions. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe. García-Avilés, J.A. (2014). Online newsrooms as communities of practice: exploring digital journalists’ applied ethics. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 29(4), 258–272. García-Avilés, J.A., Carvajal-Prieto, M., Arias-Robles, F., and De-Lara-González, A. (2019). How journalists innovate in the newsroom. Proposing a model of the diffusion of innovations in media outlets. The Journal of Media Innovations, 5(1), 1–20. García-Avilés, J.A., Carvajal-Prieto, M., De-Lara-González, A., and Arias-Robles, F. (2018). Developing an index of media innovation in a national market: the case of Spain. Journalism Studies, 19(1), 25–42. García-Avilés, J.A., Meier, K., and Kaltenbrunner, A. (2016). Reshaping the “legacy” of legacy media in the online scenario. In Franklin, B. and Eldridge II, S. (Eds.) The Routledge Companion to Digital Journalism Studies. London/New York: Routledge, pp. 449–473. Gynnild, A. (2014). Journalism innovation leads to innovation journalism: the impact of computational exploration on changing mindsets. Journalism, 15(6), 713–730. Harcup, T. (2006). The Ethical Journalist. New York: Sage. Hayes, A.S., Singer, J.B., and Ceppos, J. (2007). Shifting roles, enduring values: the credible journalist in a digital age. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 22(4), 262–279. Hermida, A. (2012). Tweets and truth: journalism as a discipline of collaborative verification. Journalism Practice, 6(5–6), 659–668. Jiménez, R. (2016). Cien casos. La ética periodística en tiempos de precariedad. Barcelona: Universidad de Barcelona. Kool, H. (2016). The Ethics of Immersive Journalism: a rhetorical analysis of news storytelling with virtual reality technology. Intersect: The Stanford Journal of Science, Technology, and Society, 9(3), 1–11.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

17

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

18

1  An Inquiry into the Ethics of Innovation in Digital Journalism

Kovach, B. and Rosenstiel, T. (2001). The Elements of Journalism. New York: Crown Publishers. Küng, L. (2013). Innovation, technology and organizational change. In Storsul, T. and Krumsvik, A.H. (Eds.) Media Innovation: A Multidisciplinary Study of Change. Gothenburg: Nordicom, pp. 2–12. Küng, L. (2017). Going Digital: A Roadmap for Organisational Transformation. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. Lewis, S.C. (2015). Journalism in an era of big data: cases, concepts, and critiques. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 321–330. Lewis, S.C. and Westlund, O. (2015). Big data and journalism: epistemology, expertise, economics, and ethics. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 447–466. Macintyre, A. (1984). After Virtue. 2ª ed., Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press. Mitchelstein, M.E., Boczkowski, P.J., and Wagner, M.C. (2017). The boomerang effect: innovation in the blogs of mainstream news sites, 2008–2012. Media, Culture & Society, 39(8), 1231–1244. Mulgan, G. (2016). Good and bad innovation: what kind of theory and practice do we need to distinguish them? NESTA. https://www.nesta.org.uk/blog/good-and-bad-innovationwhatkind-of-theory-and-practice-do-we-need-to-distinguish-them Noguera Vivo, J.M. (2012). Redes y Periodismo: cuando las noticias se socializan. Barcelona: Editorial UOC. Paulussen, S. and Ugille, P. (2008). User generated content in the newsroom: professional and organisational constraints on participatory journalism. Westminster Papers in Communication & Culture, 5(2), 24–41. Pavlik, J.V. (2013). Innovation and the future of journalism. Digital Journalism, 1(2), 181–193. Pérez-Seijo, S. and López-García, X. (2019). La ética del periodismo inmersivo a debate. Hipertext.net, 18(4), 1–18. Porcu, O. (2020). Exploring innovative learning culture in the newsroom. Journalism, 21(10), 1556–1572. Prenger, M. and Deuze, M. (2017). A history of innovation and entrepreneurialism in journalism. In Boczkowski, P.J. and Anderson, C.W. (Eds.) Remaking the News. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, pp. 235–250. Ruotsalainen, J. and Heinonen, S. (2015). Media ecology and the future ecosystemic society. European Journal of Futures Research, 3(1), 9–19. Sádaba, C., García-Avilés, J.A. and Martínez-Costa, M.P. (Coords.) (2016). Innovación y desarrollo de los cibermedios en España. Pamplona: Eunsa. Singer, J.B. (2003). Who are these guys? The online challenge to the notion of journalistic professionalism. Journalism: Theory, Practice and Criticism, 4, 139–163. Singer, J.B. (2006). Partnerships and public service: normative issues for journalists in converged newsrooms. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 21(1), 30–53. Singer, J.B. and Ashman, I. (2009). “Comment is free, but facts are sacred”: usergenerated content and ethical constructs at The Guardian. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 24(1), 3–21. Storsul, T. and Krumsvik, A.H. (Eds.). (2013). Media Innovation: A Multidisciplinary Study of Change. Gothenburg: Nordicom. Suárez-Villegas, J.C. and Cruz-Álvarez, J. (Eds.). (2016a). Desafíos éticos en el periodismo digital. Madrid: Dykinson.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

References

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Suárez-Villegas, J.C. and Cruz-Álvarez, J. (2016b). The ethical dilemmas of using social networks as information sources. Analysis of the opinion of journalists from three countries. Revista Latina de Comunicación Social, 71, 66–84. von der Pfordten, D. (2012). Five elements of normative ethics-a general theory of normative individualism. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 15(4), 449–471. Ward, S.J.A. (2014). Radical media ethics. Digital Journalism, 2(4), 455–471. Ward, S.J.A. (2018). Disrupting Journalism Ethics: Radical Change on the Frontier of Digital Media. London: Routledge. Ward, S.J.A. and Wasserman, H. (2010). Towards an open ethics: implications of new media platforms for global ethics discourse. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 25(4), 275–292. Weiss, A.S. and Domingo, D. (2010). Innovation processes in online newsrooms as actor-networks and communities of practice. New Media and Society, 12(7), 1156–1171. Whitehouse, G. (2010). Newsgathering and privacy: expanding ethics codes to reflect change in the digital media age. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 25(4), 310–327. Zaragoza-Fuster, M.T. and García-Avilés, J.A. (2020). The role of innovation labs in advancing the relevance of public service media: the cases of BBC news labs and RTVE lab. Communication & Society, 33(1), 45–61.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

19

20

2 Democratically Engaged Journalists Ethical Invention amid Unreasonable Publics Stephen J.A. Ward

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

University of British Columbia

The reinvention of journalism ethics for a digital, global media must be radical, addressing three daunting problems, the digitalization of media, the globalization of media, and the use of this digital, global media to spread misinformation, fake news, and intolerant ideology. Digitalization has extended the bounds of journalism ethics beyond professional newsrooms to the journalism of citizens, NGOs, political groups, and almost anyone with access to the Internet. Globalization means journalism ethics should be revised to make journalism a globally responsible practice. This means that codes of journalism ethics and journalism principles should help journalists properly cover global issues such as immigration and climate change, and evaluate reports that will circle the globe. Finally, the existence of unreasonable and intolerant groups in the global media sphere entails that journalists should conceive of themselves as social advocates, engaged in the promotion of egalitarian democracy and human flourishing anywhere in the world. Today, new forms of journalism arise, such as participatory journalism, entrepreneurial journalism, and civic engagement journalism.1 These forms of journalism set aside calls for the reporter to be neutral or objective. The journalist, or the activist who uses journalism as a tool, enters public debate with an explicit perspective and goals. Often, the goal is to persuade others and recruit citizens to their cause or organization.2 In some cases, such as civic engagement journalism, journalists are ready to act with citizens to support social or political reform. They immerse themselves in the community to better understand the concerns of disadvantaged groups, even if this method raises questions about their independence as journalists.3

1  See Singer, Participatory Journalism, Briggs, Entrepreneurial Journalism, and Batsell, Engaged Journalism. 2  An example of engaged, partisan journalism are the websites established by American conservative groups, such as the Franklin Center for Government and Public Integrity and the Sam Adams Foundation, to cover state legislatures from their libertarian, right-wing perspectives. See http:// watchdog.org/about/and http://watchdog.org/category/illinois. 3  An example of civic engagement journalism is the Honolulu Civic Beat, a website established by Pierre Omidyar at www.civicbeat.org. In one series, “Home but not Homeless,” a Civic Beat reporter lived for months with a camp set up by poor citizens in an exclusive part of the city to focus attention the lack of proper housing. News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

These forms of journalism do not embrace the traditional ideal of journalistic disengagement or detachment from their audiences, financial sources, their citizens, and their nation’s political system.4 Instead, they embrace various methods of social expression and engagement. They use methods of funding that reduce the editorial distance between journalists and revenue sources, e.g., citizen and group donations, philanthropic individuals, or politically engaged civic societies.5 Not all of this engaged journalism is biased, or politically extreme. A significant amount is thoughtful, informed, and regularly wins awards for journalistic excellence.6 Some of the best and most informative sources on human rights, for example, are to be found on NGO online sites.7 Engaged journalism is studied by academic institutions,8 developed by labs,9 is promoted and supported by journalism centers,10 is the topic of books, and is a concept analyzed by journalism organizations.11 Non-neutral journalism, criticism of detachment, and activist journalism are not new. Non-neutral journalism was one of the first forms of modern journalism as a periodic news press emerged in seventeenth-century Europe. The new editors produced newsbooks redolent with advocacy and partisan political journalism—royalist versus non-royalist newspapers, then conservative versus liberal newspapers.12 However, with the mass commercial press in the early 1900s, neutral reporting, especially in North America, became an ideal, and was separated from editorial opinion. Neutrality and objectivity were central principles of many of the first explicit journalism codes of ethics.13 In the United States and then in Canada, the idea of journalists as neutral or detached reporters striking a balance between viewpoints became an influential model for good reporting. North America

4  Traditionally, in journalism ethics, neutrality has been regarded as part of the stance of objective reporting. Neutrality refers to the psychological attitude of not taking sides when reporting on conflicting groups. Objectivity is neutrality plus a strict reporting of just the facts, stripped of bias or interpretation. I chart the history of this notion of objectivity in Ward, Objectively Engaged Journalism. 5  One method is to use social media to “crowdsource” sources of revenue, such as asking individuals to donate to a series of stories. One form of engaged journalism, non-profit news organizations, may depend on funds from major philanthropic organizations who may be liberal or conservative in their political goals. For a successful nonprofit news organization, see the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism at https://www.wisconsinwatch.org. 6  For list of awards won by the Civic Beat, see https://www.civilbeat.org/about/our-awards. 7  See https://www.raptim.org/20-international-human-rights-organizations. 8  For example, conferences on engaged journalism have been held at the Agora Journalism Center in the School of Journalism and Communication at the University of Oregon. 9  See https://medium.com/the-engaged-journalism-lab. 10  For example, the European Journalism Center hosts the Engaged Journalism Accelerator at https://www.engagedjournalism.com/Engaged. Journalism is a topic of discussion among members of the World Association for Newspapers and News Publishers, https://blog.wan-ifra.org/2019/01/25/ engaged-journalism-why-newsrooms-should-put-the-needs-of-their-communities-first. 11  https://www.americanpressinstitute.org/publications/reports/strategy-studies/ what-is-engagement. 12  Ward, The Invention of Journalism Ethics, Chapter 4. 13  Ward, The Invention of Journalism Ethics, Chapter 7.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

21

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

22

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

journalism ethics became a professional ethic of “news objectivity” where news and opinion were strictly divided and the reporter’s job was to neutrally present “just the facts.” News objectivity was never as robust or popular in Europe yet the ideas of neutrality, factuality, balance, and fairness found their way into numerous European codes of journalism ethics, especially in the guidelines for public broadcasters.14 With the “democratization” of media in the late 1900s due to the Internet, citizens and groups obtained the means to skirt around the mainstream press and publish journalistic pieces that ranged from biased, partisan tirades and conspiracy theories to informed analysis and advocacy—and everything in between. There is an increasing amount of unreliable nonobjective journalism, whether supported by governments or far-right groups, and much of it expresses extreme political views. Therefore, there are complaints about fake news or racist articles parading as accurate journalism.15 Determining which report is true or false, and who is or is not a reliable information source has become a large social problem. The voice of the informed and fair journalist is lost amid a cacophony of angry, biased voices that grab attention and dominate public debate, not only online but also on mainstream radio and television programs. Today, both the citizen and the ethical journalist live in a polluted media sphere which imperils egalitarian democracy.16 This emergence of engaged journalism raises ethical questions. There is the issue of how society should attempt to detox the polluted public sphere. This is a social question: How to reform media institutions, media laws, and systems of accountability? Also, there is another question that goes to the heart of journalism ethics: If media practitioners abandon neutrality or objectivity, what other norms define the ethics of journalism? Moreover, if professional or citizen journalists wish to practice their non-neutral journalism responsibly, then what norms should they follow? What aims? What norms would help to ensure that non-neutral or engaged journalism serves the public, publishing accurate material that is not sheer partisanship? What distinguishes the ethical engaged journalist from the unethical engaged journalist? It can seem that the answer to a polluted public sphere is for journalists to follow existing norms for responsible journalism. Or, they could avoid doing non-neutral journalism and regard the engaged writers online as not “really” journalists but

14  Objectivity was at its zenith among the mainstream media of North America between the 1920s and 1960s, and fell gradually out of favor among journalists. From its beginning, the ideal always had its critics, such as the non-neutral magazine muckrakers, Henry Luce’s interpretive Time magazine, and the activist journalists who covered the American civil rights movement. Mark Hampton has argued that as American journalists were developing the ideal of objectivity in the news, British journalists were resisting the trend. See Hampton, “The ‘Objectivity’ Ideal and its Limitations in 20th-century British Journalism.” On muckrakers, see Filler, The Muckrakers; on Luce’s negative view of objectivity, see Baughman, Henry R. Luce and the Rise of the American News Media, 25. 15  On the amount and nature of unreliable media, see Ghosh and Scott. “Digital Deceit,” and Fuchs, Digital Demagogue. 16  On the relationship between extreme opinion and democracy today, see Levitsky and Ziblatt, How Democracies Die, and Ward, Ethical Journalism in a Populist Age.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

advocates. When the first online journalism appeared in the late 1900s and early 2000s, with its opinions and perspectives, this attitude prevailed. Many professional journalists dismissed it as subjective blogging, and not journalism at all. This conservative resistance to new journalism is unhelpful today as non-neutral journalism grows. As for falling back on existing norms, the problem is that journalism ethics today is fragmented. Journalists lack a consensus on what ethics is appropriate for digital, global media, and the new media create ethical issues never foreseen by the founders of journalism ethics. Also, there is not a lot of rigorous, comprehensive ethics material on non-neutral journalism to fall back on. One reason is that the ethics of non-neutral journalism was under-developed in the previous century. Professional ethics focused on how reporters should cover events in a detached and fair manner. Non-neutral writing, sometimes lumped into the category of “opinion journalism,” was a subjective enterprise which did not admit to a detailed ethic.17 This imbalance is being addressed today as ethicists and journalism associations articulate guidelines for practice, such as how to use social media.18 But this is still a work in progress. We do not have a mature, systematic ethic for non-neutral or engaged journalism, let alone a consensus on what such an ethic should look like. To respond to the ethical challenges, journalism ethics should reflect on three levels:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

(1) Reform of the moral ideology of journalism:19 How should we re-conceive journalism’s ethical role and aims in a global media era? (2) Reform of the “content” of journalism ethics: What new guidelines and practices are needed to guide responsible journalism, and to oppose anti-democratic groups? (3) Reform of media institutions and structures: How can journalists, citizens, and civic groups, locally and globally, come together to detox the public sphere, improve mechanisms of media accountability, and put pressure on unethical media practitioners? This chapter works on level (1), the philosophical level. It proposes a way to conceptualize journalism as both engaged and objective. I call it democratically engaged journalism. It is a “third way” between partisan and neutral journalism. Once this moral ideology is constructed, one can get to work on levels (2) and (3). The chapter defines democratically engaged journalism, using a continuum of kinds of journalism. Then it considers possible objections. It concludes by identifying four duties of democratically engaged journalism.

17  However, there was writing here and there that attempted to codify non-neutral journalism, such as MacDougall and Reid’s Interpretative Reporting, or ethical discussions around literary (or narrative) journalism, e.g., https://www.poynter.org/archive/2002/the-ethics-of-narrative-journalism-a-continuingdebate. As well, columnists explained their craft in articles, books, or public speeches, such as honoring the norm of being “independent from faction.” See Kovach and Rosenstiel, The Elements of Journalism, Chapter 5. But the amount and quality of serious ethical thinking on non-neutral journalism did not compare with the numerous, in-depth textbooks on professional and objective journalism across the twentieth century. 18  See, for example, Craig, Excellence in Online Journalism. 19  By a moral ideology I mean a view about the basic aims and principles of journalism—the point of the practice.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

23

24

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

Section 1: A Continuum of Journalism Journalism is the publication of reports, analysis, and commentary on events and issues of public interest and significance, using whatever forms of media are available. Anyone can commit “acts of journalism” sporadically or regularly, and do so ethically or unethically. One does not have to be a professional journalist in the mainstream news media. What is engaged journalism? Engaged journalism is journalism that is motivated, fully or in large part, to promote certain ideas, causes, leaders, policies, or reforms.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Engaged and Disengaged Our default psychological approach to the world is to be engaged with it in some manner. The etymology of “engagement” revolves around three senses: being occupied with something; being committed to something; and finding something interesting. We are occupied when we perform a role or job. Teachers are engaged in classrooms. Being occupied can also mean being engrossed in some activity, e.g., learning to paint watercolors. Engagement is commitment when we pursue some complex, usually difficult to reach, goal, e.g., to commit oneself to marriage, or to devote one’s life to helping street people. One is occupied and committed. We are engaged with something as entertaining when something grabs our attention, such as an engaging play. For this chapter, engaged means being occupied with, and committed to, social goals or practices. To be disengaged means not to be occupied, committed, or fully involved with the world or some aspect of the world. This disengagement can take on two forms: global and local. Global disengagement occurs when a person withdraws from agency and society, often caused by a decline in interest in the world. Seriously depressed people experience a nihilism of values, and can lose interest in the issues that roil social life. Some people, depressed or not, may become an ironic spectator on life’s passing show, or become a hermit. There is also local disengagement which means that a person is not engaged in this issue, or that activity, or these groups, at this time. Aside from depression or a lack of interest, what other reasons might there be to adopt the attitude of disengagement? One reason is to set aside the pressures of life, temporarily, to do intellectual work, e.g., to retreat to my study to create a theory. Another reason is to ensure rigorous, critical inquiry. This is the motive behind the many objective methods of scientific and humanistic inquiry into nature or society. Disengagement means standing back from beliefs and goals, the better to judge them. This same call for disengagement occurs in the professions, where judges, teachers, and public servants are cautioned to make objective judgments based on facts and logic, without the influence of conflicts of interest. As noted, journalistic disengagement in the early 1900s came to be called news objectivity. To be disengaged meant the reporter should place a distance between themselves and their biases and beliefs. They do not use reporting to advance their personal interests. They maintain intellectual and editorial independence from the world outside—audiences, advertisers, donors, and political pressure groups. They are neutral and report just the facts.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Section 1: A Continuum of Journalism

Engaged journalism is defined in contrast to disengaged journalism. It is not neutral and its reports include “more” than the facts, such as interpretation, opinion, advocacy, or polemical argument. Moreover, it does not place a “wall” of independence between journalists and external groups. Some forms of engaged journalism think journalists should get closer to public groups, the better to understand their needs or causes. Where does engaged journalism fit with respect to other forms of journalism? There are many ways to categorize journalisms: by form of technology (e.g., broadcasting, online, print newspaper), by size (global, national, or local news media), by their political perspective (liberal, conservative, anarchist, far-right), or by their types of audiences (young, rural, urban, college-educated). No category system is uniquely correct or best. It depends on your purpose. Figure 2.1 ranges from the strongly disengaged and neutral pole to the strongly engaged pole. The continuum contains three broad categories of journalism. Disengaged journalism: The goal is factual and fair informing, without taking a position or a strong perspective, without engaging in persuasive rhetoric or seeking to participate with citizens in some social project. The most obvious example is neutral reporting already discussed. But it is not limited to neutral reporting. It is possible to include explanatory journalism, such as found in science journalism, in thoughtful, non-polemical analyses of issues, or in “backgrounders” on complex public events. “Explainers” and analysis do depart from strict neutrality but they belong to the disengaged category because they tend to stay close to the facts, they attempt to represent views fairly, and they are moderate in opinion or persuasive rhetoric. Perspectival engaged journalism: The goal is to influence public opinion, and perhaps encourage social reform, by expressing through publication certain opinions, perspectives, and arguments. A newspaper’s editorial or the opinion of a newspaper columnist are traditional examples. Investigative journalism belongs here because it rejects neutrality, while seeking deep facts below the level of press releases and political rhetoric. Interpretive journalism is found in attempts by foreign reporters to give “meaning” to

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Disengaged

Perspectival Engagement

Active Engagement civic engagement

straight reporting explanatory

moderate opinion analysis

extreme populism ideology/partisan

participatory

investigative interpretative magazine

propaganda

Figure 2.1  A Continuum of Engagement.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

25

26

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

complicated movements, and in magazines such as The New Yorker, and The Economist, which mix reportage and commentary. Also included are stronger forms of perspectival journalism, such as advocacy and activist journalism, and the websites of partisan or ideological groups whose writings can stray into the realm of propaganda. In this category, journalists abandon neutrality as an ideal, and they honor norms such as accuracy and fairness in varying degrees. Active engaged journalism: The goal is not only to express views and hope they have an impact, but to act socially and politically in the public sphere. Journalism in this category departs the most from the ideals of disengaged journalism. The kinds of journalism include: (a) extreme populist groups that seek to recruit citizens to their perspective and political causes, or to vote for their leaders. This may include encouraging citizens to show up at rallies by their leaders, or to disrupt the public events of their political “enemies;” (b) participatory journalism which uses the Internet and social media to gather news, images, and eye-witness testimony from citizens around the world; and (c) civic engagement journalism where journalists encourage community activism in the hope of improving communities.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Features of the Continuum

The first feature is this: Where exactly a form of journalism should be placed on the continuum to be debated. For example, should I have placed investigative journalism before or after advocacy journalism? Why is civic journalism placed last on the continuum? It should not surprise us that precision in categorizing is difficult. Journalism is too complex an area to be divided neatly into kinds of journalism. Differences are matters of degree, and different kinds of journalism combine values in various ways. The continuum is a map of a complex terrain. The aim of the continuum is not precision in placement but to show how kinds of journalism can be roughly grouped into three categories of moral ideology. Second, the differences between the kinds of journalism are matters of degree. Generally speaking, as one moves from left to right, we move from a journalism that is more invested in acting as a public spectator and sticking close to the “shoreline” of available facts, than in venturing out into the choppy waters of political opinion and advocacy. There is a greater degree of strict factual accuracy and pre-publication verification. As we approach the right-handed pole, there are greater amounts of hypothesizing, speculating, and theorizing. Journalists are also more active in the public sphere. Third, the continuum helps to highlight misconceptions. For example, the continuum shows that all three forms of journalism have goals and values. Disengaged journalism, such as neutral reporting, has its own goals. The ethical point of adopting the disengaged model is to provide the public with a relativity unbiased stream of factual information. This stream of information is important because it helps to create an informed democracy. However, disengaged journalism has not always stressed that it too has goals and is engaged in society. In fact, the ideology has often implied that neutral reporters are not engaged at all. In this view, to be “engaged” was to be a political partisan or a social activist. Journalists are not, or should not be, engaged. Fourth and finally, the continuum reminds us that certain kinds of journalism may combine norms from the three categories. For example, investigative journalists combine disengaged journalism’s stress on facts with engaged journalism’s stress on stories that prompt reform.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Section 2: Democratically Engaged Journalism

Section 2: Democratically Engaged Journalism We can now approach two key questions: What is the idea of democratically engaged journalism? Where does it fit on the continuum?

The Idea Democratically engaged journalism is journalism that uses the most rigorous and objective methods of inquiry to explain, promote, and defend democratic communities for the sake of greater flourishing among citizens, individually and as a whole. The moral ideology of democratically engaged journalism can be broken down into two large pieces: one is its ultimate goal; the other is the method or stance by which it pursues this goal.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ultimate Goal: Dialogic Democracy

Journalists can be engaged in ways that are positive or negative, responsible or irresponsible. So, we face a choice in forms of engagement. For democratically engaged journalism, the goal is the promotion of democracy. But there are many forms of democracy—representational, republican, parliamentary, elitist, populist, participatory.20 Democratically engaged journalism does not support all these forms. For instance, it should not support a populist democracy where demagogues use media to portray themselves as “strong” men of the people; and it should not support an elitist form of democracy marked by great inequalities. In my view, democratically engaged journalism should support a representational, liberal democracy that is plural and egalitarian. It is open and participatory in impulse and structure, with constitutional protection for minorities from the tyranny of majorities. As Dewey argued, this form of democracy is a precondition for the richest kind of communal life and human flourishing.21 Plural, egalitarian democracy is grounded in the rule of law, division of powers, public-directed and transparent government, and core liberties for all. The process of plural democracy is robust, knowledge-based, respectful dialog, a willingness to compromise for the common good, and a readiness to test (and modify) one’s partial view of the world.22 I call this dialogic democracy. It is important that people have a meaningful opportunity to participate in crucial decisions. Yet, how they participate is also crucial. Dialogic democracy requires moderate, informed exchanges of information and views not dominated by powerful interests or intolerant voices. Dialog promotes what Rawls called a “reasonable pluralism,” a reasonable discourse among groups with different values and philosophies of life.23 Dialogic democracy is an ideal. It is valuable as a target at which to aim.

20  On the kinds of democracy, see Held, Models of Democracy. 21  Dewey, Democracy and Education, 16. 22  This preference for egalitarian, participatory democracy would need, to be fully persuasive, an extended argument. I provide a detailed conception in Ward, Global Journalism Ethics. 23  Rawls, Political Liberalism, 4.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

27

28

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

How does journalism help democratic publics exist? By influencing the flow and quality of communication in a democracy’s public sphere. Journalism can help societies make the often-difficult assent to better forms of democracy, characterized by tolerance and equality. Or, journalism can encourage intolerant communication which sends democracy into a downward spiral to discordant society. Promoting dialogic democracy requires much more than disengaged, neutral reporting. It requires journalistic engagement in democracy. Among the tasks of democratically engaged journalism is monitoring and alerting the public to leaders or groups that could undermine a democratic “concord” among groups. To face our troubled public sphere, journalists could “double down” on neutrally reporting just the facts, such as quoting accurately what leaders like Donald Trump say in public; or sticking unswervingly to balanced reports on crucial issues, such as immigration or climate change, where voices for non-credible and intolerant views are given equal space with credible and tolerant views. Or, journalists could become engaged as partisan activists, identifying with, and becoming mouthpieces for, specific political parties or leaders. Perhaps they might join protesters marching in the streets.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Adopting Either Option Would Be a Mistake

If journalists join the protesters, this engagement would erode media credibility and contribute to an already partisan-soaked media sphere. Yet a journalism of just the (alleged) facts, studiously balanced, is too passive and ripe for manipulation. In a partisan public sphere, what is a fact is up for debate. Democratically engaged journalism lays between partisan advocacy and mincing neutrality. It is not a neutral spectator or a channel of information that merely repeats people’s alleged facts or racist views. When important social and democratic issues are raised, democratically engaged journalism critically evaluates sources and claims, and operates with a clear notion of the goal of democratic media. Journalism cannot avoid involvement in the political sphere. One reason is this: as the politics of a country goes, so goes the flourishing of its citizens. If a nation becomes a tyranny, the citizens suffer. So, journalists have a duty to critique and evaluate what happens in the political sphere. Another reason is this: As democracy goes, so goes journalism. Where democracy weakens, democratic protections of freedom of speech and publication weaken. Journalists have a vested interest in maintaining a free and democratic nation.

The Method Democratically engaged journalism is distinct in its attachment to dialogic, egalitarian democracy. It is also distinct in combining that attachment with a commitment to objective methods in practice. Democratic journalists should guide their actions and work by the best standards of objective inquiry. They should be objectively engaged journalists. This is not the narrow objectivity of the codes of professional journalism created a century ago. Objectivity is not the passive, un-interpreted observation of external facts. Humans possess no such capacity for observing pure facts. Moreover, neutrality is not the best stance for a social engaged practice like journalism. Any significant piece of journalism—in fact, any story—is an interpretation of some

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Section 2: Democratically Engaged Journalism

person, place, event, or issue. It mixes facts, perspective, judgments about credible sources, and the evaluation of rival opinions. It requires the selection of story “angle” and emphasis. The very language one uses to tell the story reflects perspective and judgment. Moreover, the evaluation of interpretations is different from neutrally stripping stories down to bare facts. It requires a holistic set of criteria for evaluating to what degree a story (a) fits reality, (b) is coherent with existing knowledge, and (c) is able to withstand sustained public scrutiny. Criteria that assist judgments about (a) to (c) go beyond the criterion of expressing facts. They include norms of conceptual clarity, completeness of fact—the story contains the most important facts—a proper context for facts, and the logical coherence of statements within the story. This is the same type of objectivity that today guides scientific and other forms of active investigation into the world. Moreover, this type of engaged objectivity is thwarted if one adopts a strict neutrality. The correct stance for democratically engaged journalism is impartiality, understood as not allowing one’s pre-existing partialities to prejudge the facts, angle, or conclusions of a story. Unlike neutrality, impartiality allows perspectives to be adopted and conclusions to be drawn, if they are informed by sufficient investigation. In previous writings, I developed a detailed theory of this situated method of objectivity which I call “pragmatic objectivity” because it is designed for practices such as journalism.24 Condensed for this chapter, pragmatic objectivity can be described as the application of two things to practice: adopting an objective stance toward stories, and then testing stories by applying a set of evaluative norms. The objective stance is a willingness to adopt certain attitudes or “cognitive virtues” which allow us to step back from beliefs, claims, and theories. The cognitive virtues include a willingness to be impartial, and acceptance of the “burdens of judgment” when making public statements. The burdens include the need to verify facts and to provide good evidence for claims.25 The objective stance also requires inquirers to be passionately and genuinely interested in truth-seeking, which shows itself in a willingness to follow the facts where they lead and to alter one’s views as the evidence dictates. However, adopting the objective stance is not sufficient for objectivity. The inquirer has to apply that stance to actual stories. That is, journalistic inquirers evaluate their interpretations by testing for accuracy, by seeking cross-verification from multiple sources, by questioning the origin of information, by providing fair representations of other people’s views, and so on. Journalists are objective if they adopt the objective stance and use objective norms to test interpretations. Pragmatic objectivity suits today’s journalism because it is a flexible method that can be applied to different kinds of journalism, from reporting to analysis to civic engaged journalism. The norms of disengaged, neutral journalism apply only to fact-stating, straight reporting. Pragmatic objectivity works against dogmatism, sloppy reporting, entrenched biases, and a refusal to learn from other perspectives. Regrettably, we have too little pragmatic objectivity in the public sphere, among journalists and citizens.

24  Ward, The Invention of Journalism Ethics, Chapter 8. 25  Rawls, Political Liberalism, 54–58.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

29

30

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

Where Does It Fit? Where does democratically engaged journalism fit on the continuum of Figure 2.1? The obvious answer is that it fits somewhere in the perspectival or active engagement divisions, perhaps the latter. However, I offer a different conception that can at first sound paradoxical: One can think of democratically engaged journalism as not on the continuum. Democratically engaged journalism is such a broad stance toward practice that we can think of many forms of journalism on the continuum, if practiced correctly, as contributing to the comprehensive goal of sustaining egalitarian democracy amid media corruption. Straight reporting in a neutral fashion does not violate the ethic of democratically engaged journalism; it simply is insufficient for democracy and it should not be the dominant approach to journalism. A democratic public benefits from many forms of journalism: investigative journalism, interpretative journalism, community journalism, opinion journalism—all working under the umbrella stance of democratically engaged journalism. However, this “ecumenical” idea should not blind us to the fact that the moral ideology of democratically engaged journalism is calling for serious revision of how many people think about journalism. The change can be stated most provocatively by saying that, for democratically engaged journalism, journalists are, or should be, social advocates— social advocates of a special kind. They are advocates for egalitarian democracy at home and abroad. They practice an impartial journalism of method for partial ends— democratic goals. This conception is a long way from the original notion of news objectivity constructed a century ago.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Section 3: Objections The moral ideology of democratically engaged journalism mixes terms that, traditionally, have been thought to be opposites or incompatible, such as “objectively engaged” or “factual interpretation” or “goal-driven objectivity.” The sense that such phrases are contradictory is due, in large part, to the dualistic way in which our culture has thought about knowledge and inquiry. Therefore, it is important to consider some objections to democratically engaged journalism, concerning the role of facts, neutrality, emotions, and attachments.

Accuracy, Neutrality, and Facts When people consider how journalists should respond to a toxic public sphere, they sometimes suggest that the “answer” is that journalists should publish accurate reports, period; and not publish fake news or intolerant views. Unfortunately, the answer is not that simple. The problem goes beyond accuracy. One can accurately report fake claims by quoting officials. Also, fake news is produced by sources other than mainstream news media. Journalists cannot entirely ignore unreasonable people, since what they do and say has social implications. Another suggested answer is that journalists should stop “editorializing” and be neutral, and not take sides on any issue or problem. But neutrality is the wrong ideal for a socially embedded profession like journalism. There are many topics where

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Section 3: Objections

neutrality is absurd. Should journalists be neutral on whether child sexual abuse is right or wrong? If doing a story on child sexual abuse, should the journalism, to be balanced and objective, quote someone who thinks child sexual abuse is a good thing? Of course not. Journalists have always struggled to be neutral. Some of the best works of journalism have not been neutral. In 1887, Elizabeth Cochrane, one the first female reporters, writing under the pseudonym of Nellie Bly, went to work at Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World. One of her first projects was to get herself committed to the asylum on Roosevelt Island by feigning insanity. Her exposé of conditions among the patients precipitated a grand-jury investigation and sparked improvements in patient care. Was Nellie Bly neutral? No. Were the editors of The Washington Post and The New York Times neutral when they opposed Richard Nixon in publishing the Pentagon papers? Such journalists were engaged, their works were value-laden, and goaldriven. Yet they did not simply editorialize. They dug deep for hidden, important facts. Today, when journalism awards are handed out, the winning stories are lauded for their engagement: e.g., revealing some injustice. There is not much talk about neutrality. As for sticking to the facts, pragmatic objectivity agrees that factuality is important. But being factual is not easy. For example, journalists should ask: What facts, and whose facts? What is a fact today is often what some prominent person says is a fact. Journalists should ask: Is this really a fact? If we have facts, what do they mean? Who stands to benefit if this is reported as fact? What facts are ignored or presumed? Historian David Mindich has documented how American newspapers covered the lynching of African Americans in the 1890s. The papers covered them in a matter-offact dispassionate manner. The coverage expressed no emotion. It accepted the view that the black men were guilty of rape, though they were never tried. African Americans were depicted as cowards, and white subjects as heroes, in a detached writing style.26 Moreover, the idea that reports are, or should be, only collages of facts, scrubbed free of interpretation by the reporter, is a myth. Even straight news stories involve the reporter’s perspective on what the story is about, the angle to take, the sources to choose, the facts to include. The stories of journalism contain conjectures, expert opinion, theories, historical perspectives, and science. Further, what needs coverage is not just official facts but trends; needed reforms; implications of new technology; cultural attitudes; ethnic tensions; moral questions; history; inequalities; powerful, behind-the scenes, groups; and how people interpret the basic political principles of their society. This requires a journalism of investigation, of reform, of interpretation, and a journalism of reasoned debate. To do so properly, journalists need to be nuanced interpreters of culture and history. Better to start with the idea that stories are interpretations and seek a way to test them. One way to test them, and only one, is whether a story fits the facts available. The story also has to cohere conceptually, logically, and be consistent with existing knowledge and theory. A story needs to be able to withstand strenuous public scrutiny and the questions raised by alternate perspectives. The criteria by which we evaluate stories are plural. 26  Mindich, Just the Facts: How “Objectivity” Came to Define American Journalism, 113–137.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

31

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

32

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

Moreover, the use of facts is a complex matter, requiring us to properly interpret the meaning of facts. Facts need context, and context is a matter of interpretation. For instance, government statistics about the rate of unemployment and police “facts” about how well they are fighting crime in their community should not be accepted (or reported) at face value. Journalists should use statistical (and other) methods to interpret the data. In health reporting, journalists should compare the cancer rate of a group in a clinical trial with background levels of cancer in the general population. In political reporting, the facts of opinion polls are worthless unless correctly interpreted. Often, getting the correct interpretation of the facts is as important as knowing the “bare” facts. We need to select facts for relevance and importance, organize them into coherent statistical patterns, and place them in their proper context. Odd or contentious facts may be overridden or doubted by other considerations, such as coherence with existing knowledge. Nevertheless, empirical facts originate in the deliverances of our senses and therefore anchor our conceptual systems in experience. There is perhaps no more succinct debunking of the idea that isolated facts have a special power by themselves than John Dewey’s introduction to The Public and Its Problems.27 In a few pages, Dewey throws cold water on the idea that facts “carry their meaning along on themselves on their face.” There can be disagreement on the facts or on what they mean. There may be insufficient facts to establish a claim. The same facts may support rival interpretations. Purported facts may be false or manipulated. Dewey points out that a few recalcitrant facts cannot force a person to accept or abandon a particular theory. Neo-pragmatist Willard V.O. Quine argued that facts never “prove” an empirical theory. There is always the possibility of an equally good, rival theory. Just as facts “under-determine” scientific theory, so they under-determine our news reports.28 Yet, despite these cautions about a simplistic view of facts, pragmatic objectivity in journalism does not dismiss the importance of facts, properly understood. To the contrary, it recognizes, for instance, the importance of facts to investigative journalists in their efforts to expose government corruption. Pragmatic objectivity does not share the post-modern skepticism that there are no facts. Rather, it rejects the mythical idea of “pure” facts or a pure “given” in experience that is known without any interpretation, and the mythical idea that such facts are the sole and sufficient basis for evaluating the objectivity of reports. Pragmatic objectivity regards facts as creatures of interpretation and conceptual schemes. What we consider a fact depends on our belief systems, worldview, and epistemic norms.

Timid Reporting or Biased Engagement Democratically engaged journalism claims to be a third way between neutrality and partisanship. However, some readers may still worry that it can be used to justify biased “engagement.” In fact, I claim that democratically engaged journalism has the means to avoid two ills of contemporary journalism: (1) an excessive timidity in

27  Dewey, The Public and Its Problems, 3–8. 28  Quine, Pursuit of Truth, 96–102.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Section 3: Objections

opposing falsehood and manipulative communicators in the public sphere due to a commitment to neutrality and detachment; and (2) an aggressive, biased engagement, where people use journalism to promote dubious causes by using dubious means, such as twisting the facts or circulating conspiracy theories. That there are unethical forms of journalistic engagement is clear from Figure 2.1, which contains such unethical uses as propaganda. With respect to timidity, the negative consequences of subscribing to a journalism ethics tethered to a strict neutrality that reports “just the facts” is clear from watching mainstream news organizations' attempt to deal with false or intolerant statements by leaders or groups. For example, since Donald Trump was elected president, American mainstream reporters, seeking to honor a traditional news objectivity, have twisted themselves into verbal pretzels trying not to call an outrageous statement by Trump racist, or hate speech, or misogynist. Better to see if someone else, like a liberal professor, will say so. At the same time, partisans use the media’s commitment to “balance” to create false moral equivalencies between racist and antiracist groups. Trump, in July of 2019, told four Congresswomen of color that they should “go home” because they criticized US policy, even though all were American citizens. His storm of tweets against the women received much play. Rather than call his comments racist, CBS and the Times settled for a euphemism. It called them “racially charged” speech. Others said the comments might affect “racial divisions” but stopped short of saying they were racist. Other outlets fell back on the plaintive cry, “this is not who we are,” which only fails to come to grips with the depth of racism in the country. In this topsy-turvy world, Trump supporters then used the media’s notion of balance to get publicity for their accusation that it was the women who were racist.29 So, I ask: Whence this reticence to state the obvious, that such statements are racist, when the “go-back-where-you-came-from” slur is an age-old racist adage? It is a longstanding strategy of American white supremacists to paint people of color and non-Christians as unwelcome strangers in their own country. The answer is: a commitment to a narrow conception of good reporting as necessarily neutral and “facts only.” This conception makes it very difficult for reporters to call a president a liar or a racist, even if there is evidence for that charge. The ideology of democratically engaged journalism does not hold the extreme positions that reporters should never be neutral, or should report continually in an opposition mode, calling people liars or racists, or taking sides in a prejudicial manner. There are types of stories, such as a criminal trial, where reporters should attempt a neutral description of the evidence presented by both the prosecutor and the defense lawyer. Moreover, journalists should swing into their strong, oppositional stance where the situation requires such a position, e.g., if Trump refuses to step down as president even though he were to lose the next federal election. In crucial cases where anti-democratic ideas are advanced, journalists should greet it with active opposition, not balance. But not every story requires such engagement. However, where principles of equalitarian democracy are at stake, journalists should not be hampered by scruples

29  For a detailed analysis of this example, see Bell (with Andrea Cervantez), “News Coverage of Racism, White Supremacy & Hate Speech”.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

33

34

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

over neutrality or reporting “just the facts.”30 If a statement is a lie or racist, then say so. If a spokesperson’s description of refugees is factually inaccurate, misleading, and demeaning, then say so. And say so in news coverage and analysis, not just in editorials inside newspapers. Just be ready to back it up with solid evidence, not bias or partisanship.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Values, Attachments, and Emotions How does objectivity co-exist with values, goals, attachments, and emotions? Are not these elements of human psychology subjective. Do they not bias inquiry? The answer is that emotions, values, and goals are necessary elements of thinking and inquiry. They can empower objective investigations, or they can lead to bias. It all depends on how we employ the volitional and emotional parts of our human nature. The importance of finding a way to mix value, emotion, and objectivity in journalism is clear. The daily news is full of implicit or explicit value judgments—tales of winners and losers, good guys and bad guys. Reporters cannot avoid evaluative language in reporting on unfair bosses, brutal massacres, vicious murders, notorious pedophiles, and dangerous terrorists. Journalists employ evaluations in selecting credible sources or displaying skepticism toward a new “scientific” theory. Journalists report on gruesome scenes of disaster, and can themselves be affected emotionally. To enter journalism is to enter an emotive, value-laden craft. New journalists learn more than the skills of writing news and gathering information. They acculturate into a realm of reporting routines, news values, and peer attitudes. Thus, a theory of objectivity should take into account these value-laden activities. Democratically engaged journalism starts from the premise that all journalists have values and goals. Therefore, the issue is not whether journalists have goals but what goals they seek and how they seek them. There is no automatic formula by which journalists can test values and goals for objectivity. There is only thoughtfulness, the diligent application of rationality, and the asking of probing questions. Journalists should ask: Do the facts of the case support the value judgment? Does the value judgment cohere with my other values and goals? Have I come to my judgment with a sufficient degree of critical distance? Do I provide reasons for pursing such goals that are acceptable, or at least understandable, to other rational agents? But, what about journalists’ attachments to groups? If the claim is only that journalists have attachments to groups, then democratically engaged journalism agrees. But there are stronger claims made in this area: that journalists should or should not have attachments. Activist journalists support the former claim. Neutral journalists subscribe to the latter claim. Democratically engaged journalism thinks it is ethically permissible and often desirable that journalists report or opine for specific groups, such as gays, libertarians, or Catholics. Such forms of journalism provide additional perspectives on issues. However, group-attached journalists need to report objectively on their favored groups 30  I provide a list of types of anti-democratic activity that require the oppositional stance in Ethical Journalism in a Populist Age, 127–130.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Section 3: Objections

and causes. Moreover, they also have to rank the priority of their group attachments. Journalists should make primary their attachment to the common good of the public as a whole. A commitment to the public at large regulates and trumps attachments to more specific groups. Why stress the ranking of attachments? Because there is, in group-attached journalism, the constant danger that bias toward one’s group can override one’s fundamental duty to inform the general public. Where serving a particular group clashes with serving the public, the latter must prevail. If it is in the public interest to inform society about problems within a minority or marginalized group, it is the ethical duty of any journalist to report these facts. For example, activist journalists who support an environmental group may not report inconvenient counter-facts to their group’s position. But attachments can be ethically dubious. One can be, for example, a committed neo-Nazi. Committed journalism can be a journalism of inflexible ideology, or of faction. Meanwhile, democratically engaged journalism has a positive view of emotions, when used properly. Emotions in general are an important form of access to the world. They have cognitive functions. They help us know the world and pay attention to aspects we might ignore. Feelings of injustice can motivate courageous journalism, and empathy can prompt journalists to pay attention to people in distress. The issue is to be attentive to the emotions we have as journalists and develop healthy habits of emotions. There should be no call to repress emotions in general. Better discussions of emotion are much needed in journalism ethics.31 Psychologists have studied how emotions are necessary to rationality and to good thinking. Antonio Damasio, for example, has found that when brain injuries rob people of certain emotional capacities, they become unable to plan rationally or to react appropriately to other people.32 Adam Morton asks us to imagine the hypothetical example33 of a brilliant young scientist who is capable of working efficiently in her field but will never make fundamental advances because she lacks the empowering emotions of curiosity and awe at nature.34 It is like being a musical savant with great technical prowess but lacking a love of music. Moreover, my analysis of pragmatic objectivity presumes the importance of volition for rational inquiry. People must be willing to adopt the objective stance, with its restrictions and methodological demands. One must want to be objective. One needs a passion for rationality and truth. Similarly, people who irrationally and dogmatically refuse to alter their biased opinions, despite strong counter-evidence, is explained, psychologically, by the force of volition, emotion, and desire. Such people may defend their views by exercising what I call a “fake” rationality. They fly under the colors of genuine rationality, by showing a false concern for truth, fact, and rigorous method.

31  For an example of new and good work on the emotions, see Wahl-Jorgensen, Emotion and Journalism. 32  Damasio, Descartes’ Error. 33  Morton, Emotion and Imagination, 24–26. 34  On the contribution of wonder to the progress of science, see Daston and Park’s Wonders and the Order of Nature.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

35

36

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

Both individuals and societies face a choice between embracing or not embracing objectivity in the formation of their beliefs and in their public deliberation. Ultimately, upon that choice, rests the future of rational, egalitarian democracy.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Cold-Blooded Neutrality? A widespread belief among the legion of critics of objectivity is that objectivity is neither desirable nor possible because it requires humans to turn themselves into perfectly neutral and emotionless analysts—cold-blooded spectators on the urgent issues of life. Why should this be so? As noted, emotions motivate good thinking and inquiry. Perhaps the classic portrait of the cold-blooded “rational” person is Thomas Gradgrind, the school board superintendent in Charles Dickens’s novel, Hard Times (1854), who treats all questions, including interactions with his children, in terms of numbers, facts, prosperity, and expected utility. Critics of bloodless objectivity then ask rhetorically: Who would support an attitude like that? The response is: No one should; and, luckily, no one has to. Objectivity does not require people to become a “logic machine”—a human Dr. Spock.35 Emotional response to the world is an intrinsic part of ethics. In ethics, appeals to compassion and empathy can and should be part of rational arguments about ethical decisions. Moreover, the best practices of objectivity often combine partiality and impartiality. In a trial, the partiality of the prosecutor and the defense attorney (and the parties they represent) occurs within a larger impartial context— a judge or jury that subjects partial arguments to the test of objective evidence and to the impartial rules of law. Ideally, what is fair and objective emerges during a trial where partialities make their case and are judged by objective norms. The norms of objectivity were not constructed because its creators thought most humans could be “empty” of bias. The reverse is true. The norms were constructed because of an acute awareness of human bias, because it is evident. Shallow critics of objectivity never tire of saying: “We all have biases.” Rather than conclude that objectivity is impossible because bias is universal, scientists, journalists, and others concluded the opposite: we biased humans need the discipline of objectivity to reduce the ineliminable presence of bias. Impartiality does not require a strong neutrality or cold-blooded detachment. Impartiality is part of the stance of a person—professor, judge, journalist—who is active and engaged. Impartiality does not mean that one has no partialities. It does not mean that one does not feel the tug of one’s own biases and interests. It does not mean one must withdraw from agency, detached like the neutral gear in my car. It does not require that one can never express a judgment, conclusion, or perspective. What impartiality demands is that a person is willing and capable of not letting their partialities unduly bias their judgment. In my view, the best way to ensure one’s partialities are not biasing one’s thinking is to adopt the stance and standards of pragmatic objectivity. Genuine inquiry derives from an impartial search for the truth, “regardless of what the color of that truth may be.”36 35  Dr. Spock is a character from the TV science fiction series, Star Trek. The non-human Dr. Spock was baffled by humans who included emotions when making decisions. 36  Haack, Manifesto of a Passionate Moderate, 10.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Conclusion: Duties for Democratic Journalism

The best journalism is a judicious blend of two fundamental impulses: the emotionladen romantic impulse and the logic-directed objective impulse. The romantic impulse consists of the passion for interesting stories and substantial revelations. It is the impulse to seek out stories that give the journalist an opportunity for creative writing, interpretation, and self-expression. The objective impulse is the concern to verify what the romantic impulse finds.

Conclusion: Duties for Democratic Journalism The nature of the global media sphere entails that democratically engaged journalism should take on a number of tasks. Democratically engaged journalists protect egalitarian democracy by honoring at least four duties: (1) (2) (3) (4)

to advance democratic dialog across racial and economic divides; to explain and defend pluralistic liberal democracy against its foes; to act as a watchdog for the public against extreme or intolerant media; to develop guidelines for covering democracy-weakening trends.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Let us delve a little deeper into each of the four duties. Duty 1: Dialog across divides Journalists have a duty to convene public fora and provide channels of information that allow for frank but respectful dialog across divisions. They should seek to mend the tears in the fabric of the body politic. They should work against the trend where confrontation replaces reasonable discussion; and fear of the “other” replaces an openness to humanity. Dialogic journalism challenges racial and ethnic stereotypes and policies, e.g., investigating the factual basis of new and strident immigration laws. It means opposing the penchant to demonize. It means exposing the perpetrators and supporters of hate speech. Whether a dialog occurs depends not only on the speakers but on the manner in which their encounter in the media is structured. A heavy ethical burden lies on the shoulders of media producers, editors, and hosts to design dialogic encounters on their programs and online fora. We are all too familiar with the provocative “journalists” who seek ratings through disrespectful ranting and heated confrontation with guests. But we also have good dialogic examples on public television where viewpoints are critiqued on the basis of facts, not on the basis of the ethnicity or the personal details of the speaker. Duty 2: Go deep politically However, fostering the right sort of democracy-building conversations is not enough. Conversations need to be well-informed. Here is where the second duty arises. Journalism needs to devote major resources to an explanatory journalism that delves deeply into the political values, processes, and institutions of egalitarian democracy, while challenging the myths and fears surrounding issues such as immigration, terrorism, and so on. There is a movement toward fact-checking websites. It is a good idea but insufficient. It is not enough to know that a politician made an inaccurate statement. Many citizens need a re-education in liberal democracy. They will be called on to judge issues that depend on civic knowledge. A democracy without a firm grasp on its principles is flying blind.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

37

38

2  Democratically Engaged Journalists

Duty 3: Watchdog for extremism Journalists, in league with democratic civic groups, should help society detox the public sphere by fostering education on the nature of today’s media sphere, the difference between reliable and unreliable media, and the norms that all of us should honor when we use our media devices. In particular, it would advance understanding of the nature and history of extremism and anti-democratic groups, and their strategies. This would be a development of media literacy across society. Also, journalists should monitor the online news world and help citizens become aware of extreme media operators. Duty 4: Guidelines on extremism Within journalism ethics, journalists should continue to work on specific guidelines that help them become aware of the totalitarian and intolerant aspects of emerging groups and political leaders. These guidelines could range from general “indexes” for identifying extremists or totalitarian leaders in one’s own democracy to more specific guidelines on how to cover leaders who indulge in hate speech and conspiracy theory.37 In the end, democratically engaged journalists should have the courage to oppose intolerant groups that threaten egalitarian democracy, and not shrink from characterizing a leader as a liar or a totalitarian, where the facts warrant. When such leaders are not opposed or revealed for what they are, a neutral, disengaged journalism only smooths the path to their rise in power. In the face of such dangers, democratically engaged journalists have an ethical right to be prickly, non-neutral, and engaged.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Batsell, J. (2015). Engaged Journalism: Connecting with Digitally Empowered News Audiences. New York: Columbia University Press. Baughman, J.L. (1987). Henry R. Luce and the Rise of the American News Media. Boston: Twayne Publishers. Bell, K.M. and Cervantez, A. (forthcoming 2021). News coverage of racism, white supremacy & hate speech. In Ward, S.J.A. (Ed.). Handbook of Global Media Ethics. Amsterdam, NL: Springer. Briggs, M. (2012). Entrepreneurial Journalism. Los Angeles, CA: Sage. Craig, D. (2011). Excellence in Online Journalism. Los Angeles, CA: Sage. Damasio, A. (1994). Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain. New York: Penguin Books. Daston, L. and Park, K. (2001). Wonders and the Order of Nature. New York: Zone Books. Dewey, J. (1954). The Public and Its Problems. Athens, OH: Ohio University Press. Dewey, J. (2005). Democracy and Education. Radford, VA: Wilder Publications. Filler, L. (1968). The Muckrakers. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Fuchs, C. (2018). Digital Demagogue: Authoritarian Capitalism in the Age of Trump and Twitter. London: Pluto Books. Ghosh, D. and Scott, B. (2018). Digital deceit. New America Report. January. https://www. newamerica.org/public-interest-technology/policy-papers/digitaldeceit 37  I provide a number of indexes and guidelines in Ethical Journalism in a Populist Age.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

References

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Haack, S. (1998). Manifesto of a Passionate Moderate: unfashionable essays. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Hampton, M. (2008). The “objectivity” ideal and its limitations in 20th-century British journalism. Journalism Studies, 9(4), 477–493. Held, D. (2006). Models of Democracy. 3rd ed. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press. Kovach, B. and Rosenstiel, T. (2001). The Elements of Journalism. New York: Three Rivers Press. Levitsky, S. and Ziblatt, D. (2018). How Democracies Die. New York: Crown. MacDougall, C.D. and Reid, R. (1987). Interpretative Reporting. 9th ed. New York: MacMillan Publishing. Mindich, D.T.Z. (1998). Just the Facts: How “Objectivity” Came to Define American Journalism. New York: New York University Press. Morton, A. (2013). Emotion and Imagination. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press. Quine, W.V.O. (1990). Pursuit of Truth. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Rawls, J. (1993). Political Liberalism. New York: Columbia University Press. Singer, J.B., Domingo, D., Heinonen, A. et al. (2011). Participatory Journalism: Guarding Open Gates at Online Newspapers. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. Wahl-Jorgensen, K. (2016). Emotion and journalism. In Anderson, C,W., Domingo, E., and Hermida, A. (Eds.), The Sage Handbook of Digital Journalism. Los Angeles, CA: Sage Reference, pp. 128–143. Ward, S.J.A. (2010). Global Journalism Ethics. Montreal, Que: McGill-Queen’s University Press. Ward, S.J.A. (2015). The Invention of Journalism Ethics. 2nd ed. Montreal, Que: McGillQueen’s University Press. Ward, S.J.A. (2019a). Ethical Journalists in a Populist Age. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. Ward, S.J.A. (2019b). Objectively Engaged Journalism: An Ethic. Montreal, Que: McGillQueen’s University Press.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

39

40

3 Journalism Innovation in a Time of Survival Alfred Hermida and Mary Lynn Young University of British Columbia

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Introduction Over the past two decades, innovation has become a buzzword across industries, and journalism is no exception. Much of the innovation in journalism has taken place against discourses of economic crisis, owing to the atomization of print advertising, newspaper closures, and job losses. This context includes the disruptive force of online advertising, a growth in global startups and non-human journalism actors, competition from big technology platforms, and multiple participatory and highly sought-after publics (Westlund and Lewis, 2014). In parallel, innovation has tended to be associated with successful and not-so-successful technological developments, from the digital transformation of print journalism to the Web, social media, live video, artificial intelligence (AI), and virtual reality (VR). After more than 20 years of digital journalism, it is time to take stock of what innovation has wrought in journalism. First, as a number of scholars have already identified, a central challenge within the journalism industry and scholarly literature on journalism is the lack of definition or shared definition of what is journalism innovation. This gap has allowed scholars and practitioners to make vague assumptions about the roles of technological innovation and journalism, with both considered to be progressive forces, and innovation specifically seen as a goal without specific values, and the only option for disruptive unstable times. It has also allowed important concerns to be ignored, such as journalism’s role in social ordering, racism, Settler Colonialism, and harm to misrepresented communities, with questions such as who is not being served by journalism (Callison and Young, 2020). This chapter draws on journalism research from Canada, which, similar to other countries with a liberal, largely commercial media system, is showing signs of market failure (Public Policy Forum Report, 2018). Arguably, innovation as a technology-led solution has failed to save this country’s legacy journalism. While it has obviously contributed to journalism change and development, it has not led to economic sustainability and growth for the majority of commercial journalism organizations, while others are facing criticism about racism and harm to long misrepresented and underserved audiences. The antidote for the financial crisis in journalism in Canada has been historic levels of state support—more than $600M over five years—with governments treating News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

A Definitional Challenge

journalism organizations similar to creative industries. We suggest that without clear definitions of what is innovation, what is journalism, and what kinds of industries and/or organizations are being discussed—commercial or not for profit—we run the risk of continuing to stay focused on bright, shiny things (Küng, 2017; Posetti, 2018) and not system-wide repair and transformation sensitive to and in sync with shared understandings of how it could and should be funded. This lack of clarity limits specificity about the kinds of journalism infrastructures being supported and created, and national expectations about their values and contributions to communication, understanding, and connection in relation to local, national, and global concerns and the worlds we want to live in. This chapter seeks to reposition media innovation beyond a narrow economic or technological frame (Callison and Young, 2020), where initiatives are the product of a defensive strategy by newsrooms, driven by an imperative to survive in the face of novel challenges and actors. Rather, it suggests taking a wider approach to understanding what is innovation that prioritizes multiple journalisms, relationships with audiences, the generally precarious nature of the creative industries, and the infrastructures required to support twenty-first century journalism.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

A Definitional Challenge Journalism is considered vital to the function of a healthy democracy, with the information generated and circulated through media considered a public good because journalism is supposed to support an informed citizenry and perform a watchdog function. As such, threats to the integrity or existence of journalism are considered as threats to democracy itself. In recent years, journalism has frequently been characterized as “in crisis,” threatened by everything from the rise of so-called fake news to the demise of the local newspaper. The challenges to journalism, in particular to the print newspaper industry, pre-date the Internet, starting with the rise of competition from radio and television. Advertising revenues, the mainstay of mass circulation newspapers in high-income democracies, have been on the decline for decades (Cagé, 2016). Digitalization, bringing with it increased competition from new digital entrants such as Google and Facebook, fragmentation of audiences and novel technologies such as social media, have heightened the sense of multiple and ongoing crises, which also include prior crises such as racist coverage and its ongoing harms (Anderson and Robertson, 2011; Küng, 2015; Carlson and Usher, 2016; Newman, 2016; Nielsen, 2016; Callison and Young, 2020). Indeed, the notion of crisis has become so pervasive that even the industry itself has adopted the idea of its own demise (Siles and Boczkowski, 2012), especially in the context of legacy news outlets in Western liberal democracies. Against a background of crisis, innovation in journalism has emerged as the antidote to its struggles. According to Posetti (2018, p. 9) “The concept of ‘innovation’—in its technological, economic, structural, creative and social manifestations—sits at the intersection of these factors and it is critical to journalism’s survival.” She goes on to quote Pavlik (2013), who referenced innovation as “the key to the viability of news media in the digital age” (quoted in Posetti, 2018, p. 9).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

41

42

3  Journalism Innovation in a Time of Survival

Yet the characterization of innovation has often been in the eye of the beholder because of a range of definitional challenges, and the fact that the term crisis tends to be teleological in its deployment (Roitman, 2013; Zelizer, 2015; Callison and Young, 2020). That is, whoever identifies the crisis tends to have a solution aligned with their own identification of the problem and its solutions. In addition, as Whyte argues with respect to epistemologies of crisis in colonialism, crisis in a colonial context has tended to be constructed as “urgent” and “unprecedented,” such that underlying ideologies of power remain masked (Whyte, 2021, p. 4). As a result, pinning down how innovation in journalism is understood, implemented, and practiced is far from straightforward. For Beyan et al., one of the challenges of defining innovation is that “different players have different views on what innovation actually is” (Bleyen et al., 2014, p. 29). Posetti cites a number of definitions from within journalism studies and beyond. These include Cornia, Sehl, and Nielsen (2017) who identify innovation as “‘the introduction of new ideas, methods, and technologies’ that are pursued to enhance the reputation of an organisation, ‘to let journalists experiment with new forms of storytelling, and as part of wider attempts at driving organisational and cultural change.’” She also references Schumpeter, who defines innovation from an economic perspective as “the creation of new outputs, or improved goods; new organisational structures; new markets or new producers” (Schumpeter, 1934; Posetti, 2018, p. 12). Other scholars within journalism studies have focused more narrowly on innovation as largely a technological development. For example, Usher and Kammer (2019) define innovation as the development and adoption of new technologies, actors, or practices that are different or improve upon what already exists. In their review of the literature on innovation in journalism, Belair-Gagnon and Steinke (2020) identified 10 ways in which news organizations implement technological change. After more than 20 years of digital journalism, then, it is time to take stock of what innovation has wrought in journalism.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The “Never-Ending Pivot” The first two decades of the twenty-first century offer a suitable period to consider how innovation has played out in newsrooms, with the year 2000 marking the start of a research focus on digitization, multimedia reporting, and newsroom convergence (Belair-Gagnon and Steinke, 2020). The early pioneering study of Boczkowski into the processes in legacy organizations found how newsrooms “appropriated new technologies with a somewhat conservative mindset, thus acting more slowly and less creatively than competitors less tied to traditional media” (Boczkowski, 2005, p. 52). Subsequent studies confirmed the encumbrance of established norms, practices, and orientations toward the adoption of new ways of doing journalism (Domingo, 2008; Singer et al., 2011). That is not to say that innovation did not take place. Rather, the way innovation played out indicates how newsrooms sought to evolve and adapt to the changes wrought by the digitization of media from analog to digital, and digitalization of media practices and infrastructures (Brennen and Kreiss, 2016). The past 20 years of research into innovation of journalism highlight contested currents of change and continuity. Scholars have charted waves of technological

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The “Never-Ending Pivot”

innovations becoming part of the media. These include everything from the general digitalization of analog media to blogs (Singer, 2005; Hermida, 2009), user-generated content and audience participation (Singer et al., 2011; Williams, Wardle, and Wahl-Jorgensen, 2011), data and computational journalism (Gynnild, 2014; Anderson, 2018; Hermida and Young, 2019), social media (Belair-Gagnon, 2015), and web analytics and metrics (Belair-Gagnon and Holton, 2018; Nelson and Tandoc, 2019). At the same time, there has been a resistance to change in many newsrooms. New initiatives have been driven by a need to remain competitive, thus replicating rather than advancing what others were already doing (Boczkowski, 2010; Lowrey, 2012). The interest in participatory journalism in the first decade of the 2000s offers a good illustration of the motives for innovating in the newsroom. Participatory journalism, sometimes called citizen journalism and user-generated content, refers to “the act of a citizen, or group of citizens, playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing and disseminating news and information” (Bowman and Willis, 2003, p. 7). For some, the ability of audiences to take a more active part in the news increased the potential for more open and collaborative journalism (Bowman and Willis, 2003; Gillmor, 2004; Bruns, 2005). However, studies on participatory journalism practices, from soliciting audience photos to comments on stories, suggest such initiatives were often powered by an impulse to jump on the bandwagon. For example, online editors of UK national newspapers talked about participatory journalism as a “phenomenon you can’t ignore,” and as “an area that newspapers had to get into, otherwise they’d get left behind” (quoted in Hermida and Thurman, 2008, p. 347). The comprehensive analysis by Singer et al. (2011) of participatory practices in about two dozen leading national newspapers in 10 Western democracies demonstrates the imperative to remain competitive against a backdrop of technological and societal change. Such innovation was seen as necessary to survive, with one newspaper editor summing it up as “everyone is doing it … We need to join the competition” (quoted in Singer et al., 2011, p. 148). Survival was not the only incentive behind participatory journalism. Singer et al. found that some journalists were driven by the “potential of participatory journalism to democratize the media conversation” (Singer et al., 2011, p. 187). But of far more concern were the potential economic benefits of participatory journalism to build brand loyalty, boost website visits, and be competitive online. As Singer et al. concluded, “ensuring the survival of the newspaper” was an “urgent preoccupation among the editors we interviewed” (Singer et al., 2011, p. 187). Innovation through the lens of participatory journalism illustrates how concerns about competition and survival against a prevailing discourse of crisis have played a significant role in novel newsroom initiatives and projects. Keeping an eye on the competition, trying to stay current, and avoid being left behind have often resulted in innovation as mimicry in the industry (Boczkowski, 2010; Lowrey, 2012). Participatory journalism is part of a series of “pivots” in journalism in reaction to broader societal and technological changes in news production, distribution, and consumption. There is no question that newsrooms should be evolving and adapting to a shifting media ecosystem by innovating in what they do and how they do it. The issue is how these decisions are made and implemented.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

43

44

3  Journalism Innovation in a Time of Survival

The trend to “pivot to video” in US newsrooms in 2015–2017 serves as a cautionary tale of journalism innovation fueled by the fear of being left behind. It followed Facebook’s decision to prioritize video (Simo, 2014; Cathcart, 2015). In response, many newsrooms shifted resources from written journalism to video, lured by the promise of video advertising dollars (Benes, 2017). By late 2017, the lucrative ad dollars had failed to materialize and publishers began to pivot away from video and back to text (Newman, 2018). As the Columbia Journalism Review noted at the time, “too many publishers are resorting to video as a flashy distraction from deeper underlying problems: falling digital advertising, the expense of creating good journalism, and the existential threat to journalism’s business model itself,” concluding that “the biggest problem with pivot to video is that it’s not well-considered strategy. Instead, it’s been born of desperation” (Moore, 2017). Journalism innovation practice is littered with such examples of pivots, which are not rooted in research and development aligned with long-term strategic priorities of a news organization or clarity about the definition of innovation underpinning these moves. As Küng has noted, “the ongoing and fast-paced evolution in technology platforms, products, and services has meant that, for many, long-term strategy has been hijacked by short-term innovation projects” (Küng, 2017, p. 7). Belair-Gagnon and Steinke talk about the “‘hypes’ about new technologies in newsrooms rather than a consistent and well-established organizational strategy about innovation” (Belair-Gagnon and Steinke, 2020, p. 3). Such “hypes” include the use of drones in journalism (Holton, Lawson, and Love, 2015) and virtual reality journalism (De la Peña et al., 2010). Such an approach to innovation results in “the never-ending pivot” (Eltham, 2019) as newsrooms chase technologies to solve an economic crisis, rather than acknowledging and addressing the deep-rooted crises in journalism due to its long-standing representational harms (Callison and Young, 2020).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Canada’s Twenty-First-Century Media Policy Canadian media is no exception to the never-ending pivot in the search for the killer innovation that will save the news industry. One of the most prominent examples was the pivot to tablet by the country’s best-selling print newspaper, the Toronto Star. The tablet product launched to much fanfare in September 2015, backed by an investment of CAD$25 million in its first year and a staff of 70 people (Bradshaw, 2016). At the time, the paper’s public editor, Kathy English, described it as “revolutionary,” “dazzling,” and “cool” (English, 2015, np). The Star was hoping to replicate the success of Montreal’s French-language La Presse+, which transitioned to a primarily tablet edition in 2015. Two years later, after an investment of CAD$40 million, and two rounds of layoffs, the “revolutionary” product was shuttered (Rendell, 2017). The product had proved a dud with readers, peaking at 80,000 monthly readers, compared to the Star’s online monthly audience of 550,000 in the Toronto area alone (Rendell, 2017). It was an expensive lesson that, among other things, failed to consider the differences in the media markets in French-speaking Quebec and the English-speaking provinces of Canada. Let alone the wisdom of placing all bets on one digital

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Canada’s Twenty-First-Century Media Policy

innovation that had already been tried and abandoned by others, such as Rupert Murdoch’s The Daily (Benton, 2012). Against a backdrop of a “dismal” history of innovation in legacy outlets (Toughill, 2016), Canadian economic policy for journalism organizations is in an experimental phase in response to what is being considered a national crisis in the business of journalism and its implications for democracy. In early 2018, the government announced CAD$50M for local journalism. Later in that year, it announced its commitment to almost CAD$600M in support for journalism organizations over five years. This funding was announced after a House of Commons committee review of the state of local news in 2016, and a 2017 government-funded report on the state of the media. Both the review and study identified market failure as a key concern that could and should be rectified through policy intervention and government funding. That quality journalism should be publicly funded is increasingly being raised in public discourse and placed on the policy agenda in Western liberal democracies. The eventual funding package in Canada includes a Local Journalism Initiative that supports hiring journalists on specific underserved subject areas or communities, plus a tax subsidy or bailout, depending on your perspective of the political economy of journalism in Canada. The latter is the larger funding package. It involves three key financial components: labor tax credits for “qualified Canadian journalism organizations” (QCJO), to tax credits for citizens who can claim their “qualified journalism” for a small rebate, and the creation of a new governance model for journalism organizations to qualify as philanthropic organizations for tax purposes. In order to determine who and what is a qualified journalism organization, the government assembled a panel of eight experts to provide advice on implementation of the allocation of the $500M. The panel involved representatives from the main English and French journalism associations and the country’s largest journalism union. Unsurprisingly, the nature of the arbiters received immediate critique and pushback from critics and digital-born organizations, since these associations originated from legacy organizations, and reflected to a large extent lobbyists and forces that supported the way the funding package evolved. The panel produced a report in 2019 taking a stance on the urgent nature of the crisis in the journalism industry, locating its main genesis as a result of technological and economic competition against big foreign-owned platform companies such as Facebook and Google (Government of Canada, 2019). In addition to this panel, the government assembled an advisory board of five people (two journalists and three journalism/communications academics) to adjudicate the new Canada Revenue Agency criteria for QCJO (Canada Revenue Agency, 2020). As of publication, the page listing the qualified journalism organizations on the government website is a blank chart. There is also a third panel adjudicating the Local Journalism Initiative, which includes six people—all journalists or former journalists from commercial journalism organizations but one—also through News Media Canada. There are three glaring omissions in the government and industry response. Most of the panel members providing advice and funding decisions are white, and have worked in the past at legacy journalism organizations or continue to do so. In addition, there is no attention paid to concerns relating to larger questions about the role of journalism in the twenty-first century in Canada, who decides what good journalism

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

45

46

3  Journalism Innovation in a Time of Survival

is, as well as what is a long-term research and development strategy for the domain. What is quality journalism at a time of racial reckoning with historic harms, and what are the needs for a national journalism infrastructure in a changing technological, global, and political terrain beyond journalism are some of the questions that remain unaddressed. Also absent is consideration of the number of comparative models globally that could serve as examples for journalism funding and infrastructures that get to the wider and more profound roots of journalism’s multiple and often longer-standing crises.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Reframing Innovation in Journalism Addressing what innovation is and for whom has become ever more acute given the devastating global coronavirus pandemic of 2020. COVID-19 was the latest shock to a journalism industry still in the midst of the turbulence of digitalization. In Canada alone, more than 50 news outlets were temporarily or permanently closed and more than 2000 editorial and noneditorial workers were permanently or temporarily laid off in the first six months of the pandemic (Lindgren, Wechsler, and Wong, 2020). Across the border in the United States, some 36,000 workers in the news industry were laid off, furloughed, or suffered pay cuts by April 2020 (Tracy, 2020). The far-reaching fallout from the coronavirus is a challenge for media globally, not simply in more mature media markets, but also from India to Nigeria where advertising revenues have declined precipitously (Dutta, 2020; Krippahl, 2020). Against the turmoil caused by COVID-19, a clearly defined understanding of what is innovation and its potential role in Canadian and global journalism would seem ever more essential. Indeed, there are examples of innovative, collaborative projects in response to COVID-19, such as the Big Local News COVID-19 Global Case Mapper, produced by Stanford University’s Journalism and Democracy Initiative in partnership with the Google News Initiative and Pitch Interactive. It provides news outlets with a free embeddable and customizable map of cases and deaths. Such projects are a valuable response to an immediate need for detailed and accurate information about the spread of COVID-19. But in and of themselves, they are unlikely to bolster the long-term viability of a news outlet. The past two decades have highlighted the contributions and limitations of innovation as a technology-led path to economic sustainability and prosperity for the many commercial journalism organizations. In times of survival, few can afford to be trapped in the cycle of never-ending pivots to the latest shiny new technology. As Paulussen notes in discussing innovation in the newsroom, “one of the largest challenges for legacy media organizations has been to develop a digital strategy” (Paulussen, 2016, p. 194). The lure of the new has instead drained resources, diverted attention, and undermined editorial strategies (Küng, 2017). The news industry would be better served by reframing innovation as research and development in support of well-defined and long-term editorial and business strategic priorities. In 2018, Posetti was already sounding the alarm, writing that “there is evidence of an increasingly urgent requirement for the cultivation of sustainable innovation frameworks and clear, longer-term strategies within news organisations” (Posetti, 2018, p. 8).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Reframing Innovation in Journalism

The focus on the here and now of technology also stems from a lack of deep knowledge, expertise, and understanding in legacy newsrooms about the impact of digitalization (Brock, 2013). Who gets to decide what innovation is, how it is implemented, and how it is evaluated is critical. As we noted in an earlier work (Hermida and Young, 2019), having a mix of journalists with different but complementary backgrounds and experiences improves the likelihood of success. The need for people with digital know-how to lead innovation was a notable theme in Küng’s interviews in a wide range of media organizations, with one noting, “I don’t think you can really change the organisation until the leadership and most of the talent are different” (quoted in Küng, 2017, p. 34). It is hardly surprising then that Canada’s new media policy is skewed toward supporting legacy newsrooms, given that it was largely shaped by incumbent media interests, rather than creating infrastructures and opportunities for novel ventures. Scholars have a role to play here. Research in innovation in journalism would benefit from more of a global perspective that moves beyond the European or American bias of research that Belair-Gagnon and Steinke (2020) identify in their review of the literature on innovation in journalism. It is worth noting, though, that their study only addressed research published in English, to the exclusion of studies in other languages. And there are examples of research into innovation in other contexts. These include studies on innovation in Central and Latin America (Harlow, 2018; Salaverría et al., 2019) and in South Africa (Sefara, 2018). There are also more industry-focused reports, such as Sen and Nielsen on start-ups in India (Sen and Nielsen, 2016), and SembraMedia’s study of digital media entrepreneurs in Latin America (SembraMedia, 2017). Similarly, there is scope to move beyond studies of innovation in elite media, such as The New York Times and the BBC, or at scrappy start-ups. Valuable as this work is, it does not address how innovation is playing out at mid-range, regional, or local newsrooms, which have borne the brunt of the decline in journalism (see, for example, Lindgren et al., 2019). In many respects, Canada is a cautionary tale of the impact of the never-ending pivot, a technological lens on innovation without sufficient attention to infrastructures and longer-term strategy, given the ongoing sustained losses in Canadian commercial journalism organizations. We propose drawing from the definitions of innovation that consider it at its widest possible remit. That would mean incorporating definitions from both journalism studies and economists such as Schumpeter (1934). It would mean recognizing that framing innovation in response to crisis has its own narrowing effect as it neglects longer-term social and cultural concerns about the role of journalism and its histories, and conversations about the infrastructures that need to be generated in the present. A wider remit by its nature prioritizes longer-term strategic thinking about systems beyond the short-term and technological options. It also destabilizes systemic tendencies to support incumbents and protectionist interests. It can be applied to not-forprofit media, as well as the wider technological changes that see video and other forms of communication taking on more powerful journalism roles over text than in the previous era. In order to move beyond a narrow band of the possibilities in a public good such as journalism, creative destruction or reconstruction, as the Introduction to this book proposes, requires clarity about what needs to be repaired, reformed, or transformed in the process, not just a never-ending pivot to something new.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

47

48

3  Journalism Innovation in a Time of Survival

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Anderson, C.W. (2018). Apostles of Certainty: Data Journalism and the Politics of Doubt. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Anderson, M. and Robertson, C. (2011). Seeing Red: A History of Natives in Canadian Newspapers. Winnipeg, MB: University of Manitoba Press. Belair-Gagnon, V. (2015). Social Media at BBC News: The Re-making of Crisis Reporting. London, New York: Routledge. Belair-Gagnon, V. and Holton, A.E. (2018). Boundary work, interloper media, and analytics in newsrooms. Digital Journalism, 6(4), 492–508. http://doi.org/10.1080/21670 811.2018.1445001. Belair-Gagnon, V. and Steinke, A.J. (2020). Capturing digital news innovation research in organizations, 1990–2018. Journalism Studies. http://doi.org/10.1080/14616 70X.2020.1789496. Benes, R. (2017). What’s driving the publisher pivot to video, in 5 charts (hint: ad $$$. Digiday.com) (31 August). https://digiday.com/future-of-tv/publishers-pivoting-video5-charts (accessed September 4, 2020). Benton, J. (2012). Some lessons from the demise of the daily: was it the platform, the content, the structure, or the business model? Nieman Journalism Lab (December 3). https://www.niemanlab.org/2012/12/some-lessons-from-the-demise-of-the-daily-wasit-the-platform-the-content-the-structure-or-the-business-model (accessed September 14, 2020). Bleyen, V.A., Lindmark, S., Ranaivoson, H., and Ballon, P. (2014). A typology of media innovations: Insights from an exploratory study. The Journal of Media Innovations, 1(1), 28–51. Boczkowski, P.J. (2005). Digitizing the News: Innovation in Online Newspapers. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Boczkowski, P.J. (2010). News at Work: Imitation in an Age of Information Abundance. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Bowman, S. and Willis, C. (2003). We media: how audiences are shaping the future of news and information. The Media Center at the American Press Institute. http://www. hypergene.net/wemedia/download/we_media.pdf (accessed September 10, 2020). Bradshaw, J. (2016). Torstar cuts 52 jobs, drastically reducing tablet edition staff. The Globe and Mail (9 August). https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/ torstar-cuts-52-jobs-drastically-reducing-staff-working-on-tablet-edition/ article31334549 (accessed September 14, 2020). Brennen, J.S. and Kreiss, D. (2016). Digitalization. In Jensen, K.B., Rothenbuhler, E.W., Pooley, J.D., and Craig, R.T. (Eds.). The International Encyclopedia of Communication Theory and Philosophy. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 556–566. Brock, G. (2013). Out of Print: Newspapers, Journalism and the Business of News in the Digital Age. London: Kogan Page. Bruns, A. (2005). Gatewatching: Collaborative Online News Production. New York: Peter Lang. Cagé, J. (2016). Saving the Media. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Callison, C. and Young, M.L. (2020). Reckoning: Journalism’s Limits and Possibilities. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

Canada Revenue Agency. (2020). Qualified Canadian journalism organization. https:// www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/tax/businesses/topics/corporations/ business-tax-credits/canadian-journalism-labour-tax-credit/qualified-canadianjournalism-organization.html (accessed September 16, 2020). Carlson, M. and Usher, N. (2016). News startups as agents of innovation. Digital Journalism, 4(5), 563–581. http://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2015.1076344. Cathcart, W. (2015). Testing new video experiences. Facebook. https://about.fb.com/ news/2015/10/testing-new-video-experiences (accessed September 4, 2020). Cornia A., Sehl A. and Nielsen R. K. (2017). Developing digital news projects in private sector media. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, Oxford University. https:// www.reutersagency.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/developing-digital-newsprojects-in-private-sector-media.pdf De la Peña, N., Weil, P., Llobera, J. et al. (2010). Immersive journalism: immersive virtual reality for the first-person experience of news. Presence: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments, 19(4), 291–301. Domingo, D. (2008). Interactivity in the daily routines of online newsrooms: dealing with an uncomfortable myth. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 13(3), 680–704. Dutta, A.N. (2020). Job losses, pay cuts, editions shut—coronavirus triggers new crisis for Indian media. The Print (April 23). https://theprint.in/india/job-losses-pay-cutseditions-shut-coronavirus-triggers-new-crisis-for-indian-media/407195 (accessed September 14, 2020). Eltham, B. (2019). The never-ending pivot. Kill Your Darlings (February 14). https://www. killyourdarlings.com.au/article/the-never-ending-pivot-where-next-for-onlinejournalism (accessed September 4, 2020). English, K. (2015). A contract for credibility. The Toronto Star (September 18). https:// www.thestar.com/opinion/public_editor/2015/09/18/a-contract-for-credibility.html (accessed September 14, 2020). Gillmor, D. (2004). We the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly. Government of Canada. (2019). Report of the journalism and written media independent panel of experts (16 July). https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/corporate/ transparency/open-government/report-journalism-written-media.html (accessed September 18, 2020). Gynnild, A. (2014). Journalism innovation leads to innovation journalism: the impact of computational exploration on changing mindsets. Journalism, 15(6), 713–730. http:// doi.org/10.1177/1464884913486393. Harlow, S. (2018). Quality, innovation, and financial sustainability: Central American entrepreneurial journalism through the lens of its audience. Journalism Practice, 12(5), 543–564. Hermida, A. (2009). The blogging BBC: journalism blogs at “the world’s most trusted news organisation”. Journalism Practice, 3(3), 268–284. Hermida, A. and Thurman, N. (2008). A clash of cultures: the integration of user-generated content within professional journalistic frameworks at British newspaper websites. Journalism Practice, 2(3), 343–356. http://doi.org/10.1080/17512780802054538.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

49

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

50

3  Journalism Innovation in a Time of Survival

Hermida, A. and Young, M.L. (2019). Data Journalism and the Regeneration of News. Abingdon, UK: Routledge. Holton, A.E., Lawson, S., and Love, C. (2015). Unmanned aerial vehicles: opportunities, barriers, and the future of “drone journalism”. Journalism Practice, 9(5), 634–650. Krippahl, C. (2020). Africa’s media hit hard by COVID-19 crisis. Deutsche Welle (14 May) https://p.dw.com/p/3cArt (accessed September 14, 2020). Küng, L. (2015). Innovators in Digital News. London: Bloomsbury Publishing. Küng, L. (2017). Going digital: a roadmap for organisational transformation. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/ our-research/going-digital-roadmap-organisational-transformation (accessed September 14, 2020). Lindgren, A., Jolly, B., Sabatini, C. and Wong, C. (2019). Good news, bad news: a snapshot of conditions at small-market newspapers in Canada. Local News Research Project. http://portal.journalism.ryerson.ca/goodnewsbadnews (accessed September 14, 2020). Lindgren, A., Wechsler, S., and Wong, C. (2020). COVID-19 media impact map for Canada: fact sheet. Local News Research Project. http://localnewsresearchproject.ca/covid-19media-impact-map-forcanada (accessed September 14, 2020). Lowrey, W. (2012). Journalism innovation and the ecology of news production: institutional tendencies. Journalism and Communication Monographs, 14(4), 214–287. http://doi.org/10.1177/1522637912463207. Moore, H. (2017). The secret cost of pivoting to video. Columbia Journalism Review. (26 September). https://www.cjr.org/business_of_news/pivot-to-video.php (accessed September 3, 2020). Nelson, J.L. and Tandoc Jr, E.C. (2019). Doing “well” or doing “good”: what audience analytics reveal about journalism’s competing goals. Journalism Studies, 20(13), 1960–1976. Newman, N. (2016). How journalism faces a second wave of disruption from technology and changing audience behaviour. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, Oxford University (October 14). http://podcasts.ox.ac.uk/how-journalism-facessecond-wave-disruption-technology-and-changing-audience-behaviour-1 (accessed September 4, 2020). Newman, N. (2018). Journalism, media and technology trends and predictions 2018. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, Oxford University. https://ora.ox.ac. uk/objects/uuid:45381ce5-19d7-4d1c-ba5e-3f2d0e923b32 (accessed September 4, 2020). Nielsen, R.K. (2016). The business of news. In Witschge, T., Hermida, A., Anderson, C.W., and Domingo, D. (Eds.). Sage Handbook of Digital Journalism. London: Sage, pp. 51–67. Paulussen, S. (2016). Innovation in the newsroom. In Witschge, T., Anderson, C.W., Domingo, D., and Hermida, A. (Eds.). The Sage Handbook of Digital Journalism. London: Sage. Pavlik, J. V. (2013). Innovation and the future of journalism. Digital Journalism, 1(2), 181–193. Posetti, J. (2018). Time to Step Away from the ‘Bright, Shiny Things’? Towards a Sustainable Model of Journalism Innovation in an Era of Perpetual Change. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. Oxford: UK. https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

files/2018-11/Posetti_Towards_a_Sustainable_model_of_Journalism_FINAL.pdf (accessed September 12, 2020). Public Policy Forum [PPF]. (2018, September 25). What the Saskatchewan Roughriders can teach Canadian journalism. Public Policy Forum. https://ppforum.ca/wp-content/ uploads/2018/09/WhatTheSaskatchewanRoughridersCanTeachCanadianJournal ism-PPF-SEPT2018.pdf (accessed September 12, 2020). Rendell, M. (2017). Toronto star abandons star touch tablet app, lays off 30 staff members. The Globe and Mail (26 June). https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/ toronto-star-abandons-star-touch-tablet-app/article35473859 (accessed September 14, 2020). Roitman, J. (2013). Anti-crisis. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Salaverría, R., Sádaba, C., Breiner, J.G. and Warner, J.C. (2019). A brave new digital journalism in Latin America. In Túñez-López, M., Martínez-Fernández, V.A., López-García, X., Rúas-Araújo, X., and Campos-Freire, F. (Eds.). Communication: Innovation & Quality. Studies in Systems, Decision and Control. Cham: Springer, vol. 154, pp. 229–247. Schumpeter, L. (1934). The Theory of Economic Development. Boston: Harvard University Press. Sefara, M. (2018). The innovation challenge for the South African newspaper sector. Master thesis. Wits Business School at the University of the Witwatersrand (accessed September 14, 2020). SembraMedia. (2017). Inflection point: impact, threats, and sustainability a study of Latin American digital media entrepreneurs. SembraMedia http://data.sembramedia.org (accessed September 14, 2020). Sen, A. and Nielsen, R.K. (2016). Digital journalism start-ups in India. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/our-research/digitaljournalism-start-ups-india (accessed September 14, 2020). Siles, I. and Boczkowski, P.J. (2012). Making sense of the newspaper crisis: a critical assessment of existing research and an agenda for future work. New Media and Society, 14(8), 1375–1394. Simo, F. (2014). The latest on Facebook video. Facebook. https://about.fb.com/ news/2014/09/the-latest-on-facebook-video (accessed September 4, 2020). Singer, J.B. (2005). The political j-blogger: “normalizing” a new media form to fit old norms and practices. Journalism, 6(2), 173–198. http://doi.org/10.1177/1464884905051009. Singer, J.B., Hermida, A., Domingo, D., Heinonen, A., Paulussen, S., Quandt, T., and Vujnovic, M. (2011). Participatory Journalism: Guarding Open Gates at Online Newspapers. Malden, MA: John Wiley & Sons. Toughill, K. (2016). Status of Canadian legacy media. Research Memo. Canadian Media’s Innovation Deficit. Workshop and Event, November 4. Vancouver, BC. Tracy, M. (2020). News media outlets have been ravaged by the pandemic. The New York Times (10 April). https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/10/business/media/news-mediacoronavirus-jobs.html (accessed September 14, 2020). Usher, N. and Kammer, A. (2019). News Startups. In Nussbaum, A.F. (Ed.). Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Communication. Oxford, UK: Pennsylvania State University. Westlund, O. and Lewis, S. (2014). Agents of media innovations: actors, actants and audiences’. The Journal of Media Innovations, 1(2), 10–35.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

51

52

3  Journalism Innovation in a Time of Survival

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Whyte, K. (2021). Against Crisis Epistemology. In Hokowhitu, B., Moreton-Robinson, A., Tuhiwai-Smith, L., Larkin, S., and Andersen, C. (Eds.). Routledge Handbook of Critical Indigenous Studies. Routledge. Williams, A., Wardle, C., and Wahl-Jorgensen, K. (2011). “Have they got news for us?” Audience revolution or business as usual at the BBC? Journalism Practice, 5(1), 85–99. Zelizer, B. (2015). Terms of choice: uncertainty, journalism and crisis. Journal of Communication, 65(5), 888–908.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

53

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

News Ethics and Emerging Journalistic Narratives

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved. News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

55

4 Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism María José Benítez de Gracia, Sara Pérez-Seijo, and Susana Herrera-Damas Universidad de Santiago de Compostela and Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Introduction Immersive journalism (IJ) offers a mediated representation of reality through technology that can recreate a scene using 360-degree video. Viewers experience this representation via a stereoscopic vision system (this device is usually known as a “VR headset,” “VR goggles,” or “VR glasses”) and have a freely controlled first-person view as they do so. This combination creates the illusion that viewers are present within the event (Biocca and Delaney, 1995, p. 138), which brings them closer to the story, the characters, and their feelings and emotions in a human and natural way (De la Peña et al., 2010, p. 192). There are three elements that help us to understand the foundations on which this form of production, which has its own grammar (Dooley, 2017), is built. First, there is the illusion of presence (Slater and Sánchez-Vives, 2016) created by the use of intermediary tools between user and reality—for example, a VR headset. Second, and linked to the first element, is the assumption that these contents contribute to generating empathy (De la Peña et al., 2009; Visch et al., 2010; Slater et al., 2013; Milk, 2015; Kool, 2016; Fisher, 2017; Jones, 2017; Robertson, 2017; Shin and Biocca, 2017; Sundar et al., 2017; Archer and Finger, 2018), although there is not yet enough scientific evidence that this is true, since particular cognitive factors also play a role (Shin, 2018; Van Damme et al., 2019). The third element is user engagement, which is what this type of content aims to generate. This engagement can be linked to the sense of presence that the viewer experiences (Pérez-Seijo, 2016), although the results of a study conducted by Shin and Biocca (2017, p. 2802) suggest that “immersive or drooling interfaces do not, as the journalism industry claims, necessarily enhance the sense of engagement or satisfaction.” The fact is that, since 2015, numerous media outlets around the world have published content in this new format (Lelyveld, 2015; Doyle et al., 2016; Pérez-Seijo, 2016; Hardee and McMahan, 2017; Benítez and Herrera Damas, 2018), and this trend has made it possible to delve into the potential that this technology offers for journalism. Several exploratory studies that focus on understanding this hitherto-unseen type of production have already done so (Benítez and Herrera, 2017a, 2017b; Baía Reis and Castro Coelho, 2018; Paíno-Ambrosio and Rodríguez-Fidalgo, 2019; Benítez and Herrera, 2020). News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

56

4  Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism

The degree of proximity to the reality represented, that this content offers, requires such analysis to be supplemented by ethical considerations. IJ has dusted off old debates such as those on the integrity of the image, digital manipulation, the influence of the journalist on the scene, the use of minors as protagonists of the story, the addition of music, and the validity of certain graphic or sensitive content (Bartzen, 2015; Kent, 2015; Kool, 2016; Aitamurto, 2018; Pérez-Seijo and López-García, 2018, 2019a, 2019b). Along with its reawakening of these debates, IJ also poses new challenges, such as the extent to which it is lawful for a journalist and/or the recording crew to be edited out of the scene or how appropriate it is to artificially recreate events using ICT (Pérez-Seijo and López-García, 2019a). For Mabrook and Singer (2019, p. 8), “VR narratives, then, call into question a range of interconnected professional norms” such as the principles of independence, credibility, integrity, precision, minimization of harm, and transparency (Hardee, 2016; Mabrook and Singer, 2019; Muntean et al., 2019; Sánchez Laws and Utne, 2019). Although ethical considerations cut across all journalistic practices, here they become more urgent than they are in other audiovisual media that separate the viewer from what is represented by means of a rectangular frame and a screen. This is basically so for two reasons:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

(i) human intervention in the construction of the represented reality, and (ii) the vulnerability to which the viewer, who experiences the story in a much closer and more life-like way, is exposed. In the first case, the composition of the 360-degree video itself involves manipulating images during the production process using complex and advanced video technology. The manipulation is not limited to joining or stitching together the images but rather also allows elements to be inserted, deleted, or modified relative to the original setting in which they were captured (Frontline and Emblematic, 2018, p. 28). Further, the very innovation that the format incorporates makes this content highly persuasive and, therefore, it can easily be turned into a powerful instrument of falsification and manipulation if content is created based on malign intentions. The objective of this chapter is to first describe the ethical principles that should guide 360-degree IJ and then analyze three specific cases to delve into their successes and failings from an ethical standpoint.

Ethical Principles That Should Guide Immersive Journalism There is scant academic research on ethics and 360-degree IJ. One of the first contributions, entitled “An Ethical Reality Check for Virtual Reality Journalism” (Kent, 2015), came from Associated Press standards editor Thomas Kent. Since then, there have been only about 15  studies that have pointed out some of the challenges posed by this new form of journalism (Kent, 2015; Culver, 2015; Hardee, 2016; Madary and Metzinger, 2016; Kool, 2016; Pérez-Seijo and CamposFreire,  2016; Aitamurto, 2018; Lester, 2018; Nash, 2018; Pérez-Seijo and López García, 2018, 2019a, 2019b; Mabrook and Singer, 2019; Sánchez Laws and Utne, 2019; Benítez and Herrera-Damas, 2020).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Accurately Representing Space

Based on these first reflections and on our own, here we offer ethical recommendations on producing this type of content. We group our recommendations into two categories. The first set refers to the principles of truthfulness, accuracy, and integrity, while the second addresses the principle of responsibility and includes recommendations on respect for human dignity.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Principle of Truthfulness Journalists’ ethical commitment to the truth and their respect for reality constitute one of the basic principles of journalistic ethics. We find these aspects, for example, in UNESCO’s International Principles of Professional Ethics in Journalism (1983). However, in this regard, Bill Nichols (2013, p. 63), a pioneer in research related to another audiovisual form, namely documentary films, points out that although audio and visual recorded forms of events are apparently real and reliable, they do not always convey things that really happened. In the case of 360-degree IJ, questions arise about the match between what is represented and reality. By its very nature, representation is aimed at “creating” an “illusion” within viewers’ way of “perceiving,” which means from the outset that their brains are being “tricked” (Sánchez-Vives, Slater, 2005, p. 333; Slater et al., 2009, p. 195). Is this therefore a case of a total manipulation of the facts, or simply a different way of showing reality? Is there a line that the journalist must not cross in order for a story to be considered true? Should viewers be warned before they are exposed to such a representation? The answer to these questions is the same as it is for the rest of the media: it depends on the attitude adopted by the journalist. That attitude must be supported “by the same ethical principles that inspire the practices established through the ethical codes that regulate exercise of the profession” (García Castillejo, 2008). As De la Peña (2011, p. 11) points out, “Even when [IJ’s] peculiarities allow us to intensify this experience through increased closeness, it would be a mistake to confuse a subjective experience with offering mere subjectivity.” From a more concrete perspective, this principle involves representing space accurately, maintaining the integrity of visuals and sound, being careful in the selection of the sources, and using lawful methods to obtain information.

Accurately Representing Space The production of IJ involves a prior framing that, in a broad sense, can be understood as the selection of a part of reality. Although 360-degree video does not limit the viewing field to a rectangular frame, the spherical field that it comprises is still the result of specific, preplanned selection (Kent, 2015). For this reason, the accurate representation of the space must be subject to rigorous ethical demands that aim to avoid any “manipulation that may make interpretations confusing or are designed to achieve a particular perception” (Benítez and Herrera, 2019, p. 24). To prevent representation from conflicting

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

57

58

4  Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism

with truthfulness, the journalist must have a very good grasp not only of the possibilities offered by 360-degree technology but also of its limits. Some specific guidelines are:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

(1) Controlling the movement of people and objects within the action represented. It is appropriate to limit movement near the cut areas of the images that make up the 360-degree scene to avoid stitching errors. Moreover, it is advisable to limit the number of objects located before the user’s field of vision, since, according to the research of Dwight (2016), surrounding the spectator with action on all sides can be “confusing, loud, dizzying, and overwhelming.” (2) Considering the best way of dealing with personnel and recording equipment. The journalist must be hidden and moved away from the scene because their presence can distract viewers and diminish the immersive experience. Another issue that IJ raises relates to the recording equipment that will be used to capture the video. Sometimes doing so is easy, but at other times it is not possible. Various approaches to solve this issue have been attempted: (i) The most purist stance counsels keeping these elements just as they have been recorded. Media outlets such as Associated Press expressly prohibit any manipulation of images and choose to keep in recording equipment when it has been captured in the shot (Kent, 2015; Pérez-Seijo and CamposFreire, 2016, p. 169; Pérez-Seijo and López-García, 2019b, p. 6). (ii) An alternative is to erase all recording equipment during editing (Watson, 2016). However, doing so creates unusual effects: when viewers look down, they see a gap between their eyes and the ground, as though they are floating in the air. This “intentional omission” (Kool, 2016, p. 3) relates squarely to the goal of IJ: inducing the feeling of “being there,” even if this involves ethical conflicts such as that which we have indicated. (iii) A third option is to have a person carry the camera at a height close to their eyes (for example, by mounting it on a helmet). In this case, when viewers look down, they will see part of the camera operator (arms, torso, or legs) as though they were him or her. This approach is more in harmony within immersive narration, although it should be adopted with caution because viewers cannot know who the body that they see belongs to.

Maintaining Visual and Audio Integrity Editing 360-degree video always requires some level of technical manipulation to either join together the parts of the video or add elements such as audio or materials that help to guide the viewer. The most advanced audiovisual software is required to perform these tasks. Having to hide microphones or boom poles can cause losses in audio quality. Sometimes this situation makes it necessary to add sound during postproduction. Working carefully and precisely is the best practice. According to De la Peña (2011, p. 2), provided that things are done as accurately as possible, “video and audio captured from the physical world are used to reinforce the concept that participants are experiencing a nonfiction story.”

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Choosing Sources Carefully

For Hernández (2018), it is necessary to “apply ethics, be honest, and recount the event with precision,” just as one would do in any other piece of journalism. Likewise, it is advisable to alert viewers when some part has been dramatized, as to do otherwise would be to convey an altered state of reality.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Choosing Sources Carefully In any journalistic practice, turning to reliable and vetted sources makes it possible to offer a complete and accurate account of the events that is grounded in reality (Maciá and Herrera, 2011, p. 73). In this sense, “the seriousness with which [the journalist] chooses sources ensures the rigor of the information” (Jareño, 2009, p. 99). In the case of 360-degree IJ, Bill Nichols (2013, p. 67) calls witnesses “social actors” because, in his view, merely addressing the camera implies some form of act, since, aware of their presence on camera, “they adjust how they present themselves and others.” Staging therefore takes place from the moment when these “social actors” receive guidelines on how to speak or act in front of the camera, but it also arises when they are asked to repeat particular actions (Mullin, 2016; Sánchez Laws and Utne, 2019). In addition, sometimes sources appear alone on camera (without the journalist), something that they may very possibly not be used to. This can create a certain level of tension, a lack of naturalness, or even distrust. The solution may be to establish a certain climate of trust with the source. This implies prior preparation so that sources are familiar with the peculiarities of recording equipment and even know what questions they will be asked in order to be able to respond to them better. Aitamurto (2018, p. 11) maintains that, in this sense, “the 360° view confronts journalists with a contradictory situation: in their minds, their absence from the shot symbolizes objectivity, but the absence means staging, which interferes with the claim of authenticity.” Given the difficulty of accessing real sources, in other immersive features the choice is made to use actors’ voices to recreate the events. In these cases, it is essential to vet and verify as rigorously as possible the material’s origin and whether it is authentic (De la Peña, 2015). Another ethical discussion to be had over this issue is located at the very source of the journalistic message. Given the high degree of realism that is achieved with this type of representation, it is easier to bring in a perception of false reality with a specific purpose that may be political or economic, or of any other nature. An example here is “How Medics in Leishenshan Hospital Help Patients Improve Pulmonary Functions,”1 a feature published by the Chinese state television channel CGTN during the COVID-19 pandemic. The piece comprises footage of a hospital in Wuhan that even has giant plasma screens for patients. One of the patients can be seen blowing into a balloon, almost as if it were a game, while he is attended to by four doctors who are fully kitted out in personal protective equipment. Although it was published in April (months after the first infections were detected), the scenario of control and top medical care for

1  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oylIR3YTfLg.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

59

60

4  Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism

very few patients contrasts with the situation of collapse that has been seen via other, unofficial sources from this country. Without entering into an assessment of its truthfulness, there is a clear intention to convey a story of calm to both the Chinese population and the international community.

Using Lawful Methods to Obtain Information In general, dubious methods of obtaining information, such as pretending to be another person or to belong to another profession, entering a private space without consent, not informing people that they are being recorded, or obtaining images with hidden cameras, are to be met with disapproval. These practices are addressed in the legal systems of many countries, like in Spain, where commission of them is a crime that entails criminal sanctions for trespassing, eavesdropping, or recording images without consent, to name just a few. In the case of 360-degree IJ, requirements in this regard are even stricter. First of all, the journalist should inform the person(s) who will be recorded about the characteristics of the format. Given that the recording will capture not only the area behind where the statement will be made but also the entire surrounding scene, consent must be extended to all persons who may appear in shot and not just to any interviewees. Likewise, journalists must reveal both their profession and their intentions. Failure to do so can provoke fear or mistrust owing to the strangeness of this type of equipment.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Principle of Responsibility Along with truthfulness, the second major principle that can encourage ethically sustainable IJ is responsibility toward the audience. This moral bond constitutes one of the pillars that support the definition of IJ itself, whose origins, promoted by Nonny De la Peña and her Emblematic Group, lie in depicting humanitarian crises or denouncing unjust situations in which human rights are violated (Benítez et al., 2019). Accordingly, IJ uses technologies that immerse the audience in a particular reality in order to increase their awareness of and engagement with the social problem in question. Many of the early projects pursued this idea—for example, “Clouds over Sidra,”2 “6x9: A Virtual Experience of Solitary Confinement,”3 and “The Displaced.”4 In this attempt to expose a social situation that is considered unfair, the viewer is “emotionally vulnerable” because “under the realism of this type of experience, it is easy to forget that there is an intention behind the construction and telling of the story.”

2  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUosdCQsMkM. 3  https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2016/apr/27/6x9-a-virtual-experience-ofsolitary-confinement. 4  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecavbpCuvkI.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Understanding the Limitations of Empathy

Practices that abuse the ability to emotionally impact viewers and that elicit a quick response from them would be reprehensible, even if they were done in pursuit of a good cause. Specifically, we would advise understanding the limitations of empathy, establishing an appropriate distance between viewer and people in the IJ piece, and limiting the use of emotional-persuasion techniques.

Understanding the Limitations of Empathy Almost since the appearance of the first publications on IJ, empathy has become a rhetorical element associated with this type of journalistic practice. For Milk, virtual reality allows us to feel the humanity of the people in the IJ piece and empathize with them in a deeper way: “It can change people’s perception of each other. And that’s how I think virtual reality has the potential to actually change the world. So, it’s a machine, but through this machine we become more compassionate, we become more empathetic, and we become more connected. And ultimately, we become more human” (Milk, 2015).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

For former Associated Press standards editor Thomas Kent (2015), “The potential for empathy is even greater in the VR world, since viewers can bond far more easily with a 3-D character they’re practically touching.” However, Kent (2015) wonders whether the suffering of people who are portrayed as victims may become trivialized— a mere experience for the user—or reduced to another distraction in which viewers can immerse themselves for a few minutes. Along these lines, Gregory (2016), director of Witness,5 an organization in the United States that trains people to use video and digital technologies to defend human rights, warns that in this type of narrative, not appreciating the limits of empathy entails at least two risks: (i)  provoking a response of denial in the viewer, and (ii) promoting so-called poverty tourism, in which “narcissistic indulgence in the authenticity of the self is privileged over the genuine solidarity centered on the needs or underlying concerns of the distant other.” For Gregory, the immersive 360-degree video format is not a device that automatically generates empathy. Rather, it is a tool that can contribute to a better understanding of the experience “of the other.” In any case, Gregory distinguishes empathy from other values such as compassion and solidarity, which he considers to be the real narrative challenges, since, in addition to putting oneself in the other’s place, they imply taking “reasoned action in the interests of another.” Madary and Metzinger (2016, p. 10) recall that these types of reconstruction can also be used to deliberately cause suffering or decrease empathy, as is the case of military training applications that aim to “desensitize” soldiers so that they do not feel remorse when they have to resort to violence. Recently, Van Damme et al. (2019) carried out an experiment to measure the impact of an immersive piece that focused on the Syrian conflict. They conclude that none of 5  https://www.witness.org.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

61

62

4  Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism

the viewers became emotionally engaged with this type of “distant suffering.” This can be explained by compassion fatigue, which entails “desensitization and emotional burnout, as a phenomenon associated with persuasive communication about social problems” (Kinnick et al., 1996, p. 687). In this regard, Lester (2018, p. 200) suggests that “the potential for harm is greater with VR than with traditional media” and that viewing particular scenes via a VR headset “might be too much to bare for most users.” The BBC, meanwhile, also acknowledges that such content may generate “a more intense experience for audiences, which could increase the risk of harm and offence when the content itself is graphic or violent” (BBC, 2018, p. 10). As a result, it has included a recommendation on this matter in the latest version of its Editorial Guidelines (BBC, 2019, p. 79).

Establishing an Appropriate Distance between the Viewer and the People in the IJ Piece Chouliaraki refers to the concept of “proper distance” proposed by Silverstone (2003, p. 469) to allude to the ability of the media to promote a sense of proximity, but also to the need to contextualize the suffering of others by establishing a distance from the audience that allows an understanding of the suffering and what to do about it:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The humanness of sufferers demands that we neither zoom too close up to assume that they are like ‘us’ nor zoom too far out, reducing them to dots on the map. The demand for historicity requires that each instance of suffering is placed in a meaningful (though not tiresomely exhaustive) context of explanation and understanding that addresses the question of why this suffering is important and what there is to do about it. (Chouliaraki, 2006, p. 43) After analyzing four immersive journalistic pieces produced by the UN, Nash (2018, p. 128) concludes that all of them established an improper distance, especially during moments when special attention is required from the viewer: “The user’s attention is divided but more than that, the physical turning away that visual exploration demands is profoundly at odds with the moral demand of the face-to-face encounter.” As a consequence, “the user prioritises their own experience of transportation and exploration (spatial presence) over engagement with the testimony of the other.” She also points out the discomfort that the experience of proximity itself can generate. In fact, in an experiment led by Jones (2017, p. 181), participants reported feeling uncomfortable when they found themselves in an environment in which people were close to them. This situation can be aggravated in cases in which the people in the footage exhibit violent or angry attitudes.

Limiting the Use of Emotional-Persuasion Techniques Any audiovisual narrative format uses persuasion. One of the most common formulas is calling on a minor to recount a dramatic event, as this usually provokes an “automatic sentimental reaction” (Redondo, 2013, p. 241). In various immersive

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

“Syria’s Silence”

features, the main people that appear are children. This is an especially frequent strategy in short works in which there is little time to establish a link with the viewer. Consequently, the journalist may find themselves faced with the dilemma of whether to turn to children for greater impact or to fulfill the ethical responsibility of protecting the minor. For Kool (2016, p. 7), taken to the extreme, this type of immersive content could foster “propaganda and exploitation.” Other techniques such as music, directional sound, or a shortening of the event by including only the most impactful moments can also contribute to this aim. In other works, the camera is located at the child’s eye height, which seems to reveal an intention on the director’s part to connect the viewer more closely with the story.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Case Analysis The aim of the second part of this chapter is to analyze a series of cases that both adopt and contradict some of the ethical guidelines that we have raised. Although, as we will see, the 360-degree format reinforces the transparency and precision of the story, some practices adopted and decisions made during production and even postproduction compromise the truthfulness of the feature’s representation of reality and draw attention to the professional responsibility borne by the author of the story—that is, by the journalist. Specifically, we will critically review three features that were published in 2016 and focus on armed conflicts in which ISIS was an active party: “Syria’s Silence,” published by Vlaamse Radio-en Televisieomroep on the YouTube channel VRT Virtual Reality;6 “The Fight for Falluja,” by The New York Times; and “Nobel’s Nightmare,” produced by the online media agency SMART News. We selected these particular cases for two main reasons. First, they were published by different types of media outlet (two legacy media organizations and a digital native news agency respectively), meaning that we were able to conduct a comparative analysis. Second, they deal with similar subject matter. We use this common subject matter as a starting point in order to compare how each of the media outlets behind each production used 360-degree video to present different realities—ones that are complex and tread a very fine ethical line between offering context and indulging lurid curiosity. The fineness of that line is what makes moral responsibility on the part of both the producer (the media) and the consumer (the viewer) so important.

“Syria’s Silence” In this feature produced by Fisheye VR and Jens Franssen, a journalist for the Belgian channel VRT, the viewer enters the scene as an invisible observer guided by a voiceover that describes what life is like for the civilians and combatants who still remain in Al-Shaddadi. But the viewer’s body is not the only thing missing throughout 6  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5sDXSrU7BM.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

63

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

64

4  Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism

piece: neither the recording team nor the camera tripod appears in shot. The first absence is intentional; the second is the result of digital postproduction work, a common practice in IJ to avoid interfering with the illusion of presence that the observer is expected to experience when using a VR headset (Kool, 2016; Pérez-Seijo, and López-García, 2019b). Although the camera’s tripod has been completely removed from the video, the user is not informed at any point that the footage has been manipulated in this way. This postproduction work does not affect the content as such, since, as what we have here is an external element to the setting in which the piece unfolds, it does not alter the meaning of the story. However, as we have described, this practice has brought about various ethical controversies over the integrity of the image. Although Associated Press initiated the debate through the work The Suite Life (Kent, 2015), other organizations had already addressed this aspect in the case of the conventional video format: “Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images’ content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in any way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects” (NPPA, 2019). The absence of cameras or even the erasing of the tripod represents a paradox for Aitamurto (2018), because although the professionals believe that by taking out these elements they offer a more precise experience of the event, the removal actually distances visual journalism from the “as is” and brings it closer to the “as if,” which in this case is based on creating visual experiences that make users feel as though they were there. Through the practice, the producer compromises the truthfulness of the representation by deliberately removing things from the scene—first of all, the team’s presence and, during postproduction, the tripod. That said, the very aim of this approach is to reinforce the same value that it puts at risk: showing a truthful, precise, and spontaneous image, in which the user sees the protagonists of the story (inhabitants of the city) in their context (locations) and without the interference of elements that are from outside their reality (the team of people and their recording equipment) and may disrupt the desired illusion of presence. As we showed earlier, the viewer is emotionally more vulnerable in the case of this type of content, and this is why the inclusion of scenes that contain violence—for example, the moments in this video in which combatants are shown shooting at the enemy’s position from a combat outpost—is controversial. However, instead of omitting shocking and/or bloody scenes, VRT’s editorial guidelines and ethics code state that their inclusion should simply be limited in such a way that their use serves to communicate information (Vlaamse Radio Televisieomroep, 2012). In this case, we would say that the images offer context, since users see beyond the traditional frame and, through the omnidirectional exploration that they engage in, they can understand the situation with the help of the narrator. In addition, these images are not used to morbidly exploit the suffering of others, and so, despite their not being free from violence, we take the view that their function is more contextual than sensational. It should be noted that some scenes, including those which we have already mentioned, include musical accompaniment. Various organizations advise against the use of this device because it adds an emotional load to the story (RTDNA, 2015). In this case, the instrumental music that plays in the background only intensifies the drama and compromises the accuracy of such moments’ representation.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

“The Fight for Falluja”

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

“The Fight for Falluja” This work by The New York Times, created under the direction of correspondent Ben C. Solomon and with the support of the Pulitzer Center, recounts the attempts of Iraqi forces to regain control of the city of Falluja, Iraq, from ISIS in 2016. As with the previous case, viewers are immersed as invisible visitors. They merely observe the environment and the people present, who, moreover, seem not to be aware of the recording team’s presence, indicating that the footage has not been staged. The only member of the recording team who appears in some of the scenes is Ben C. Solomon, who guides the user and describes the conflict in a voiceover. The user puts a face to him because in approximately the first minute he introduces himself while he appears in shot, sitting in a vehicle: “My name is Ben C. Solomon, that’s me in the front seat.” Throughout the story, the director includes other spatial references and allusions to capture and focus attention: “this,” “there,” and so on. In fact, at 6:31 of the video, we see Solomon opening a cell as he explains that “these are the cells where ISIS would hold their prisoners. Smaller cages like this one [he opens the cage while he says this] or about the same size as a dog crate.” If these allusions and gestures were part of the accounts from a source in the story, then we would be talking about a “performance” by the social actor that was planned in advance by the journalist. Since it is the correspondent who offers them, they are justified by the narrative and visual-grammar demands of the 360-degree format. Although two victims take part in the feature, both appear alongside Solomon and an interpreter when they speak. These interactions resemble conventional interviews, and there is no evidence of the staging that entities such as RTDNA (2015) or NPPA (2019) oppose. All this contributes to reinforcing the accuracy and truthfulness of the reality represented, and even of the transparency of the process, as the correspondent is present. However, one decision compromises how accurate this representation is: the intentional deletion of the tripod from the scenes. We know about this deletion because an editor’s note is included at the end of the video, in which it is stated that it was removed to help “preserve the scene as a viewer on location would normally see it” (The New York Times, 2016). However, the decision contradicts the “Guidelines on Integrity” of The New York Times: Images in our pages, in the paper or on the Web, that purport to depict reality must be genuine in every way. No people or objects may be added, rearranged, reversed, distorted or removed from a scene (except for the recognized practice of cropping to omit extraneous outer portions) (The New York Times, 2008) Despite this contradiction, we understand the editor’s note as an act of transparency and professional responsibility toward the audience, as it explains what has been done and why, while highlighting the ethical challenges that this new narrative format raises. Although in this case the editor has been transparent over the removal of the tripod as part of their moral responsibility, they have compromised that responsibility by not warning the user about the presence of scenes whose content may be too graphic or violent. For example, in one of these scenes—perhaps the most controversial among them—viewers witness some Iraqi soldiers taking photos of an alleged ISIS combatant’s corpse, while in others, viewers see moments of combat between the armed forces from a first-person perspective.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

65

66

4  Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism

Behind the dissemination of this type of images lies the professional’s moral responsibility to, fundamentally, avoid falling into lurid curiosity (SPJ, 2014) and minimize harm. But in the debate on the publication or broadcast of graphic or sensitive content, there are both opposite and related visions. Linfield (2010), for example, argues that the use of images of this type is a mechanism to generate social awareness and foster a feeling of solidarity and empathy toward the distant other. But does this justify the use of music in some scenes of the video? Once again, we would highlight how devices of this type have the ability to alter the meaning and sense of images, including adding editorial tones (RTDNA, 2015), in such a way that their use causes the representation of reality to no longer be entirely accurate or impartial.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

“Nobel’s Nightmare” This feature, which focuses on the White Helmets’ rescue efforts in Aleppo, was produced by Smart Media Group and directed by Chamsy Sarkis, director of the online media agency SMART News. Unlike the previous pieces, the camera appears in all the scenes because the cameraman is holding it and taking it through the different locations. The user only has to look down to see him, except in a scene where he appears in front of the device alongside a victim who recounts what happened. There is no staging; this is a conventional interview in which the recording device remains static on a tripod that, in addition, has not been erased from the image. The presence of the cameraman in the footage and the signs of the camera reinforce the truthfulness of the events and serve as an act of transparency concerning the construction of the story in this novel format. Thus, the viewer sees in real time what the camera recorded during his visit to Aleppo, which brings meaning to the concept of immersive witness in this work. Although we found no evidence of postproduction manipulation, beyond the inevitable stitching, we did note another controversial issue: the use of highly sensitive and graphic content. After the first minute, viewers find themselves in a delicate scene: a voiceover describes how the White Helmets frequently risk their lives when carrying out rescue tasks, while, simultaneously, users watch as volunteers and civilians flee in the face of the imminent threat of a bombing. Despite the fact that these images are already explicit in themselves, they are accompanied by tense music and a slowmotion effect. These two devices introduce biases into the story because they predispose the user to react in a certain way and further dramatize an explicitly perilous scene. This editing endangers principles such as accuracy, as we described earlier, and it also puts the journalist’s responsibility toward his audience in the spotlight. Although the intention is to show reality as it happened, without filters and in order to make visible the seriousness of the conflict, the professional journalist has adulterated the representation with additions (music and effects), doing so to further intensify a moment of danger while not warning the user in advance about this. In short, the drama has been heightened and the degree of accuracy and truthfulness of what the user sees has been diminished. In this regard, we would also raise the vulnerability to which users are exposed, because, if they are watching the feature via VR headsets and there is no prior warning about the nature of the content, the only way for them to avoid seeing the images is to close their eyes.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Conclusions

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Conclusions VR technologies have opened the door to a path toward narrative innovation that raises new possibilities not only for the creation of information but also for the consumption of it. But beyond this, all professional decisions, from initial design to postproduction and subsequent distribution, must be guided by three basic values common to all journalistic practice: professional responsibility toward the audience; transparency in processes and in the representation of realities; and, of course, the truthfulness of the information as sine qua non. This is also reflected in the case analysis, which reveals both encouraging and concerning aspects. We have confirmed that the immersive 360-degree video format contributes to reinforcing the transparency of narrative-construction processes (recording, interviews, and so forth), at the same time as it allows reality to be represented in a more truthful and precise way than traditional framing allows. As the slogan that various media used at the beginning to publicize their first immersive content said, it allows people to see the whole picture, in context and in a way that is no longer limited to the traditional frame. Along with this, users become filmmakers because they are able to choose their viewpoint over the scene: the journalist can guide them, but they no longer limit their field of vision. They are now free to explore, although not without risks such as their missing important actions or elements that may affect their comprehension of the story and their being left with a partial version of events. On the other hand, the flip side of 360-degree video reveals risks that compromise the accuracy of the reality represented. A slow-motion effect to allow the user to calmly explore in detail what happened on the ground just before a bomb fell, tense music in full combat, or any other addition whose function is not to provide or complement the information, but to add intensity or emotional impact: all these devices are incorporated as a result of decisions made in postproduction, and they introduce biases into the story, dramatize events, and put the moral responsibility of whoever produces the story in the spotlight. At the beginning of this chapter, we described how some 360-degree video content has been designed to stimulate social awareness on issues, usually of a humanitarian nature, as well as to promote a more empathetic link with the reality of the distant “other.” However, we also examined the vulnerability of users once they put on a VR headset and explore the scene as though they were there. Therefore, in considering the emotional impact of graphic images or explicit violence when they are consumed in an immersive way, we would appeal to the moral responsibility of the journalist and emphasize that they must weigh up whether such scenes provide vital value in the viewer’s understanding of the story’s reality. We emphasize this issue because, just as 360-degree video has many positive aspects, it also has negative ones, one of which is that the intensity with which events are experienced is greater with a VR headset on than it is when viewed on a screen, which makes the barrier between context and morbid curiosity more blurred. The existence of these encouraging and concerning aspects is another reminder that the emergence and novelty of a format is not enough to justify forgetting the requirements of professional practice that is ethical, responsible, and respectful when it comes to both the protagonists of the reality represented and the audience. After all, every information professional takes on an ethical commitment to society when practicing journalism.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

67

68

4  Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism

Therefore, it is not helpful to try and exploit an innovation first and then look for solutions to the ethical challenges and conflicts that it raises. Rather, in the publicservice activity that all journalism practice amounts to, ethics should be not only what guides the innovation process but what stimulates it too.

Acknowledgments This work has been supported by the project Digital native media in Spain: storytelling formats and mobile strategy (RTI2018-093346-B-C33), funded by the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (Government of Spain) and co-funded by the ERDF structural fund. Further, the author Sara Pérez-Seijo is beneficiary of the Training University Lecturers’ (FPU) Program funded by Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (Spanish Government).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Aitamurto, T. (2018). Normative paradoxes in 360 journalism: contested accuracy and objectivity. New Media and Society, 21, 3–19. Archer, D. and Finger, K. (2018). Walking in another’s virtual shoes: do 360-degree video news stories generate empathy in viewers? Tow Center for Digital Journalism Report, 1–70. https://www.cjr.org/tow_center_reports/3virtual-reality-news-empathy.php Baía Reis, A. and Castro Coelho, A.F.V.C. (2018). Virtual reality and journalism. Digital Journalism, 6(8), 1090–1100. Bartzen, K. (2015). Virtual Journalism: immersive approaches pose new questions. Center for Journalism Ethics. https://goo.gl/9937LN Benítez, M.J. and Herrera, S. (2017a). El reportaje inmersivo a través de vídeo en 360º: caracterización de una nueva modalidad de un género periodístico clásico. In de Lara, A. and Arias, F. (Eds.). Mediamorfosis. Perspectivas Sobre La Innovación En Periodismo. Elche: Universidad Miguel Hernández 196–212. Benítez, M.J. and Herrera, S. (2017b). El reportaje inmersivo a través de vídeo en 360º: ventajas, límites y buenas prácticas. In Torrado, S., Ferreras, J.G., and Ródenas, G. (Eds.). Territorios transmedia y narrativas audiovisuales. Barcelona: Universidad Oberta de Catalunya, 165–189. Benítez, M.J. and Herrera, S. (2018). Los primeros pasos del reportaje inmersivo a través de vídeos en 360º. Historia y Comunicación Social, 23(2), 547–566. Benítez, M.J. and Herrera, S., (2019). Buenas prácticas éticas en el reportaje inmersivo con vídeo 360º. Telos, 111, 22–25. https://telos.fundaciontelefonica.com/telos-111-asuntosde-comunicacion-maria-jose-benitez-susana-herrera-periodismo-inmersivo-360opracticas-eticas Benítez, M.J. and Herrera, S. (2020). Cómo producir reportajes inmersivos con vídeo en 360º. Barcelona: UOC. Benítez, M.J., Herrera, S., and Benítez, E. (2019). Analysis of the immersive social content feature in the Spanish news media. Revista Latina de Comunicación Social, 74, 1655–1679.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

Biocca, F. and Delaney, B. (1995). Immersive virtual reality technology. In Biocca, F. and Levy, M.R. (Eds.). Communication in the Age of Virtual Reality. Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. British Broadcasting Corporation. (2018). The BBC’s editorial guidelines consultation document. http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/insidethebbc/howwework/ accountability/consultations/editorial_guidelines_review_consultation_document.pdf British Broadcasting Corporation. (2019). Editorial guidelines. https://www.bbc.com/ editorialguidelines/guidelines Chouliaraki, L. (2006). The Spectatorship of Suffering. London: Sage. Culver, K.B. (2015). Virtual Journalism: immersive approaches pose new questions. Center for Journalism Ethics. https://ethics.journalism.wisc.edu/2015/02/11/virtualjournalism-immersive-approaches-pose-new-questions De la Peña, N. (2011). Physical world news in virtual spaces. Representation and embodiment in immersive nonfiction. Media Fields Journal, 3. http://mediafieldsjournal.org/ physical-world-news-in-virtual/2011/7/22/physical-world-news-in-virtual-spaces-­ representation-and-emb.html De la Peña, N. (2015). The Future of News? Virtual Reality. TED. https://www.ted.com/ talks/nonny_de_la_pena_the_future_of_news_virtual_reality. De la Peña, N., Weil, P., Slater, M., and Sánchez-Vives, M. (2009). Virtual reality in the extreme: experiencing and understanding violence. Conferencia en Art and Science: exploring the limits of human perception, Benasque, Huesca. De la Peña, N., Weil, P., Llobera, J., et al. (2010). Immersive journalism: immersive virtual reality for the first-person experience of news. Presence: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments, 19(4), 291–301. Dooley, K. (2017). Storytelling with virtual reality in 360-degrees: a new screen grammar. Studies in Australasian Cinema, 11(3), 161–171. Doyle, P., Gelman, M., and Gill, S. (2016). Viewing the future? Virtual reality in journalism. Knight Foundation. http://www.knightfoundation.org/media/uploads/publication_ pdfs/VR_report_web.pdf Dwight, L. (2016). These VR film tips show how to direct audience attention. https://cutt. ly/5twTUWN Fisher, J.A. (2017). Empathic actualities: toward a taxonomy of empathy in virtual reality. In Nunes, N., Oakley, I., and Nisi, V. (Eds.). Interactive Storytelling, p. 10690. Frontline and Emblematic. (2018). Creating virtual reality journalism: a guide for best practices. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/ creating-virtual-reality-journalism-a-guide-for-best-practices García Castillejo, A. (2008). Autorregulación y deontología de la profesión periodística. Madrid: Ediciones GPS. Gregory, S. (2016). Immersive witnessing: from empathy and outrage to action. Witness. https://blog.witness.org/2016/08/ immersive-witnessing-from-empathy-and-outrage-to-action Hardee, G.M. (2016). Immersive journalism in VR: four theoretical domains for researching a narrative design framework. In Proceeding of the International Conference on Virtual, Augmented and Mixed Reality. Cham: Springer, 679–690. Hardee, G.M. and McMahan, R.P. (2017). FIJI: a framework for the immersion-journalism intersection. Frontiers ICT, 4, 1–21. Hernández, R. (2018). Interviewed by María José Benítez.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

69

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

70

4  Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism

Jareño Alarcón, J. (2009). Ética y periodismo (Ética aplicada). Bilbao: Desclée de Brouwer. Jones, S. (2017). Disrupting the narrative: immersive journalism in virtual reality. Journal of Media Practice, 18(2–3), 171–185. Kent, T. (2015). An ethical reality check for virtual reality journalism. Medium. https:// medium.com/@tjrkent/an-ethical-reality-check-for-virtual-reality-journalism8e5230673507 Kinnick, K.N., Krugman, D.M., and Cameron, G.T. (1996). Compassion fatigue: communica­ tion and burnout toward social problems. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 73(3), 687–707. Kool, H. (2016). The ethics of immersive journalism: a rhetorical analysis of news storytelling with virtual reality technology. Intersect, 9, 1–11. Lelyveld, P. (2015). Virtual reality primer with an emphasis on camera-captured VR. Motion Imaging Journal SMPTE, 124(6), 78–85. Lester, P.M. (2018). Visual Ethics: A Guide for Photographers, Journalists, and Filmmakers. New York: Taylor & Francis. Linfield, S. (2010). The Cruel Radiance: Photography and Political Violence. London: University of Chicago Press. Mabrook, R. and Singer, J.B. (2019). Virtual reality, 360° video, and journalism studies: conceptual approaches to immersive technologies. Journalism Studies, 20(14), 2096–2112. Maciá, C. and Herrera, S. (2011). Ética y excelencia informativa: los conflictos y retos en el quehacer periodístico desde la perspectiva de los profesionales de la comunidad de Madrid. Madrid: Asociación de la Prensa de Madrid. Madary, M. and Metzinger, T.K. (2016). Real virtuality: a code of ethical conduct. recommendations for good scientific practice and the consumers of VR-technology. Frontiers in Robotics and AI, 3(3), 1–23. Milk, C. (2015). How virtual reality can create the ultimate empathy machine. TED Talks. https://www.ted.com/talks/chris_milk_how_virtual_reality_can_create_the_ultimate_ empathy_machine Mullin, B. (2016). Virtual reality: a news frontier in journalism ethics. Poynter. https:// www.poynter.org/ethics-trust/2016/virtual-reality-the-next-frontier-in-journalismethics Muntean, R., Hennessy, K., Denes, A., and Phuttitarn, L. (2019). On research ethics and representation in virtual reality. In 2019 IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (VR) IEEE, 1493–1496. Nash, K. (2018). Virtual reality witness: exploring the ethics of mediated presence. Studies in Documentary Film, 12(2), 119–131. National Press Photographers Association. (2019). Code of Ethics. https://nppa.org/ code-ethics-spanish Nichols, B. (2013). Introducción al documental. Ciudad de México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Paíno-Ambrosio, A. and M.I. Rodríguez-Fidalgo. (2019). Propuesta de géneros periodísticos inmersivos basados en la realidad virtual y el vídeo en 360º. Revista Latina De Comunicación Social, 74, 1132–1153. Pérez-Seijo, S. (2016). Origen y evolución del periodismo inmersivo en el panorama internacional. In Proceedings of the II Simposio de la Red Internacional de Investigación de Gestión de la Comunicación, 402–418.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

Pérez-Seijo, S. and Campos-Freire, F. (2016). La ética de la realidad virtual en los medios de comunicación. In XIII Congreso Latinoamericano de Investigadores de la Comunicación, 167–172. Pérez-Seijo, S. and López-García, X. (2018). Las dos caras del Periodismo Inmersivo: el desafío de la participación y los problemas éticos. In López Paredes, M. (Ed.). Nuevos escenarios en la comunicación: retos y convergencias. Quito: Centro de Publicaciones PUCE. Pérez-Seijo, S. and López-García, X. (2019a). Five ethical challenges of immersive journalism: a proposal of good practices’ indicators. In Rocha, Á., Ferrás, C., and Paredes, M. (Eds.). Information Technology and Systems. ICITS 2019. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing. Cham: Springer, 954–964. Pérez-Seijo, S. and López-García, X. (2019b). La ética del Periodismo Inmersivo a debate. Hipertext.net, 18, 1–13. Redondo-García, M. (2013). El sensacionalismo y su penetración en la prensa española de calidad. El ‘caso Mc-Cann’ en El País, El Mundo y ABC. Estudios Sobre El Mensaje Periodístico, 19(1), 235–253. Robertson, A. (2017). At Tribeca’s VR showcase, artists are trying to move beyond empathy. The Verge. https://www.theverge.com/2017/5/3/15524404/tribeca-film-festival-2017-vrempathy-machine-backlash RTDNA. (2015). Code of Ethics. https://goo.gl/8ZG1bu Sánchez Laws, A.L. and Utne, T. (2019). Ethics guidelines for immersive journalism. Frontiers in Robotics and AI, 6, 28. Sánchez-Vives, M.V. and Slater, M. (2005). Opinion: from presence to consciousness through virtual reality. Nature Reviews. Neuroscience, 6(4), 332–339. Shin, D. (2018). Empathy and embodied experience in virtual environment: to what extent can virtual reality stimulate empathy and embodied experience? Computers in Human Behavior, 78, 64–73. Shin, D. and Biocca, F. (2017). Exploring immersive experience in journalism. New Media & Society, 19(111), 1–24. Silverstone, R. (2003). Proper distance: towards an ethics of cyberspace. In Liestøl, G., Morrison, A., and Rasmussen, T. (Eds.). Digital Media Revisited: theoretical and conceptual innovations in digital domains. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 469–490. Slater, M., Lotto, B., Arnold, M.M. and Sánchez-Vives, M.V. (2009). How we experience immersive virtual environments: the concept of presence and its measurement. Anuario De Psicología, 40(2), 193–210. Slater, M. and Sánchez-Vives, M.V. (2016). Enhancing our lives with immersive virtual reality. Frontiers in Robotics and AI, 3, 74. Slater, M., Steed, A. and Usoh, M. (2013). Being There Together: experiments on presence in virtual environments (1990s). London: University College London. SPJ. (2014). Code of Ethics. https://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp Suh, A., Wang, G., Gu, W., and Wagner, C. (2018). Enhancing audience engagement through immersive 360-degree videos: an experimental study. In Schmorrow, D. and Fidopiastis C. (Eds.). Augmented Cognition. Cham: Springer, 425–443. Sundar, S.S., Kang, J., and Oprean, D. (2017). Being there in the midst of the story: how immersive journalism affects our perceptions and cognitions. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 20(11), 672–682. The New York Times. (2008). Guidelines on Integrity. https://nyti.ms/2XCRs4Z

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

71

72

4  Ethics in 360-Degree Immersive Journalism

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The New York Times. (2016). The Fight for Falluja. YouTube. https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=_Ar0UkmID6s&list=PLNJVXiIeT9BOy0LOjqGN-qLMgAcMTvPX&index=43&ab_channel=TheNewYorkTimes UNESCO. (1983). Principios internacionales de ética profesional del periodismo. In Fourth Consultative Meeting of International and Regional Organizations of Journalists. Van Damme, K., All, A., De Marez, L., and Van Leuven, S. (2019). 360º video journalism: experimental study on the effect of immersion on news experience and distant suffering. Journalism Studies, 20(14), 2063–2076. Visch, V.T., Tan, E.S., and Molenaar, D. (2010). The emotional and cognitive effect of immersion in film viewing. Cognition & Emotion, 24(8), 1439–1445. Vlaamse Radio-en Televisieomroep. (2012). Redactiestatuut met inbegrip van de deontologische code voor de journalisten bij de VRT. https://bit.ly/2KwpCV2 Watson, Z. (2016). Factual storytelling in 360 video. British Broadcasting Corporation. https://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/blog/2016-11-360-video-factual-storytelling

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

73

5 Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games1 Salvador Gómez-García and Juan Martín-Quevedo Universidad de Valladolid and Universidad Rey Juan Carlos

You are a pirate commander staked with $50,000 from local tribal leaders and other investors. Your job is to guide your pirate crew through raids in and around the Gulf of Aden, attack and capture a ship, and successfully negotiate a ransom. (Cutthroat Capitalism, Wired, 2009) You’re a full-time Uber driver with two kids to support, and a $1000 mortgage payment due in a week. Can you earn enough to pay the bill—and make more than other players? (The Uber Game, Financial Times, 2018)

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

News in Games’ Guise: Introduction to Newsgames The informative aspect of serious games (a term coined by the pedagogue Clark Abt in 1968 to define games whose objective is not entertainment) is specified in newsgames to define those products that are located “in the crossroad between journalism and videogames” (Bogost et al., 2010, p. 13). This meeting happens in the context of the mediatic convergence of the first decade of the twenty-first century (Vobič, Dvoršak and Vtič, 2014, pp. 123–124); the features that made digital games become one of the new mass media (Dovey and Kennedy, 2006, pp. 84–103; De la Hera, 2019). Marshall McLuhan pointed out this idea when he emphasized that games “are extensions of our being, not individual, but social, and it should be clear that they are media” (1996, p. 253). The first examples of this formula of “play the message” (Frasca, 2007) in mass media could be found as interactive entertainment, such was the case of Fojba2000 (Mladina, 2000) or in the category of multimedia infographics, as in Can You Spot the Threats? (MSNBC.com, 2001). This offer was complemented by several independent creations, not related to the official discourse of mass media. Such was the case of September 12th (Powerful Robots, 2003), whose creator, Gonzalo Frasca, coined the

1   This research is the result of the R&D & i Research Project “Politainment in the post-truth environment: new narratives, clickbait and gamification” (CSO2017-84472-R), funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

74

5  Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games

term “newsgame” to describe “an emerging genre: videogames based on news. Traditionally, videogames have focused on fantasy instead of reality, but we think they may be excellent tools to better our understanding of the world” (Newsgaming, 2003). This conceptualization, which presents several theoretical weaknesses, nonetheless reflects a key feature of newsgames; the relation between videogames and current affairs, in a fusion of ludic simulation and relevant topics of our present. This dichotomy has created a “terminological grey zone” between newsgames and other similar terms, such as social impact games, docugames, or interactive media. This academic problem—to be precise and differentiate the characteristics of each term—is not usually on the agenda of creators and designers, defined by a scenario in which “terminology is in constant flux and where the borders between such categories are still being actively negotiated” (Grace, 2020, p. 103). Despite this hesitant beginning, the presence of this content has increased in many media in the last years. These efforts are part of an innovating strategy in the struggle for the disseminated attention of online users (Plewe and Fürsich, 2018, p. 12) and the pursuit of higher levels of visitors and, above all, loyal audiences (Ferrer and Karlsson, 2016, p. 5) through the integration of the informative contents in videogames, virtual reality, and 360-degree videos (Mañas-Viniegra et al., 2019, p. 154). Therefore, the main concern has been innovation, but there has been remarkably less attention given to the ethical implications of these new genres. It is crucial to consider the high inversion, both in human and economic resources, required to develop newsgames, as a fact that limits its scope to specific, narrow audiences. However, this is part of a sophisticated trend to gamify journalism contents (García-Ortega and García-Avilés, 2018) led by some of the most important international media, such as The New York Times, The Guardian, RTVE Lab, or Al Jazeera.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Can We Play with the Message? The above-mentioned considerations place the origins of newsgames in the contemporary media landscape and point to the objective of this chapter: an exploratory reflection about the tensions between the informative principles in the message, its ludic structure, and the ethical standards that must be met in journalism. So, this chapter will examine how these ethical principles are formulated and applied to the design and development of newsgames. We conceptualize newsgames with the theoretical codes specific to Game Studies, both in the narrative and in their interaction with the users. The later arrival of newsgames to online or digital journalism has created the need to rethink them in order to adjust informative games to professional journalism standards. The interest that newsgames generate to journalists comes from their usefulness to attain clicks and navigation time, which are translated to advertising income, one of the features that define actual journalism as a “clickable, consumable media” (Breese and Luengo, 2016, p. 282). The incorporation of newsgames to the informative discourse of mass media would add a new layer to the tensions that are already present in a “professional journalism” defined by a narrative frame of area crisis. A legitimate question in this contest arises: Which level of “ludic component” should be considered acceptable in journalism, and how can we measure it in a context in which “if newsgames and other playful approaches to journalism are to assume a more dominant position within

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

News in Games’ Guise: Introduction to Newsgames

mainstream news delivery […] They should push journalists and game creators out of their comfort zones, requiring them to challenge a perceived orthodoxies, philosophical assumptions and editorial, ethical and digital practices” (Ferrer et al., 2020, p. 10). Analyzing the message of videogames is challenging because of its interactive nature and multi-branched narrative (Aarseth, 2003). This research has used a text analysis, successfully employed by other scholars (Carr, 2009; Plewe and Fürsich, 2018), to identify and analyze the narratives, rules, and mechanics that each game possesses. Every game has been treated as “a self-significance unit with binding characteristics […], forming groups and continuities with, through and beyond the text” (Carr, 2009, p. 5). The interpretation has been based on the frame of ethical principles established by the Ethical Journalism Network, which has summarized a vast number of existing ethical and deontological codes in five main premises: truthfulness and accuracy; independence; fairness and impartiality; humanity; and, lastly, accountability (EJN, 2015). Not all of these core principles are always relevant to our analysis objects, as there are premises, like informative independence of a medium, that does not apply to only one type of content. Thus, this investigation will tackle a fundamental question: What are the ethical consequences of elaborating and presenting informative messages in a ludic format?

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Designing Information as a Game: A Representative Sample The sample for this investigation has been gathered from those products classified as newsgames in specialized databases and catalogs, such as Serious Games Classification, Newsgames Directory (D´Agostino, 2016), or Games 4 Change, as well as those newsgames referenced in academic bibliography (Bogost et al., 2010; Gómez, 2014; GarcíaOrtega and García-Avilés, 2020). The chosen sample (which comprises 132 titles) does not pretend to be a comprehensive list of all the existing newsgames in media, but it does collect the most popular references. In the last decade, the production of informative games has experienced a growth, although the annual rate of media-developed newsgames was still barely a dozen in 2014–2019. These figures place newsgames in a logic of narrowcasting and experimentation, despite the relevance of the media that publish them. These numbers are not surprising, but they should be put into context with three key facts. First, the popularity of newsgames among audiences. Despite the lack of official figures, titles like How Y´all, Youse, and You Guys Talk were the most popular content of the digital edition of The New York Times in 2013 (Meyer, 2014). Second, there is an academic interest in newsgames that have been translated in extensive scientific production, such as the monographic published by Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, titled “Playful approaches to news engagement.” And third, the growing importance of presenting information interactively is a common perception among journalism professionals, as reflected by Nikki Usher: When newly anointed Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Matt Richtel gave his thank-you speech in front of The New York Times’ staff, he made specific mention of Times staff members that no other journalist had ever given a nod to at this kind of gathering: the people who make video games in the newsroom. He proclaimed, as if it were still a surprise to him, “And, we have video

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

75

76

5  Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games

game-making skills. Old-world journalism is the essence of new-world journalism. The series was long form [journalism] with video, audio, and, yes, video games […].” The “video games” had made an impact on the newsroom. Not only had the games themselves generated massive Web traffic, but they had taken Richtel’s series about “Driven to Distraction”—driving with cell phones—to a whole new level. Safely, from the comfort of your computer, you could try a simulation of texting and driving. One of the games tested your ability to navigate highway toll booths while responding to text messages about your favorite dessert from a mock cell phone. The subtext of Richtel’s statement to the newsroom was quite powerful: traditional journalism was only one element of telling stories now. Interactivity enabled journalists to create a whole new experience for readers (Usher, 2014). Regardless of the enthusiasm of Matt Richtel about incorporating ludic elements, it is too soon to know to what extent interactive elements or games will be integrated into the discourse of traditional media. However, there is a palpable eagerness to use them as the spearhead of digital journalism.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Informative and Mediatic Background of Newsgames Other independent creators followed in the wake of Gonzalo Frasca’s September 12th, popularizing the formula with games such as Reelect Bush (EllaZ Systems, 2003), Madrid (Powerful Robots, 2004), Hothead Zidane (2006), or So You Think You Can Drive, Mel? (Game Show Network, 2006). Some media also explored those possibilities with Can You Spot the Threats? (MMSNBC.com, 2001) or Climate Challenge (BBC, 2006). This first group of creations shared some common features. The most prominent was their participation in public debates of their presentation (Sicart, 2008, p. 27), the simplicity of their discourse and their technology, and an experimental flavor, with an appearance of outsiders from the videogame industry and mass media. Thus, they formed the first period (2003–2006) in the usage of these kinds of contents that tried to transform news and current affairs into game systems. The first examples of traditional media trusting in these newsgames began in 2007, when The New York Times included them in its digital edition, and participated in the development of Food Import Folly (launched May 24, 2007) and Points of Entry: An Immigration Challenge (launched on June 22, 2007). These projects had no continuity, albeit they marked a continuous growth of these contents in traditional media and the birth of several studies that tried to define this phenomenon. This popularity has had its reflection in the academic attention to this format. There have been works trying to attain a definition of the concept (Burton, 2005; Sicart, 2008; Bogost et al., 2010; Ferrer and Karlsson, 2016; Meier, 2018; Mañas-Viniegra, 2018), development proposals (Grace et al., 2016; Siitonen et al., 2019), or case studies (Gómez and Cabeza, 2016; García-Ortega and García-Avilés, 2018; Mañas-Viniegra et al., 2019; Herrero-Curiel and Planells, 2020). In this sense, recent investigations have distinguished newsgames from other serious games, based on their role in the journalistic practice, including their development linked to events with news value, as a complement to traditional news formats (Plewe

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Challenges and Changes in Ethical Principles and Journalism Practices Through Newsgames

and Fürsich, 2018; Rojas-Torrijos, 2020). Beyond the theoretical debate, these proposals create a new relation between information and media audiences, as the way to inform the need not only to convey raw data, but also to make possible different ways to interact with the information, and to let users create their own route to consume information and consume the news.

Challenges and Changes in Ethical Principles and Journalism Practices Through Newsgames The results of this investigation consist of the summarized description of each ethical principle. From that point, explore how newsgames as an informative proposal and journalistic products employed by mass media comply with that principle (or break it). In this sense, we have tried to focus on the ethical guidelines of journalism, to go beyond a strictly technological and narrative vision of this ludic and interactive genre.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Truthfulness and Accuracy Principles The truthfulness and accuracy principles comprise professional rigor, to convey unbiased information (separation of facts and opinion, neutrality in the coverage, and inclusion and exclusion criteria), the discourse-building procedures (election of a headline, journalistic genres, avoidance of sensationalism, among others), use of inappropriate narrative elements (such as recreation of fiction techniques), or deceitful or unethical practices to obtain information. As pointed out by Borden and Tew (2007), this principle means accuracy in the depiction of demonstrable facts, but also that the journalist has to be critical of their sources and avoid merely repeating propaganda from others. This characteristic is reflected in newsgames, as they try to depict reality, but also implicitly ask the users to make their own critical interpretations. Most newsgames used in digital editions of media outlets are defined as “interactive simulations” or “interactive documentaries.” However, this identification usually does not include the sources that have been used to design the information component of the game. Journalistic texts tend to specify, explicitly or implicitly, its authors (identifying the journalist or agency) and its sources (statements, official reports, or other media, for example). This construction—inherent in other media—was not present in the first years, as newsgames mostly offered reflections, opinions, or tried to highlight the importance of recent events. This circumstance was reflected in the first investigations about newsgames, which conceptualized them as related to political cartoons (Treanor and Mateas, 2009). On other occasions, the game tried to be a complement in digital media to the data conveyed by other journalistic texts, whether they were written or audio-visual. Such was the case of Cutthroat Capitalism: The Game (Wired, 2009). It was a supplement to a report about the business model of the pirates of African coasts. Wired published this game that allowed users to pilot a pirate ship to kidnap other vessels in the Gulf of Aden to negotiate a ransom. The objective was explaining the reasons for the persistence of these criminal entrepreneurs, which are mainly profitable. In this way, Cutthroat Capitalism guided the user to a preconceived conclusion, complementing the standard informative discourse (the report and interviews).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

77

78

5  Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games

However, perception about newsgames have become increasingly inclined to consider them as journalistic messages, and this has made it necessary to present transparently the elements used to construct that informative discourse, in order to support that truthfulness is present in the conversion to a ludic format. Therefore, new projects in the last decade have tended to incorporate elements of classic journalism protocols explicitly. This support has taken two main forms. The first is creating an interactive narrative based on real stories, for example, Syrian Journey (BBC, 2015) and The Uber Game (The Financial Times, 2018). Their respective prologues clarify this circumstance (Table 5.1). The prologue explaining how these informative fictions were constructed is a mandatory view for the user in both cases. The creators explain through this preface that these games are not as “standard” news, because the proposed narrative is multibranched. Thus, it implies that each user's experience is created through fragments of a wide selection of testimonies and stories that would usually be part of a broader informative coverage. This narrative formula, creating a macro-story through microstories, is commonly accepted, as the audience is warned beforehand. However, it also reminds us of cases of unethical praxis and false reports, created by combining several real interviews to create a character that did not exist, as happened in the case of Michael Finkel and his controversial article Is Youssof Malé a slave? (The New York

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Table 5.1  Construction of veracity in newsgames. Syrian Journey (BBC, 2015)

The Uber Game (The Financial Times, 2018)

This journey is based on extensive research and real stories of Syrians who have made the journey […] The routes, options, and outcomes in this Syrian Journey feature were based on real stories uncovered by extensive research as part of a BBC Arabic digital project exploring migration from Syria.

This news game is based on real reporting, including interviews with dozens of Uber drivers.

Source: Compiled by authors

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Challenges and Changes in Ethical Principles and Journalism Practices Through Newsgames

Times, 2001), in which he combined several interviews to create a more exciting person, but one that was also completely false. A second, more exhaustive, formula consists in accompanying the newsgame with a “making of” of sorts. It is the case of MonteLab (Lab Rtve, 2007), which offers three clarification signals to the user at the bottom of the screen. The first one is a link-signature that leads to the web of the Spanish Radiotelevision Innovation Laboratory. The second one presents an image of the 12-person team that has collaborated to create a multimedia project, highlighting the three main sources: the current affairs show Documentos TV, a documentary titled Casas Vacías, and the game itself. The last signal, named “methodology,” explains how the project was created, defining MonteLab as “above everything, a journalistic project narrated in the form of a videogame.” For this reason, every marker, consequence, and result has been elaborated, based on statistics and official studies. The informative resources used as documentation for the docugame are easily accessible” (Lab Rtve, 2007). The documentation in this section is divided into data, official reports, testimonies, and interviews with experts. Both formulas fulfil two functions, from a journalistic point of view. On the one hand, they serve to give legitimacy to the use of a game as an informative strategy by a mass media, as they have to fight the blot of “pure entertainment” that videogames have in wide segments of society. On the other hand, both formulas comply with the ethics of separating the facts, as gathered by the professionals, and the way they are told. These features suggest similarities between newsgames and the “New Journalism” popularized by Tom Wolfe, both in an aesthetic dimension of fictionalizing the content and in the documentalist attitude, characterized by accuracy, verification, objectivity, and investigation (Kramer, 1995). The narrative risks that the adopters of this current content are akin to those present in the newsgames, as we will see later.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Fairness and Impartiality Principles From the perspective of journalism ethics, the classic conception of justice builds up the principles of fairness and impartiality (Lambeth, 1986) and are related to informing in an objective and unbiased manner (inclusion of different points of view and the right to reply), the appropriate treatment of minorities, and the presumption of innocence. Both principles—fairness and impartiality—have been gradually incorporated into the informative and design procedures of newsgames. On the one hand, as we will see later, the principle of fairness—defined as a principle of justice that “not only consists in ‘being fair’ in a certain sense but to favor those minorities that are in disadvantage” (Figueras Maz, 2010, p. 89)—has been present in newsgames from their beginning, because of their links with humanitarian and social collectives and organi­ zations, who have employed these games to convey their messages to new audi­ ences. On the other hand, the principle of impartiality nuances the informative rigor with the subjective component of newsgames. Gonzalo Frasca pointed out already in the origins of the genre that “we do not believe in an absolutely objective journalism. We do prefer games that encourage critical thinking, even if the user disagrees with the ideas expressed in the game” (Newsgaming, 2003). However, the gradual incorporation of newsgames to the official discourse of mass media has worn the edge off

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

79

80

5  Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

this characteristic, compelling newsgames into the standard registers of classical journalistic genres. As mentioned above, the principle of fairness, understood as favoring the disadvantaged minorities, has been present in newsgames from their very beginning. Escape from Woomera (EFW Collective, 2003) was the first representative example of these principles. It is a mod (fan-made modification from an existing graphic engine of a commercial videogame) of Half-Life (Valve, 2002) developed in 2003 by a team of Australian activists. Their objective was to denounce the Australian government´s decision to restrict access of mass media to the detainment center of Woomera. The designers programmed Escape from Woomera as a social protest message that tried to attract attention, even a virtual one, to the situation of the immigrants in Woomera, against government’s obscurity policy (Nicholls, 2003). Escape from Woomera puts the player in the shoes of Mustafa, a detained immigrant in this refugees’ center, whose main objective is managing to escape before being deported. The authenticity appearance of the message is an essential part of the discourse, and, as pointed out by Kate Wild (an investigative journalist that was part of the project), “everything in the game is based on actual events […] and all escape plans had been tried at some point by actual inmates” (Golding, 2013). Escape from Woomera was a brilliant precedent of the use of digital games to make public and denounce social issues, because of its success in putting the focus of the Australian public debate on the problem of the immigrants in this center. However, it was the object of bitter polemics such as the accusation of “trivializing a serious problem” (Apperley, 2008, p. 225) or the controversy between the Australia Council for the Arts and the Ministry for Communications, Cyber Safety and the Arts because of the former awarding of 25,000 Australian dollars to this project (Apperley, 2008, pp. 225–226). Escape from Woomera was followed, soon after, by a large group of socially conscious designers that also chose videogames, rather than more traditional media, as a tool to raise awareness about humanitarian catastrophes. One of the more notorious examples of this inspiration was Darfur Is Dying (USC and mtvU, 2006). The game is defined in its webpage as: Darfur is dying viral videogame for change that offers a glance to the daily life of the 2.5 million of refugees from Darfur in Sudan. Players must try to maintain the refugees camp working against a possible attack from the Janjaweed militias. The game allows players to learn more about the genocide in Darfur, which has taken the life of 400,000 persons to this day, and can learn of more ways to get involved and help to stop this humanitarian crisis that put Human Rights into risk. (Take Action Games, 2006) Darfur Is Dying was a considerable success in its ability to attract attention, and media such as The Washington Post, Time Magazine, BBC News, or El Mundo published articles about the employment of this game to raise awareness about a humanitarian crisis. In an interview with El Mundo, Susana Ruiz, chief designer of Darfur Is Dying, said it was difficult to quantify this achievement. However, they estimated that more than 800,000 users had played the game in the first few months (Parkin, 2006).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Challenges and Changes in Ethical Principles and Journalism Practices Through Newsgames

There have been other proposals that have achieved significant popularity in mass media because they address social issues, such as human migration and refugees—The Refugee Challenge (The Guardian, 2014), Syrian Journey (BBC, 2015), Against All Odds (UNHCR, 2005), and The Migrant Trail (Gigantic Mechanic, 2013); violence against women—L’une d’elles (Liberation, 2015); labor standards—The Amazon Race (Abc.net, 2019); illness—Parkinson, que tiemble el camino (Rtve Lab, 2016), or Can You Navigate a Day with Depression? (Buzzfeed News, 2015); and the situation of people with disabilities—Play Our Game … Wheelchair User (Buzzfeed News, 2017); to cite only some of the most relevant examples. The rigor of newsgames to meet the standards of the principle of impartiality has been less than overwhelming. Newsgames tend to be a subjective product related to opinion journalism genres. This can be seen in two proposals: Hothead Zidane (Corriere della Sera, 2006) and Points of Entry: An Immigration Challenge (The New York Times, 2007). These examples in Table 5.2 represent the first years of a format that stood out for addressing controversial topics in different contexts. The previous examples resort to parodic constructions, choosing to adopt the point of view of the “protagonists” of the events (Zinedine Zidane in one case and the INS agents in the other). However, the parodic and irreverent tone of the first contrast with the underlying logic of the second: the bureaucratic and administrative overload that INS agents face when

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Table 5.2  Informative impartiality in newsgames. Hothead Zidane (Corriere della Sera, 2006)

Points of Entry: An Immigration Challenge (The New York Times, 2007).

This game recreates the moment when the football player Zinedine Zidane headbutted Marco Materazzi in the final match of the World Football Championship in 2006. The user controls Zidane and has to hit the clones of Materazzi as they appear on the screen. After a few seconds, the referee appears, expelling the aggressor and making him lose the opportunity to obtain the World Cup, as happened in reality, and ending the game.

The user competes with another employee of US Immigration and Naturalization Service controlled by the game. This AI employee establishes a score each time it evaluates a candidate to enter the country, and the player must try to get as near as possible to this mark. The player gets points depending on how fast they can process each immigrant’s application and how they grade the merits of the candidate (information, employment, English proficiency …).

Source: adapted by the authors.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

81

82

5  Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games

they have to decide who gets the green cards and who does not. While in the first newsgame, the parody is in the act of the user themselves—headbutting the rivals, the second has a clear role as informative or opinion content, albeit one with a cartoon aesthetics that makes it appear as deceitfully frivolous. These questions point to an interesting consideration about the relation between newsgames and the principle of impartiality: their strength lies in the subjective content that conveys its editorial logic, combined with a call to the users to participate. Newsgames are an informative process that actively encourages the user to empathize with the characters—through the difficulties of the INS agents in Points of Entry: An Immigration Challenge to do their job and make “fair” decisions. Also, newsgames emphasize the subjectivity load implicitly when the user adopts only one point of view.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Humanity Principle The humanity principle establishes the importance to journalism of not hurting other people, and to promote human values, such as empathy and people understanding. Friedman, Kahn, and Borning have defined this in the new technological contexts as “value-sensitive design,” based, at least theoretically, in a “grounded approach to the design of technology that accounts for human values in a principled and comprehensive manner throughout the design process” (2008, p. 69). The potential of newsgames to convey values stems from their nature as “meaningful supplements to already existing forms of journalism” (Plewe and Fürsich, 2018, p. 2). This kind of formulation derives from two types of narrative. The first one constructs the user experience through a simulated scenario. It is the case in Can You Beat Usain Bolt (The New York Times, 2016) or How to Survive a Nuclear Bomb (BBC, 2016). The first one challenges the user to have a faster reaction than Usain Bolt, measuring how much time they take to react after hearing the same signal as Bolt in the 100 meters flat race in the Rio de Janeiro Olympics. The game measures how long do we take to push a button, establishing if we would react faster or slower than Bolt. If we have a response time in the most common rank (between 0.155 and 2 seconds), we get the message “you were slower than Bolt. Maybe more training will help,” encouraging the player to try again and get a better time. This way, the user can obtain the message “Bolt just barely edged you out. With a little work, Tokyo 2020 is in your sights” or, if the user achieves a reaction time lower than 0.155 seconds, “Is that you Justin Gatlin? Congratulations. You were faster than Usain Bolt.” The game serves as an introduction, through a first-person experience, to a report about the training of speed racers for the Rio de Janeiro 2016 Olympics. The second kind of narrative is the construction of a tale through “the eyes of the other,” in roleplay storytelling. It is the case in Uber Game (The Financial Times, 2018) or in Poverty News (RTL Nieus, 2019). In the first scenario, the player has to work as a Uber driver and manage to earn 1000 dollars in a week to pay their mortgage. To achieve this, the user must complete several transport contracts, trying to balance them with daily life situations. For example, the tension when we have promised to be home by 7 pm to help our son with his homework, while the Uber app warns us that if we do a few services more, we will earn a substantial amount of money. Do we keep driving—thus getting closer to our objective of paying the mortgage—or do we keep our word to our son? This formula faces the player with significant dilemmas through an emotional design that tries to implicate the user in the information the audience is receiving, thus involving

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Challenges and Changes in Ethical Principles and Journalism Practices Through Newsgames

different dimensions of empathy, as in other audio-visual formats: emotional, cognitive, absorbing the story, and personal attraction to the characters (Igartua et al., 2009). This multidimensional empathy-building process is also present in the newsgames of our sample that address lack of reliable information and fake news: Bad News (DROG, 2017), Fake It to Make It (Amanda Warner, 2017), iReporter (BBC, 2018), and Factitious (Augame Studio, 2017–20). The role of the user in each is summarized in Table 5.3. The question of which roles the user takes is critical. It guides how the game constructs the interaction, as the actions of the player (creating fake news, identifying them or verifying them) increase their understanding of fake news and the motivations behind their making. The game can border or even fall into ethical pitfalls about what can videogames as a form of discourse propose. This circumstance led to a reflection of Amanda Warner (Fake It or Make It designer) when questioned if she was afraid of her game showing the “opportunities” that fake news provides when understood as a business model: The process of creating fake news is already well documented online. If someone wants to make a fake news site, they already have access to the information they need. However, I acknowledge that there is a difference between information and inspiration. It’s possible that this game could inspire someone to make fake news, but I’m willing to take the risk, because I think the potential for positive change in players is worth it. My hope is that by making players more aware of how and why fake news is written and distributed, that they will be more skeptical of what they encounter in the future. In general, I think that better understanding how and why we are manipulated by others, for profit or power, is a worthwhile knowledge to have. (Warner, 2017)

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Table 5.3  Roles assigned to the user in newsgames about fake news. 1) The player takes the role of fake content creator. Bad News: “You´re here for the position of disinformation and fake news tycoon, is that correct?” Fake It to Make It: “You will be making money by creating news sites and profiting when people view and click on ads on your site. It’s pretty easy as long as you can generate enough traffic. Your sites are going to be targeting people in the United States. Why? Well, because views and clicks from people in this country are paid at a higher rate than in other countries. You might not care about American politics, but you can still use its drama to profit! […] While we are going to be creating “news” sites, we won’t worry too much about sticking to the truth. Fake news takes less time to create, and it often spreads better than real news, since you aren’t as constrained by facts.” 2) The player takes the role of a journalist. iReporter: “Your role as a BBC journalist is to cover a breaking news—publishing your story to a BBC Live site. Your story will be judged on how well you balance accuracy, impact and speed.” 3) The player takes the role of reader or news verifier. Factitious: “Can you tell real news from fake news?” Source: Compiled by the authors

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

83

84

5  Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games

Ultimately, reverse engineering unethical information processes or fake news-making should help us not only to understand the phenomenon but also to digital literacy and critical thinking, instead of hampering these skills. The promotion of this subjectivity as a key element of newsgames is also present in McLuhan’s conception of games as “made-up situations that allow the participation of many people in a significative pattern from their own corporative life” (1996, p. 253). This perception sheds light on the cognitive dimension of information, in general, and of newsgames in particular, turning them into a toll “to understand the world” (Frasca, 2009, p. 37).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Principles of Independence and Accountability The last two principles, as enunciated by the Ethical Journalism Network, are independence and accountability. The journalist´s independence establishes that the professional “should not act, formally or informally, on behalf of special interests whether political, corporate or cultural. We should declare to our editors—or the audience— any of our political affiliations, financial arrangements or other personal information that might constitute a conflict of interest” (EJN, 2015). On the other hand, the principle of accountability in journalistic practice has a wide range of applicable situations. Commonly, it is usually defined by the use of ethical methods to obtain and gather information (Dör and Hollnbuchner, 2017), transparency (Ward, 2010), and journalistic rigor (Singer, 2007). Respecting the principle of accountability should be inherent to the journalistic duties when informing about facts but is also a stimulus to audiences to adopt a prosocial behavior (De-Aguilera and Casero-Ripollés, 2018). Following this line, many newsgames let the audience take the role of the main characters to encourage the compromise with the discourse that the media are proposing through that game. Different producers have chosen this designing decision. For example, in the case of the above-mentioned Darfur Is Dying, the roleplay storytelling has helped to improve the willingness to help other people through donations, public debate, promotion of other activities, and backing public petitions (Peng et al., 2010). Later on, research showed evidence that players of Darfur Is Dying were more receptive to contents about the situation of the refugees in Sudan and more inclined to share them in social media (Cohen, 2014). In this way, there can be a secondary objective in a newsgame: not only to inform, but also to serve to raise awareness of the users about sensitive topics. This responsibility creates a tension between two elements that are not usually combined in an informative context: the game system design (a practice related to entertainment) and the elaboration of an informative product (with the standards of professional journalism). This combination requires accepting that “a game-design perspective needs to account for the way in which the game designs its architecture for the possible lives of player, unlike fiction, which provides the architecture for the possible life of characters” (Sicart, 2013, p. 15). This circumstance has been highlighted by Jeremy Gilbert, Strategic Initiatives Director at The Washington Post, when he pointed out that “a gaming company as I understand it has some storytellers, but not a ton of storytellers, and there are a ton of developers and people who render things. A news organization is almost the opposite” (Foxman, 2015). The new way of telling stories that represent newsgames is not exempt from criticism, especially in the usage of a ludic format to address sensitive social issues, such as

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Can Journalism Reinvent Itself as a Game? A Challenge for Media Ethics

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

migrants. In the case of Syrian Journey (BBC, 2015), the game was attacked by newspapers such as the Daily Mail and The Sun, stating that “the decision of the BBC to transform the human suffering of literally millions into a children’s game beggars belief” (Sales and Payne, 2015). The BBC responded that the newsgame was “a method of raising awareness about the bloody conflict” and “a tool for those interested in learning more about the situations Syrian refugees face” (Gander, 2015). This debate shows the polarized reading that some new journalistic formats are receiving. Instead of understanding them as a formula that encourages the engagement of the readers, sometimes they are rather viewed as a way of trivializing and making light of sensitive situations through just plain entertainment. Therefore, newsgames have to be careful and establish the limits of entertainment before human drama, and that also affects the above-mentioned principle of independence, even if its implementation in the case of newsgames is rather complex. Many newsgames that have addressed political or social topics have received negative criticism and accusations of too much simplification and not explicating enough on the causes of the information (Plewe and Fürsich, 2018). This tension is, as pointed out by Ian Bogost, “a problem of familiarity and convention […] When you stop to think about it, there’s really no reason to believe that film and television aren´t inappropriate media for exploring real-worlds issues and events” (Stuart, 2013). This idea was made manifest with Darfur Is Dying. Some people argued (probably without solid evidence) that the game might have reached many players. However, it had not caused real changes in the crisis in Darfur, and that the only objective of the game was advertising its developers (Boyd, 2006). Another reason for criticism was the sponsorship of mtvU, as that made the game merely a marketing tool for that corporation (Boyd, 2006). These critics, albeit infrequent, stem from the occasional fusion between newsgames and infomercials, in which, under the guise of news, the message is purely commercial. An example of this is ¿Crees que eres un buen conductor? (El Confidencial, 2018). Initially, the game appears to be just a visual driving test (and there is no warning of the advertising nature of the game). However, if the player manages to spot the cars committing traffic violations, the game suddenly transforms itself into an advertisement of an insurance company.

Can Journalism Reinvent Itself as a Game? A Challenge for Media Ethics The new challenges that traditional journalism is facing (especially the most classical versions, as print newspapers) also affect to the core principles of information in digital formats (Díaz-Campo and Segado, 2015). One of the battlefronts of these tensions is how can the so-called immutable deontological principles be adapted to the new narratives and audiences’ demands in a contemporary technological context. The new multimedia, transmedia, or interactive formulas (the most common) can be applied to journalism, but they do not escape these tensions and, besides, they are burdened by a theoretical weakness in their definition that makes it difficult for the media to establish consolidated procedures. This context is aggravated by ever-increasing costs, changing profiles, and modifications in the classic dynamics of journalism, as opposed to these new forms of presenting information. The newsgames have not

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

85

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

86

5  Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games

escaped this situation, and, moreover, they started to be developed as informative serious games, with the logic of game design, but without stopping to consider the necessary ethical and practical questions. Beyond this controversy lies the need to redefine journalistic work procedures regarding new formats and contexts, like the one we are exploring in this text, that is based on the above-mentioned ethical principles. The development of newsgames requires the cooperation between different languages (informative, visual, game programming, etc.) and different professional profiles, which in itself presents new challenges. This is even more important considering that publishing a newsgame means fixed (in specialist employees) and variable costs (time and resources). These expenses are hardly justifiable, especially for a journalistic profession that has grown to become accustomed to being in a perpetual state of crisis. Another consideration is the difficulty to make newsgames profitable. There is an ongoing debate about how to monetize information, but it is even trickier with newsgames, as they are at an awkward middle point: the game cannot be too basic and devoid of quality, but neither can it be so expensive to produce that it becomes a burden to the media finances. The solution of establishing a paywall and dropping the free-to-play characteristic of newsgames does not seem appropriate, as then newsgames would have to compete with commercial games, and they would not then fulfil their objective of reaching a broad public. In this sense, Robin Kwong, creator of The Uber Game in The Financial Times, argues that “[it] was a big success for us. Nearly half a million people have now played the game, and they have each spent 20 minutes, on average, playing the game. To put this into context, our average time on page for an FT article is just over a minute” (Kwong, 2019). Obviously, popularity does not necessarily imply accountability in an informative message. This leads to a debate about the ludic function of the games and its relationship with a deontological debate in the context in which serious games have become so accessible to mass media. Ultimately, this gradual implementation of a new way of telling stories by digital media requires that mass media adapt to new technologies and infrastructures and rethink the boundaries of the ethical and deontological rules that have been present in journalism from its very beginnings as a profession. At present, the adaptation to interactive narratives is still burdened with its “narrowcasting” logic, which will only be overcome if the media outlets adopt clear and defined strategies (as those used, with some caution, by The New York Times, The Guardian, or The Financial Times) regarding innovating in their contents. The innovative nature of newsgames also becomes one of the most considerable difficulties in formalizing an ethical code of their own. The core problem is the heterogeneity of the productions: some are very basic, little more than animated jokes, such as Hothead Zidane (Corriere della Sera, 2006) or Find the Terrorist (Revista Salón, 2003). In contrast, others are much more ambitious proposals. They aim to explain very complex issues in a comprehensible way, in a minimal time, and often with multiple connexions with other problems, such as Darfur Is Dying. Thus, they have an enormous potential to fall short in these ambitious aims, and stick with a short-sighted or too simple vision, deliberately or not. Besides, due to the cost in time and effort of making a newsgame, they tend to be used only to address dramatic situations in which the designers try to raise awareness of the public, looking for great emotional engagement.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Can Journalism Reinvent Itself as a Game? A Challenge for Media Ethics

As Omar Rosas points out, the role of the emotions, both of journalists and audiences, is very important when selecting the news and is especially crucial in the case of dramatic and catastrophic events. While digital media have an increasingly important role in the production and consumption of information in modern society, it is becoming necessary to examine the role of emotions in journalists that work in digital environments […] This kind of investigation about the digital press is, unfortunately, scarce, if not non-existent. (Rosas, 2016) The traditional view, as sustains Rosas, is that “the journalist should adopt a professional perspective about his work, which means leaving personal feelings and moral points of view to their private life.” However, the people involved in the events can express their emotions, and, in fact, the journalist has no control over it. However, in the case of newsgames a new ethical difficulty arises. When designing a game, the journalist does have control over the characters in the story and their behavior, what they say, and how they say it. Thus, journalists and programmers must walk a narrow line between two ethical chasms; they cannot offer a biased depiction of the events, but neither can they silence the voice of the protagonists, which is also part of the reality and of the human experience, and that must be present to tell the facts accurately. In summary, the role of newsgames in the new digital scenario that journalism is facing should be understood as an effort to reach new audiences, much more receptive to interactive formats, but also more accustomed to narratives closer to fiction than to journalism, with the ethical challenges that this situation poses (Williams and Carpini, 2020). Besides, a kind of relationship can be seen that is brewing between newsgames and other formats that they could complement (such as data journalism, which could benefit from the visualization possibilities of newsgames). Whatever the case, the new scenario will require a double dialogue between its technological potential and the ethical and deontological principles of journalism.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ludography Against All Odds (UNHCR, 2005) Bad News (DROG, 2017) Can You Beat Usain Bolt (The New York Times, 2016) Can You Navigate a Day with Depression? (Buzzfeed News, 2015) Can You Spot the Threats (MSNBC.com, 2001) ¿Crees que eres un buen conductor? (El Confidencial, 2018) Climate Challenge (BBC, 2006) Cutthroat Capitalism: The Game (Wired, 2009) Darfur Is Dying (USC and mtvU, 2006) Escape from Woomera (EFW Collective, 2003) Factitious (Augame Studio, 2017–20) Fake It to Make It (Amanda Warner, 2017) Find the Terrorist (Revista Salón, 2003) Fojba2000 (Mladina, 2000)

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

87

88

5  Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games

Food Import Folly (The New York Times, 2007) Half-Life (Valve, 2002) Hothead Zidane (Corriere della Sera, 2006) How to Survive a Nuclear Bomb (BBC Taster, 2016) iReporter (BBC, 2018) L’une d’elles (Liberation, 2015); Madrid (Powerful Robots, 2004) MonteLab (Lab RTVE, 2007) Parkinson, que tiemble el camino (Rtve Lab, 2016) Play Our Game … Wheelchair User (Buzzfeed News, 2017) Points of Entry: An Immigration Challenge (The New York Times, 2007) Poverty News (RTL Nieus, 2019) Reelect Bush (EllaZ Systems, 2003) September 12th (Powerful Robots, 2003) So You Think You Can Drive, Mel? (Game Show Network, 2006) Syrian Journey (BBC, 2015) The Amazon Race (Abc.net, 2019) The Migrant Trail (Gigantic Mechanic, 2013) The Refugee Challenge (The Guardian, 2014) The Uber Game (The Financial Times, 2018)

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Aarseth, E. (2003). Playing research: methodological approaches to game analysis. Paper presented at Melbourne DAC: 5th International Digital Arts and Culture Conference, Melbourne, Australia (May 19–23). Apperley, T. (2008). Videogames in Australia. In Wolf, M.J.P. (Ed.). The Videogame Explosion: A History from Pong to Playstation and Beyond. Westport: Greenwood Press. Bogost, I., Ferrari, S., and Schweizer, B. (2010). Newsgames: Journalism at Play. Cambridge: M.I.T. Press. Borden, S.L. and Tew, C. (2007). The role of journalist and the performance of journalism: ethical lessons from “fake” news (seriously). Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 22(4), 300–314. Boyd, C. (2006). Darfur activism meets videogaming. BBC News (July 6). http://news.bbc. co.uk/2/hi/technology/5153694.stm Breese, E. and Luengo, M. (2016). News innovations and enduring commitments. In Alexander, J., Breese, E., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered. Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Futures. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Burton, J. (2005). News-game journalism: history, current use and possible futures. Australian Journal of Emerging Technologies and Society, 3(2), 82–93. Carr, D. (2009). Textual analysis, digital games, zombies. Paper presented at DIGRA 2009 Conference: Breaking New Ground: Innovations in Games, Play, Practice and Theory, West London, UK (September 1–4). Cohen, E.L. (2014). What makes good games go viral? The role of technology use, efficacy, emotion and enjoyment in players’ decision to share a prosocial digital game. Computers in Human Behavior, 33, 321–329.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

D´Agostino, J.O. (2016). Game directory. https://johnodagostino.io/what-i-do/games/ newsgames-serious-games-directory De la Hera, T. (2019). Digital Gaming and the Advertising Landscape. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. https://doi.org/10.5117/9789462987159 De-Aguilera, M. and Casero-Ripollés, A. (2018). ¿Tecnologías para la transformación? Los medios sociales ante el cambio político y social? Presentación, Icono 14, 16(1), 1–21. https://doi.org/10.7195/ri14.v16i1.1162 Díaz-Campo, J. and Segado-Boj, F. (2015). Journalism ethics in a digital environment: how journalistic codes of ethics have been adapted to the Internet and ICTs in countries around the world. Telematics and Informatics, 32(4), 735–744. Dörr, K.N. and Hollnbuchner, K. (2017). Ethical challenges of algorithmic journalism. Digital Journalism, 5(4), 404–419. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2016.1167612 Dovey, J. and Kennedy, H.W. (2006). Game Cultures. Computer Games as New Media. Reading, UK: Open University Press. EJN: Ethical Journalism Network. (2015). The 5 principles of ethical journalism. https:// ethicaljournalismnetwork.org/who-we-are/5-principles-of-journalism Ferrer-Conill, R., Foxman, M., Jones, J., Sihvonen, T., and Siitonen, M. (2020). Playful approaches to news engagement. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354856520923964 Ferrer-Conill, R. and Karlsson, M. (2016). The gamification of journalism. In Gangadharbatla, H. and Davis, D.Z. (Eds.). Emerging Research and Trends in Gamification. Hershey: IGI Global, 356–383. Figueras Maz, M. (2010). El tratamiento informativo de los grupos socialmente desfavorecidos. In Alsius, S. and Salgado, F. (Eds.). La ética informativa vista por los ciudadanos. Contraste de opiniones entre los periodistas y el público. Barcelona: UOC. Foxman, M. (2015). Play the News: Fun and Games in Digital Journalism. New York: Tow Center for Digital Journalism. Frasca, G. (2007). Play the Message: Play, Game and Videogame Rhetoric. Copenhagen: IT University of Copenhagen. Frasca, G. (2009). Juego, videojuego y creación de sentido. Una introducción. Revista Internacional de Comunicación Audiovisual, Publicidad y Literatura, 1(7), 37–44. Friedman, B., Peter, H.K. and Borning, A. (2008). Value sensitive design and information systems. In Himma, K.E., and Tavani, T. (Eds.). The Handbook of Information and Computer Ethics. New Jersey: Wiley. Gander, K. (2015) BBC defends Syrian Journey game where player confront problems refugees face. Independent (April) 7. https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/ gadgets-and-tech/gaming/bbc-defends-syrian-journey-game-where-players-confrontproblems-refugees-face-10160831.html García-Ortega, A. and García-Avilés, J.A. (2018). Gamificación del contenido periodístico para mejorar el engagement: análisis de cuatro casos de éxito. In González-Esteban, J.L. and García-Avilés, J.A. (Eds.). Mediamorfosis: Radiografía de la Innovación en el Periodismo. Sociedad Española de Periodística, pp. 151–174. García-Ortega, A. and García-Avilés, J.A. (2020). When journalism and games intersect: examining news quality, design and mechanics of political newsgames. Convergence. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354856520918081 Golding, D. (2013). Videogames and politics: why was escape from woomera so divisive. ABC Arts (September 2). http://www.abc.net.au/arts/blog/Daniel-Golding/ videogames-politics-Escape-From-Woomera-130901

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

89

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

90

5  Quo Vadis, Newsgames? Ethical Boundaries Between Journalism and Games

Gómez, S. (2014). ¿Pueden los videojuegos cambiar el mundo? Una introducción a los serious games. Logroño: Unir Claves. Gómez-García, S. and Cabeza, J. (2016). The informative speech of newsgames: the “Bárcenas case” on games developed for mobile devices. Cuadernos.info, 38, 137–148. https://doi.org/10.7764/cdi.38.593 Grace, L. (2020). Doing Things with Games: Social Impact Through Play. Florida: CRC Press. Grace, L., Treanor, M., Totten, C., and McCoy, J. (2016). A case study in newsgame creation: why game designers and journalists are still learning to work together. Paper presented at International Communication Conference 2016, Fukuoaka, Japan, June 9–13. Herrero-Curiel, E. and Planells de la Maza, A.J. (2020). Nuevas narrativas periodísticas entre la información y la simulación lúdica: los docuwebs y los newsgames. Palabra Clave, 23(2). https://doi.org/10.5294/pacla.2020.23.2.5 Igartua, J.J., Acosta, T., and Frutos, F.J. (2009). Recepción e impacto del drama cinematográfico: el papel de la identificación con los personajes y la empatía. Global Media Journal, 6(11), 1–18. Kramer, M. (1995). Breakable rules for literary journalists. In Literary Journalism: A New Collection of the Best American Nonfiction, pp. 21–34. Kwong, R. (2019). Why emotional storytelling is the future of journalism. https:// robinkwong.com/storytelling Lambeth, E.B. (1986). Committed Journalism: An Ethic for the Profession. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Mañas Viniegra, L. (2018). Los newsgames. Análisis de su contenido gamificado por formatos periodísticos inmersivos. In Romero-Rodríguez, L.M. and TorresToukoumidis, A. (Eds.). Gamificación en iberoamérica. experiencias desde la comunicación y la educación. Ecuador: Abya Yala. Mañas-Viniegra, L., Zamith, F., and López-Cepeda, I. (2019). Newsgames, más allá de la información y la reputación corporativa: el caso the uber game. In Romero-Rodríguez, L.M. and Torres-Toukoumidis, A. (Eds.). Juegos y sociedad: Desde la interacción a la inmersión para el cambio social. México: McGraw Hill. McLuhan, M. (1996). Comprender los medios de comunicación: las extensiones del ser humano. Barcelona: Paidós. Meier, K. (2018). Journalism meets games: newsgames as a new digital genre. Theory, boundaries, utilization. Journal of Applied Journalism & Media Studies, 7(2), 429–444. Meyer, R. (2014). The New York Times' most popular story of 2013 was not an article. The Atlantic (January 17). Newsgaming. (2003). F.A.Q. http://newsgaming.com/faq.htm. Nicholls, S. (2003). Ruddock fury over Woomera computer game. The Age (April 30). Parkin, S. (2006). Darfur is dying. Entrevista con Susana Ruiz. Eurogamer.net (December 10). http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/i_darfurisdying_pc Peng, W., Lee, M., and Heeter, C. (2010). The effects of a serious game on role-taking and willingness to help. Journal of Communication, 60, 723–742. Plewe, C. and Fürsich, E. (2018). Are newsgames better journalism? Empathy, information and representation in games on refugees and migrants. Journalism Studies, 19(16), 2470–2487.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

Rojas-Torrijos, J.L. (2020). Gamification of sports media coverage: an infotainment approach to Olympics and football world cups. Communication and Society, 33(1), 29–44. Rosas, O. (2016). Emociones en la prensa digital española: actitudes profesionales y reflexiones éticas. In Álvarez, J.C. and Suárez-Villegas, J.C. (Eds.). Desafíos éticos en el periodismo digital. Madrid: Dykinson. Sales, D. and Payne, W. (2015). Fury at sick BBC flee Syria refugee game. The Sun (April 5). Sicart, M. (2008). Newsgames: theory and design. In Stevens, S.M. and Saldamarco, S. (Eds.). Proceedings of the International Conference on Entertainment Computing, pp. 27–33. Sicart, M. (2013). Beyond Choices: The Design of Ethical Gameplay. Cambridge: M.I.T. Press. Siitonen, M., Uotila, P., Uskali, T., Varsaluoma, J., and Välisalo, T. (2019). A pilot study on developing newsgames in collaboration between journalism and computer science students. Nordicom Review, 40(2), 143–155. Singer, J.B. (2007). Contested autonomy: professional and popular claims on journalistic norms. Journalism Studies, 8(1), 79–95. Stuart, K. (2013). News as games: immoral or the future of interactive journalism? The Guardian (January 11). Take Action Games. (2006). Darfur Is Dying. http://www.darfurisdying.com Treanor, M. and Mateas, M. (2009). Newsgames-procedural rhetoric meets political cartoons. In DiGRA ‘09—Proceedings of the 2009 DiGRA International Conference: Breaking New Ground: Innovation in Games, Play, Practice and Theory. Usher, N. (2014). Making News at the New York Times. Michigan: University of Michigan Press. Vobič, I., Dvoršak, L., and Vtič, M. (2014). Digital games and journalism. Teorija in Praksa, 51(1), 123–142. Ward, S.J.A. (2010). Global Journalism Ethics. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press. Warner, A. (2017). Fake It to Make It. https://www.fakeittomakeitgame.com Williams, B.A. and Carpini, M.X.D. (2020). The eroding boundaries between news and entertainment and what they mean for democratic politics. In The Routledge Handbook of Mass Media Ethics. London: Routledge.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

91

92

6 Guiding the Adoption of News Storytelling Design Through Ethics The Use of Stories in Google’s AMP Project Mariché Navío-Navarro and Laura González-Díez Universidad San Pablo-CEU, CEU Universities

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Introduction: Media and Market Context in Which AMP Stories Are Inserted In 2017, for the first time in Spain, the number of readers of journalistic information via social media platforms exceeded that of print media readers (AMI, 2017). More than 7 million consumers used tools such as Facebook or Twitter to access media content, a growing figure that was already half a million users ahead of that of printed newspapers. In 2019, the Reuters Institute Digital Report stated that 55% of Internet users worldwide would rather access news through platforms such as search engines, social media, or news aggregators (Newman et al., 2019). Therefore, this new form of information consumption has raised important questions for journalists and communicators, from the definition of news distribution and dissemination strategies to the way the information product itself is conceived. Formats change to become more digestible and adapted to the consumption patterns of these platforms; shorter items of news that are easier to scan and in which graphic and audiovisual components are increasingly important. Technical requirements influence the development of the journalistic process; the loading speed, the optimization of keywords, and making sharing easier for users, become important requirements. Click or interaction and engagement ratios are formulated as great objectives of each news content, which is measured autonomously, as an informative unit capable of being analyzed for its effectiveness in the different channels in which it is present. This context has meant an important race for big tech companies that, like Google or Facebook, have sought the key to position themselves, in the eye of the consumer, as the main way to access journalistic content. One of the first great challenges for them has been making these publications accessible through mobile devices. If the main search engine and the social networks receive most of their traffic from smartphones (We are social and Hootsuite, 2020), it is logical to think that improving the usability and design of the information pieces prepared to be consumed in these terminals is a necessary condition to gain audience loyalty. For users, one of the main barriers to accessing mobile content is its loading speed (An, 2017), since its lack of instantaneity can cause a high bounce rate. This is why

News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Introduction: Media and Market Context in Which AMP Stories Are Inserted

social networks and Google have developed a good number of initiatives that, when made available to the media, have sought to optimize mobile access and consumption of their content. In 2015, Facebook launched Instant Articles (IA), a tool that originally targeted big media and that allowed journalists to publish their news directly on the big social network. Up until then, Facebook was, for newspapers, just an additional way to disseminate content. Since these were hosted on their own websites, they only used the social network to create publications where the link to the original source was inserted. However, IA opened up the possibility of generating that content on Facebook directly, which left all that traffic within the social network. The added value for the reader is a clear improvement of the user experience, since IA entails, firstly, increased speed of access, as there is no waiting for the news to load in any browser. In addition, it enables the possibility of agile content sharing on the social network itself and produces a less annoying type of advertising design. For the media, Facebook Instant Articles is an extra effort in content generation, since more technical and human resources are needed to adapt the information piece to the tool, and to publish, manage, and analyze it. In exchange, they gain potential advantages: an audience made up of millions of Facebook users, the possibility of becoming viral, the publications’ social impact, and even opening up new forms of advertising revenue. These potential benefits, however, have not materialized in most cases, which has led to largely abandoning the functionality (Brown, 2018). Nonetheless, the social network’s effort to strengthen its position as a platform for information have not stopped, and the attempts to fight fake news are an example of this. Besides, in this race, Zuckerberg’s company witnesses how newspapers from all over the world transmit daily news using Instagram publications and stories, so that, either with one network or another, they continue to be one of the leading platforms in this race. But another technology giant, Google, has always lived up to the generation of initiatives that facilitate news reading and viewing on mobile devices. Also in 2015, the search engine, along with other technology companies and publishers around the world, announced the Accelerated Mobiles Pages (AMP) project. The initiative also sought to increase content loading speed on smartphones, although, this time, in the open Web. If Facebook was, for many media, a “walled garden” (Bloomberg News, 20171), AMP proposed an open source tool that provided, in principle, greater autonomy of content for newspapers. This way, the AMP Project allows media to generate lighter versions of their news that can be loaded almost instantaneously on mobile devices. Thus, when users find, on their smartphone and through the search engine, a news item associated with its AMP version, this will be highlighted on the results page with a lightning bolt icon. When accessing it, this visit will not be redirected to the usual story published in that media, but to its AMP version, which will load rapidly and will eliminate the site’s navigation elements and advertising that can be annoying. For newspapers and content creators around the world, this advantage, along with the rise of mobile SEO positioning criteria, has fostered the implementation of this technology as an essential asset. 1  In 2017, Kinsey Wilson, an adviser to Mark Thompson, president of The New York Times, stated that “Facebook’s environment is a Facebook-hosted walled garden” (Bloomberg News, 2017). In other words, Facebook’s environment is a walled garden hosted on the platform itself, which refers to the social network’s closed content as opposed to content on the open Web and indexed by Google.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

93

94

6  Guiding the Adoption of News Storytelling Design Through Ethics

The Accelerated Mobile Pages Project and the AMP Stories

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The evolution of the Accelerated Mobiles Pages project has focused lately not only on content loading speed on the smartphone but on the generation of tools that allow media to adapt their informative pieces to the type of content consumption that users carry out on their mobile devices today. In this context, the last steps of the project have focused on the launch of the so-called AMP Stories, fueled by the success of a story format that is typical of social media platforms such as Instagram and Snapchat. This format, which many have called “stamps” because this is the original name conceived for the functionality, grants media the possibility of telling their news through an eminently visual and full-screen storytelling. Multimedia information is designed on several frames or screens, as parts of an interactive timeline in which the narrative of the journalistic story unfolds through videos, images, graphics, music, and textual elements. The format is implemented using the AMP HTML language and is integrated into Google searches, within a special section called “Visual Stories.” As can be seen from Figure 6.1, when any user searches for a keyword that Google has indexed as an informative product in the form of a stamp, it appears on the results page so it can be easily accessed. AMP Stories is not an original release—not in its format, nor its disposition at the service of the publishers. Years before, Snapchat had created its Discover section, where those media associated to the social network also published their news with a visual language created and popularized among younger readers by Snapchat itself. CNN, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Times, or Le Monde, among many others, have produced, and in some cases still publish today, ephemeral stories specifically for Snapchat. Some, like NBC, have created large departments of 30  people devoted to producing news programs that are exclusive for this platform. The information here is eminently visual and accessible for a targeted audience that is halfway

Figure 6.1  How Google AMP works. Source: Vineetgupta.net (2017).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Ethical Codes That AMP Stories Put into Play

through the Gen Z and Millennial generations. For this reason, Snapchat already opened up the media to the possibility of promoting the attractiveness of informative content for those readers closely linked to communication on social networks, for whom fast, visual, and interactive consumption is an added value. In the words of journalist Alejandro Muñoz (2018): Millennials do have an interest in journalistic information, though they demand two conditions. Firstly, information must be presented in an attractive way. In a world riddled with visual stimuli, information must win the user’s right to attention, and millennials demand that their rules be applied in their world—may this be Snapchat, Instagram or another. (…) In any case, Snapchat’s information formats have redefined the old media slogan: teach, educate and entertain. Because it is indeed possible to teach in a captivating manner.2 (s.p) In a similar line of business, AMP Stories takes over Snapchat Discover to bring this practice of telling journalistic stories on the open Web. As opposed to its predecessor, the stamps are not limited only to the ecosystem of a particular social network, as was also the case with the news in Facebook Instant Articles, but can be embedded in any web or platform that allows them. In fact, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Pinterest allow publications generated with the AMP technology, which are also compatible with content managers (CMS) such as Wordpress or Joomla and e-commerce platforms such as Magento or Prestashop, among many others. Along with adapting to the demands of information consumption by younger readers, this could be what promotes the definitive implementation of this type of innovation and format in journalistic practice.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ethical Codes That AMP Stories Put into Play Information effectiveness is probably one of the main objectives to be served by technological innovation in the newspaper industry, at least from the ethical perspective of its study. Beyond corporate goals such as the scope or the amount of interactions, which will lead to greater or lesser income coming from advertising impacts, we defend that generating knowledge in the reader must be the ultimate goal of the information process. In this respect, incorporating new information technologies into newsrooms requires prior examination of the reality surrounding the innovation and its implications to determine if the viability of this transformation of the journalistic practice is not exclusively measured in economic terms but from the perspective of an efficient transmission of the message. News design plays an essential role here, since it determines how the page or screen is perceived by the reader “and influences their cognitive mechanisms of selective attention, information recall and understanding” (Suárez Carballo et al., 2014, p. 80).

2  Translator’s note: translated from the original in Spanish.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

95

96

6  Guiding the Adoption of News Storytelling Design Through Ethics

This information efficiency is based, as Casasús (1995, p. 62) points out, on “rigor and readability, on the truthfulness and the enjoyable topics; on accuracy and attractive headlines.” These characteristics, along with the inclusion of “short texts, informative graphics (infographics), quality color photographs that are purposeful and meaningful, and, ultimately, information presented with clarity and visual pleasantness,” define, according to Casasús, service journalism; a concept that emerges as a result of the interaction of several factors, such as the technological perks, the competition coming from new media, the configuration of a new reader profile, or the influences from contemporary aesthetics. As Micó et al. put it:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Information Ethics deems that it is fair to ask those in charge of helping us interpret the world—that is, journalists—to reflect on the technology they use to inform us and ask themselves whether or not their characteristics have an impact on the rhetoric of hypermedia that enables to fight for the truth today. This examination around technology, its possibilities and its limits, must constitute an unavoidable field within Deontology.3 (Micó et al., 2008, p. 15) But information efficiency, from the ethical perspective of its study, must also be addressed in terms of the influence that access to knowledge of reality has on democratic societies. Insofar as narratives and formats promote the accessibility of all audiences to the understanding of information, its processing and, therefore, the acquisition of knowledge, we get close to the idea of the Internet as an “agent of change” (Couldry, 2014; Sanz, 2014). The Internet, for authors like Alexander (2016, p. 7), liberates from the oppressive effects of the “anti-democratic, professional elite;” hence, when applied to the mass media, information breaks into the collective consciousness without the weight of the traditional press (Shirky, 2008). Gillmor (2004) portrays this media ecosystem as a world of “complacency and arrogance” that, due to the eruption of the digital press and the new formats, may switch toward a type of news production form conceived, this time, as a conversation. This is why getting the production of journalistic content closer to the codes, languages, and narratives typical of conversations among groups of people fosters a better understanding of the message. Democratization is promoted in this way, and it will also “contribute to the moral discourse that makes civil solidarity possible,” since it creates “assertions that everybody can hear and see” (Alexander, 2016, pp. 14–15). Barnhusrt and Muntz (1997) agree with this view when they refer to journalism not as a mere transmission of information but as an interpretation of it in a universalized manner that provides meaning to the facts. Thus, the story format of the stamps makes the message accessible to those audiences for whom audiovisual culture prevails. This follows, in our view, the route of the “next journalism” proposed by Kovach and Rosenstiel (2010), according to which journalism must empower citizens. The interactivity in news turned into stories generates an immersive narrative in which the audience feels an integral part of the informative process and not merely a passive audience. Moreover, this trait tallies with one of the

3  Translator’s note: translated from the original in Spanish.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Ethical Codes That AMP Stories Put into Play

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

five principles of cordial Ethics proposed by Cortina (2007), according to which ethics requires empowering people so that they become active agents of their own lives. In order to achieve this, the transmission of scientific culture is highlighted as an essential aspect. As can be seen from Figure 6.2, examples of effective transmission of messages through the stamp story format in La Vanguardia, the first Spanish newspaper to use it, or in a leading American newspaper The Washington Post, whose digital edition was recognized as the world’s best-designed by the Society for News Design (SND) in April 2020 (see Figure 6.3). When examining both examples, we can ask whether AMP, Instagram, or Snapchat story formats serve the purpose of improving the information process. The design of journalistic items for this new language is made according to the specific characteristics of the contents that have most interactions and sharing on the Internet. This ensures, at least, attracting the interest of the audience, which is the minimum initial condition for this process to get started. Stories help journalists to ensure both that the receiver’s attention is available and that the message is adapted to the channel and context in which it is transmitted. The question that may arise is whether social networks or Google, as channels, are adequate for disseminating and consuming news and other journalistic content. This type of reflections, however, has already been widely analyzed for other previous channels and formats that, like tele­ vision, continue to host journalistic material. Since the 1980s, television has been studied from a critical perspective for its promotion of infotainment, a type of content conceived by a good number of authors, not as a way to communicate culture but as an attack on it (Postman, 1991). The spectacularization of news and treating it as “an appealing merchandise” (Micó et al., 2008, p. 16) is a phenomenon that can also be observed in digital channels and has been referred to as one of the factors

Figure 6.2  Information published in La Vanguardia in a stamp story format. Source: La Vanguardia (March 20, 2020).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

97

98

6  Guiding the Adoption of News Storytelling Design Through Ethics

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Figure 6.3  Information published in The Washington Post in a stamp story format. Source: The Washington Post (July 17, 2020).

fostering the current loss of credibility in the media. It is thus necessary to question whether stamps are a format that promotes informative efficiency or, on the contrary, deteriorates both the users’ ability to be knowledgeable about news events and their trust in news editors. In this sense, different studies and essays have reflected, in the last decade, on the influence that the consumption of digital content and, subsequently, information and communication technologies have on the generation of knowledge. For authors, such as Nicholas Carr (2011), the neuroplasticity of the human brain causes the use of any technology to structurally change the person’s neural networks so they adapt to it. In the specific case of reading digitized information, features such as hypertext, an excess of information on the Internet, notifications from the apps we use, or the multimedia content layout itself had, for the author, significant impacts on our brain configuration. As long as we dedicate part of our cognitive capacity to continuously assess the never-ending informational stimuli that we receive through the Internet, the attention that we dedicate to the consumed content itself is significantly less. This leads, unconsciously, to a much more superficial acquisition of knowledge, which is why,

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ethical Codes That AMP Stories Put into Play

compared to reading printed items—which tend to be more carefully and deeply consumed—digital content generates a distracted and fragmented understanding of information. Hence, the analysis of the intellectual consequences of the AMP Stories format becomes a necessity for the ethics of journalism. Adapting news design to the digital technology requirements and, along with it, to the demands of the users of the Gen Z and Millennial generations imposes a narrative and a set of formats that are, in their initial conception, short, attention-grabbing pieces, with fragmented pills of interactive information, and expandable through hyperlinks. This requires producing stimuli constantly to attract users and make them surf the news through their different frames or key ideas. Moreover, it encourages non-attentive, fast, and shallow consumption. Should it, therefore, be considered whether the inclusion of stories in information dissemination strategies is really beneficial for the user, for the digital ecosystem, and for journalism? Thus, we could even ask whether the media must necessarily adapt to the requirements of social media platforms and Google, or whether, on the contrary, they should foster the transformation of these technological tools according to what journalism demands. In the first scenario, journalism would be at the mercy of big tech companies, whose main objective is to ensure their role as a gateway to access the content that users consume. For them, this requires to increase the dwell time, which leads to growing possibilities of inserting advertising and thus maintaining their business models. As for the second scenario, previous attempts to put pressure on tech companies have not always been beneficial for either journalism or readers. Let us recall the case of the withdrawal of Google News from Spain in light of the requirement to pay a tax in 2014 due to the Intellectual Property Law. For Google, paying the media for generating traffic for them through this functionality was unsustainable, so the most feasible option was to eliminate, for the first time ever in the whole world, this service for the Spanish users (El Mundo, 2014). According to a study by data analytics company Chartbeart, this meant a decrease of between 10% and 15% of traffic to digital newspapers (20  minutos, 2014), with estimated economic losses of up to 9 million euros per year in advertising for these newspapers (El Español, 2017). Regardless of a clear conclusion, steps have already been taken in both directions. In the specific case of Accelerated Mobile Pages, the amount of newspapers and magazines that experiment with stories increases worldwide and, at the same time—and from the initial stages of the project— the media are called to participate in the design and conceptualization of the technology itself. Therefore, the assessment of dangers for the autonomy of journalism as an institution is not, nevertheless, a debate that exclusively hinges upon digital technology. Television or radio, like any disruptive technology, have also been studied in this respect. As Alexander (2016, pp. 4–5) put it: Examining the upheavals created by television and cable reveals how the deep meaning structures of journalism construed new technology and economic organization as dire threats to journalistic integrity, anxieties that, paradoxically, actually helped maintain the independence of journalism in new organization forms. (…) The same combustible combination of enduring cultural

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

99

100

6  Guiding the Adoption of News Storytelling Design Through Ethics

structures and rapidly shifting technological and economic change is at work today, and how new platforms of journalistic work are being forged and engaged. Critical jeremiads against the profane, putatively anti-democratic effects on technology and economy should be seen less as accurate depictions than as spirited rallying cries to protect the sacred, and still robust, ethics of independent journalism. (Alexander, 2016, pp. 4–5)

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Changes in Journalistic Practices and Challenges in Professional Dynamics: Innovative Formats for the “Next Journalism” and the Principles of Ethics A more favorable review of the integration of these lighter formats could be made from the perspective of them being conceived as a kind of palliative solution to the overabundance of information that prevails in the Net. Given the massive amount of information that is published, where verification and rigor can be conspicuous by their absence, could the AMP Stories be positioned as a recipe for slow journalism? Unlike other formats, faster in their production, these stories require slower planning and design of the information, not only due to technical requirements but also due to aesthetic and informative efficiency. This could spur this set of formats if executed from an added value perspective: slower, more contextualized news, with an attention-to-detail design to transmit, with an accessible language, realities that are complex to the user. Scientific, cultural, and technological journalism could thus find an ally to penetrate segments of the audience that may be unfamiliar with this type of news. From our perspective, AMP Stories bring along a set of social effects that are similar to those of journalistic infographics, since they manage to reformulate the discourse and its format to bring complex realities closer to the audience. On the one hand, they can be used to tell a story or process that is difficult to understand through the text, so that they foster the understanding and application of the content (Rajamanickam, 2005). On the other hand, it maintains the information quality of any written news, since it involves a similar process of creation of the news item: from determining what needs to be communicated to taking decisions regarding how content can be efficiently structured (Ivars-Nicolás, 2019). As happens with any journalistic design decision, applying one format or narrative or another must be at the service of the transmission quality of the message. This adds news design, focused on attracting attention and improving cognitive processes for understanding the content, as a further task to the already-known functions of verification, accuracy, and contextualization. The aforesaid can position these narratives as a slow journalism formula, as opposed to a type of journalism focused on the amount that is produced, where speed prevails to massively generate news items. Thus, journalistic innovation, in the format that we are dealing with, becomes a tool that filters and concentrates the most important aspects of the entire news event and puts it at the service of the user. This opens up the possibility of becoming a source of additional material for other digital media covering that same news event. As opposed to the walled garden in which the story format is presented in other

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Changes in Journalistic Practices and Challenges in Professional Dynamics

closed social networks, stamps can include references and links that redirect the traffic and the narrative to other channels. This, in a way, enriches, if the user wishes, the experience and knowledge of the news and fulfils the maxim of the “next journalism” proposed by Kovach and Rosenstiel (2010), in which journalism is an intelligent aggregator. In its adaptability to social media, such as Twitter and LinkedIn or the main CMS in the market, AMP Stories can be embedded as integral parts of other information items or as publications themselves on social networks, allowing the interaction of audiences, and subsequently producing user generated content connected to the news story. Therefore, the stories format would also serve Cortina’s (2007) dialogical principle of ethics. In his own words:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

[The possibility of] getting further information and creating platforms for participation is an indispensable requirement to respect freedom and dignity, as well as the only way to arrive at the fairest decisions possible, but, in addition, it is a measure of prudence.4 (Cortina, 2007, p. 239) However, applying the discussed format to the functions of “next journalism” and the principles of Cortina’s ethics are not new to journalism but, rather, a way to boost its essential characteristics. As Kovach and Rosenstiel (2010) point out, journalism, far from becoming obsolete, is becoming increasingly complex. In this sense, the format’s technical complexity presents important challenges for journalism practitioners and media institutions themselves, since they need to know how to adapt to the new social demands. In order to do this, deep knowledge of the different formats will allow them to choose the most effective one to meet the communication objectives. This is why, according to the authors, the ability to detect which news elements are best suited to effectively transmit each story becomes increasingly relevant for journalists. This last need takes us to another key aspect in the review of this technology, which, from an ethical perspective, also has an influence on the professional practice of journalism. Communicators face a redefinition of the skills, knowledge, and competencies that they need to be able to do their job. Considering the time given, which is probably insufficient toward reinventing this sector of the labor market, most digital journalists have transited from an ecosystem where they produced purely textual pieces of information to a landscape dominated by video and, perhaps now, to the predominance of infographics, graphic narratives, and multimedia content. García-Avilés (2014) highlights the diversification of the journalistic product through multiple platforms, which, in our case, is clearly applicable to AMP stories. For this author, recent growth in media convergence strategies has enhanced journalists’ integration into single newsrooms or crossmedia synergies becoming necessary to foster success for those strategies. This means, as we see, important changes for the professional training of communicators, but also for the business organization chart in which they work. In Alexander’s (2016, p. 5) view, this is not to be conceived in terms of creative destruction but rather “as the culturally-informed reconstruction of new organizational forms.” As pointed out a propos of the AMP Stories, when any new technology or 4  Translator’s note: translated from the original in Spanish.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

101

102

6  Guiding the Adoption of News Storytelling Design Through Ethics

practice bursts into the newsrooms, it is usually perceived as a threat to professional journalism. This leads to a symbolic struggle between the codes attributed to traditional journalism and the new models of news production. As a result of this, the defenders of the so-called “professional journalism” bring up a series of cultural arguments regarding what should remain and what they consider ephemeral within the field of journalism (Breese and Luengo, 2016). In this way, among the ethical guidelines for online journalism (Poynter Institute, 2011) we find that values, such as democracy and community, may live on if the drastic transformations of the current changing media context are accepted. The values of journalism resist only if they are sustained on healthy economic bases for the media, which requires journalists to participate proactively and not reactively in the innovation process. Therefore, the mission of the media is not to focus their attention on the creation of products based on ephemeral technologies, but rather to find those transformations that really generate added value for the audience (González-Esteban and García-Avilés, 2018).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Conclusions and Next Lines of Research The launch of AMP Stories has brought along a proposal for journalism to adapt, on the open Web, its messages and news to the format and languages of the communication channels used mainly by the Gen Z and Millennial generations. In this sense, journalists face important professional and management challenges related to the information process. These will require them to reinvent themselves, reorganize their work structures to define transmedia dissemination strategies that are efficient, and question the implications that these technological innovations entail, from an ethical perspective, regarding the new role that society demands for digital journalism. AMP Stories are conceived from the beginning as a format for mobile devices where multimedia language combines infographics, videos, images, and short portions of text. This makes information messages more accessible and offers great possibilities for information effectiveness if approached from the perspective of sound ethical principles. Such effectiveness could lead to citizen empowerment and result in a flexible format that integrates different platforms, allowing the reader to adapt the news experience to their needs. Moreover, the adaptability of AMP HTML open source language allows its integration into several social networks and content managers, so that it can potentially act as a format that catalyzes users’ opinions. However, allowing this type of format in newsrooms without starting off from an ethical analysis may end up having negative consequences for both media and users. Readers could find in AMP Stories another kind of fragmented, shallow, and spectacularized information format that would foster the acquisition of superficial knowledge and its subsequent implications. As for the media, they could see how their dependence on big tech companies like Google increases, in addition to promoting a practice in which the obsolescence of qualified personnel becomes unsustainable. The main challenge, for academics and journalists, is researching toward a real measurement of the effectiveness of these formats. The objective is to test, in an unbiased way, whether or not AMP Stories improve the acquisition of knowledge, the understanding of the information context, and citizen’s participation in the public sphere.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

References

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References 20 minutos. (2014). Un estudio cifra en 15% la caída de tráfico de medios españoles tras el cierre de Google News. 20 minutos. https://www.20minutos.es/noticia/2326789/0/ medios-espanoles/pierden-15-trafico/google-news Alexander, J. (2016). Journalism, democratic culture, and creative reconstruction. In Alexander, J., Breese, E. B., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered. Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. AMI (2017). El Libro Blanco De La Información. Madrid: AMI. Asociación De Medios De Información. An, D. (2017). Descubre si la velocidad de carga de tus páginas web en móviles es la adecuada con las nuevas comparativas del sector. Think with Google. https://wwwthinkwithgoogle-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.thinkwithgoogle.com/intl/es-es/ canales-de-publicidad/movil/descubre-si-la-velocidad-de-carga-web-en-moviles-esadecuada/amp Barnhusrt, K. and Muntz, D. (1997). American journalism and the decline in eventcentered reporting. Journal of Communication, 47(4), 27–52. Bloomberg News. (2017). Google developing tools to boost news publishers’ subscriptions. The Telegraph. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2017/08/18/google-developingtools-boost-news-publishers-subscriptions Breese, E.B. and Luengo, M. (2016). News innovations and enduring commitments. In Alexander, J., Breese, E., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered. Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Brown, P. (2018). More than half of Facebook Instant Articles partners may have abandoned it. Columbia Journalism Review. https://www.cjr.org/tow_center/are-facebookinstant-articles-worth-it.php Carr, N. (2011). ¿Qué está haciendo internet con nuestras mentes? Superficiales. Madrid: Taurus. Casasús, J.M. (1995). Renovación tecnológica y diseño de un periódico nacional. In Comunicación y estudios Universitarios. 5, 59–69. Cortina, A. (2007). Ética de la razón cordial. Educar en la ciudadanía en el siglo XXI. Oviedo: Ediciones Nobel. Couldry, N. (2014). Citizen Bezos. New York Review of Books (July 10), 28–32. El Español. (2017). Los diarios digitales pierden 9 millones al año en publicidad por el fin de Google News. El Español. https://www.elespanol.com/invertia/empresas/ 20170519/217228417_0.html El Mundo. (2014). Google News cierra desde hoy en España. El Mundo. https://www. elmundo.es/tecnologia/2014/12/16/548f9448e2704eed688b458d.html García-Avilés, J.A. (2014). Online newsrooms as communities of practice: exploring digital journalists’ applied ethics. Journal of Mass Media Ethics: Exploring Questions of Media Morality, 29(4), 258–272. González Esteban, J.L and García-Avilés, J.A (coords.). (2018). Mediamorfosis. Radiografía de la innovación en el periodismo. Madrid: Sociedad Española de Periodística. http:// gicov.edu.umh.es/wp-content/uploads/sites/1344/2018/05/MEDIAMORFOSIS-WEB.pdf

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

103

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

104

6  Guiding the Adoption of News Storytelling Design Through Ethics

Gillmor, D. (2004). We the Media: grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People. Cambridge: O’Reilly. Ivars-Nicolás, B. (2019). La infografía periodística en España: definición y tipología de uso. Estudios Sobre El Mensaje Periodístico, 25(1), 283–302. https://doi.org/10.5209/ ESMP.63729 Kovach, B. and Rosenstiel, T. (2010). Blur. How to Know What’s True in the Age of Information Overload. New York: Bloomsbury. Micó, J.L., Canavilhas, J., Masip, P., and Ruiz, C. (2008). La ética en el ejercicio del perio­ dismo: credibilidad y autorregulación en la era del periodismo en Internet. Estudos Em Comunicação, 4, 15–39. http://www.ec.ubi.pt/ec/04/pdf/02-Jose-Lluis-Mico-La-etica-enel-ejercicio-del-periodismo.pdf. Muñoz, A. (2018). Periodismo en una red social de selfis. Telos. https://telos.fundaciontelefonica. com/snapchat-periodismo-una-red-social-selfis Newman, N., Fletcher, R., Kalogeropoulos, A., and Nielsen, R.K. (2019). Reuters institute digital report. https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/inline-files/ DNR_2019_FINAL.pdf Postman, N. (1991). Divertirse hasta morir. El discurso público en la era del show business. Barcelona: Ediciones de la Tempestad. Poynter Institute. (2011). Conjunto de guías éticas para hacer periodismo en la web. https:// knightcenter.utexas.edu/guias_eticas_SPANISH_2011.pdf Rajamanickam. (2005). Infographics seminar handout. http://www.schrockguide.net/ uploads/3/9/2/2/392267/infographic_handout.pdf Sanz, E. (2014). Open governments and their cultural transitions. Public Administration and Information Technology, 4, 1–15. Shirky, C. (2008). Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations. New York: Penguin. Suárez Carballo, F., Martín San Román, J.R., and Nó Sánchez, J. (2014). La hiperfragmen­ tación informativa en el Diseño Periodístico Impreso: propuesta metodológica y análisis de repercusiones cognitivas. Icono 14, 12, 63–104. https://doi.org/10.7195/ri14.v12i1.627. Vineetgupta.net. (2017). Google accelerated mobile page (amp): a passing fancy or here to stay? Vineetgupta.net. https://www.vineetgupta.net/google-accelerated-mobile-pages We are social and Hootsuite. (2020). Digital 2020 en España. https://wearesocial.com/es/ blog/2020/02/digital-2020-en-espana

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

105

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Interrogating Data, Algorithms, and Automatization Through Journalism Ethics

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved. News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

107

7 Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation What the Panama Papers Have Taught Us About Ethics Helena Cortés and María Luengo

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

“Hello. This is John Doe, interested in data? I would be happy to share,” an anonymous source asked the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung in late 2015. “We are very interested,” they answered. “There are a couple of conditions. My life is in danger. We will only chat over encrypted files. No meeting ever. The choice of stories is obviously up to you.”1 This short conversation was the beginning of the biggest leak of inside information in history: 2.6 terabytes of data from Mossack Fonseca, a little-known but powerful law firm based in Panama. The firm has offices in more than 35 locations around the globe, and it is one of the world’s top creators of shell companies, corporate structures that can be used to hide ownership of assets. Süddeutsche Zeitung, together with The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which comprises more than a 100 other media partners from 80 countries, spent a year sifting through 11.5 million leaked files to expose offshore holdings of world political leaders, powerful figures’ links to global scandals, and details of the hidden financial dealings of fraudsters, drug traffickers, billionaires, celebrities, and other figures besides. On March 3, 2016, they started to disclose the results of the investigations, which caused political resignations, such as those of Iceland’s prime minister and Spain’s minister of industry, and triggered economic and legal consequences that are still playing out in the courts today. At least 82 countries have been investigating illegal tax evasion brought to light thanks to the Panama Papers. Moreover, tax authorities have recouped more than 1.2 billion dollars. But the Panama Papers did more than merely reveal key information about how powerful companies, politicians, and celebrities had been evading or avoiding taxes. They prompted a long reflection process within journalism about the ways in which journalists deal with leaks and massive data sets, and they made both journalists and politicians reflect on how they approach transparency and privacy. As Süddeutsche Zeitung investigative reporters Alexander Mühlauer, Frederik Obermaier, and Vanessa Wormer commented a year later, “At the very least, in

1  Obermaier, F., Obermayer, B., Wormer, V., and Jaschensky, W. (April 4, 2016). About the Panama Papers. Süddeutsche Zeitung. Retrieved from: https://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/56febff 0a1bb8d3c3495adf4. News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

108

7  Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation

many countries the Panama Papers have sparked a debate about what is acceptable behavior for a politician and what isn’t, how much transparency is necessary, and how much is problematic.”2 Investigative and data journalism are not cheap; they are even considered a luxury in many newsrooms today. In 2018, 37,900 people worked as reporters, editors, photographers, or film editors in the US newspaper industry—a fall of 47% compared to the figure for 2004. The media outlets that chose to bring the Panama Papers to the public’s attention were a combination of major legacy news organizations such as The Guardian (United Kingdom), The Washington Post (United States), Le Monde (France), and L’Expresso (Italy), and native digital outlets such as El Confidencial (Spain) and IDL Reporteros (Peru). In addition to their publishing details of the offshore business dealings of politicians, big companies, artists, and sportspeople, all of these titles ran opinion pieces asserting the importance of transparency, investigation, cooperation, and reliability of sources, ethical values that have guided (or should have guided) journalism practice for decades. This chapter analyzes the way in which legacy and new journalistic organizations from different media cultures raised ethical concerns about the Panama Papers and how, even in the era of digitization and massive data sets, the traditional ideals and values of reporting still guide new forms of collaborative investigative journalism.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

How Ethical Approaches to Data Have Changed Newsrooms Big data—in other words, the capacity to process, analyze, and draw conclusions from massive data sets—has broken into politics, the economy, civil society, and, of course, journalism. This shift toward working with quantitative data is not new—as far back as in 1973, Philip Meyer argued that social science methods could and should be used in gathering news—but it has been empowered by the development of new technologies (Meyer, 1973). He is considered the father of CAR (computer-assisted reporting), which refers to the incorporation of computers into newsrooms in order to process huge volumes of data. As Wormer (2007) has put it, “Only the combination of powerful computers and the World Wide Web has offered the possibility of storing and analyzing (or generating by web robots) big databases in order to discover ideas for a story or to add facts and proofs to a story which has already been initially investigated by classical journalistic means.” In the twenty-first century, the term “CAR” has become obsolete and has been replaced by “data journalism” (Dader, 1997), which puts technology at the center of the debate by positioning its computers and online tools as the main way of doing investigative reporting (Coddington, 2015). Without technology, the 378 journalists who investigated the Panama Papers—their work is an example of an extensive and investigative form of data journalism, according to Eddy Borges’s classification

2  Mühlauer, A., Obermaier, F., and Wormer, W. (4 April 4,016). Shedding light on the grey areas. Süddeutsche Zeitung. Retrieved from: https://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/e329109.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

How Ethical Approaches to Data Have Changed Newsrooms

(2016)—could have neither processed 11.5 million documents nor even shared their progress. In addition, data journalism places more emphasis on visualization tools. Sometimes, as in the case of the Panama Papers, charts are the only way of understanding complex ideas and connections. Data journalism is based on three fundamental pillars: the development of technology, the use of new journalistic practices (for example, mathematical know­ ledge, the ability to find data sets on the deep web and request data from government bodies, and competence in cleaning up data), and the participation and involvement of civil society, which is becoming increasingly aware of the importance of open data to governance (Martinisi, 2013; Parasie and Dagiral, 2013; Cohen et al., 2011). Borges (2016, p. 842) points out that “data journalism uses methods reinforced by values such as numeric infallibility, scientific rigor, computational neutrality, crowdsourced collaboration, intra- and extra newsroom cooperation and hyperlocal empathy, to generate exclusives that are generally perceived as more accurate and transparent.” However, as the implementation of data journalism in newsrooms has become more widespread, some voices have been calling into question the perception that data journalism is always neutral and transparent and calling for a reconsideration of the overall consequences of big-data practices on democracy and society (Boyd and Crawford, 2012). Westlund and Lewis (2017, p. 447) have observed that “big data is a social, cultural, and technological phenomenon—a complex amalgamation of digital data abundance, emerging analytic techniques, mythology about data-driven insights about the overall consequences of big-data practices for democracy and society.” According to Lewis (2015), there are three important areas of concern in relation to data journalism: data transparency and quality, social science research ethics, and the inscription of values into technological systems. Regarding transparency, in Western countries, the accessibility to public data is protected by law. In the United States, for example, journalists can ask for information from any public institution thanks to the Freedom of Information Act. In the European Union, Directive 2003/98/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of November 17, 2003, guarantees the right of citizens to access public institutions’ information. Nevertheless, open data cannot always be used without subjecting it to prior processing. “Much of the time, government data is often ‘dirty,’ with missing metadata, incorrect fields, or gaps in collection. Journalists have to extract data from PDFs, validate it, and clean up data sets to make them usable in applications, report it out, and then present it in context,” as Howard (2014, p. 64) has pointed out. Anderson (2012) explains that the ability to work with data depends on both the digital tools available in each newsroom and the public institutions that offer open access to information. As a rule, data sets cannot be released in raw form, because they contain personal or private information. Indeed, governments and public institutions sometimes make this point in order to avoid giving journalists the information they are looking for (LaFleur, 2014). On May 9, 2016, the ICIJ decided to publish a searchable data set that strips away the secrecy of nearly 214,000 offshore entities. The consortium did not publish the totality of the leak to avoid disclosing raw documents or personal information en masse. As the ICIJ explained on its blog, “The database contains a great

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

109

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

110

7  Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation

deal of information about company owners, proxies and intermediaries in secrecy jurisdictions, but it doesn’t disclose bank accounts, email exchanges and financial transactions contained in the documents.”3 The principle that guided the selection of the information published was “public interest,” as we will show below in the empirical analysis of the case. Mossack Fonseca urged the ICIJ to cease and desist prior to the leak online, but the consortium moved ahead with the release. Mossack Fonseca then announced a lawsuit against the publisher. “The Consortium has forced us to start aggressive legal action to protect ourselves from acts such as these, which, since they are crimes, must be taken to the proper bodies for due process,”4 the company said in a statement. Meanwhile, the decision not to release the whole leak for ethical reasons aroused the indignation of Wikileaks, whose leadership argued in a Tweet that the ICIJ was not as committed to transparency as the organization claimed it was: “If you censor more than 99% of the documents you are engaged in 1% journalism by definition.” In terms of journalism ethics, Boyd and Crawford (2012) express concern about information security and the privacy of the source and the people who, for good or ill, are subjects of the data. As they observe, “Journalists must weigh the benefits of open data against the risks of personal harm that may come with publication, particularly at a time when private information can be so easily shared and searched” (Howard, 2014, quoted in Lewis and Westlund, 2015, p. 461). “John Doe,” the source that leaked Panama Papers to the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, argued in a manifesto published on May 6 in all media outlets that investigated the leak that he did not work for any government or intelligence agency, and that he did not offer this information to the press “for any specific political purpose,” but simply because he understood enough about the data’s content “to realize the scale of the injustices they described.” Therefore, he called for immunity for those who risk their lives publishing information on “massive and pervasive corruption.” He said, “I have watched as one after another, whistleblowers and activists in the United States and Europe have had their lives destroyed by the circumstances they find themselves in after shining a light on obvious wrongdoing,” using Edward Snowden (Wikileaks), Bradley Birkenfeld (Swiss Leaks), and Antoine Deltour (Luxembourg Leaks) as examples. “And there are plenty more examples,” he added.5 Süddeutsche Zeitung even rejected a resolution that was passed by the Bundesrat, the Berlin-based legislative body that represents Germany’s 16 federal states, to demand full access to the Panama Papers. The publication argued that the life of the newspaper’s source was more important than the interest of the state in prosecuting possible crimes. “Süddeutsche Zeitung will not make the

3  Wakler, M. (May 9, 2016). ICIJ Releases Panama Papers Offshore Company Data. ICIJ. Org. Retrieved from: https://www.icij.org/blog/2016/05/icij-releases-panama-papers-offshore-companydata. 4  Mossack Fonseca (April 3, 2016). Mossack Fonseca’s response to the Panama Papers. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/03/mossack-fonsecasresponse-to-the-panama-papers. 5  John Doe (2016). Manifesto. Süddeutsche Zeitung.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

How Ethical Approaches to Data Have Changed Newsrooms

Panama Papers data available to the tax authorities and prosecutors,” its editorsin-chief said in a statement. “Our source supplied us with these documents expressly for journalistic use, on condition that we commit in absolute terms to protecting the source’s identity. If we did not do so, this person’s life would be in danger,” they added. Data manipulation is another controversial issue associated with journalistic reporting that involves the use of big data. In line with the basic principles of interpreting data, journalists should avoid creating trends and patterns that are not clearly inferred from data. Data are just statistics, and they may be interpreted in more than one way, as Elías (2015) argues. In other words, he concludes, journalists may have access to a data set, but that data set may not contain a pattern that supports a headline or a news item. Big data itself does not create a more transparent society. According to Lewis and Westlund, (2015), “We think of big data as neither good nor bad for journalism. Rather, it is freighted with equal parts potential and pitfall, depending on how it is imagined and implemented—and, crucially, towards what purposes and in whose interests.” Automated journalism represents the most recent manifestation of big data’s arrival in newsrooms. This type of journalism is an aspect of the shift “from reporting tool to the generation of news content” that use of data has undergone (Carlson, 2015, p. 419). This new practice raises debates about human resources, law, and ethics. As Carlson (2015, p. 429) comments,

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

At the positive end of the spectrum, the growth of automated journalism greatly expands the amount of available news and frees up journalists to pursue less mechanical stories. The technology also aids journalism as a smart system capable of finding patterns easily missed by human perception. Conversely, negative predictions include increased layoffs, polarizing personalization, and the commoditization of news writing. A large-scale implementation of data journalism in newsrooms may be restricted by a lack of resources such as time, tools, manpower, and the financial means and expertise required to appeal against denials of requests for data (Fink and Anderson, 2015). Some scholars such as Solop and Wonders (2016) take the view that issues related to the organization of the newsroom, the behavior and structure of the market, and the power of government have curbed the development of data journalism. Despite journalists’ euphoria over the ideas and projects that data journalism allows them to develop, they soon realized that it is quite difficult to incorporate data journalism’s routines into their daily work (Manovich, 2011), owing to the presence of established routines or a lack of time, people, and institutional or structural support, among other factors. Under such circumstances, data journalism becomes reduced to the production of charts: “If news organizations do not explicitly disregard data journalism, they clearly consider it as a low priority. As a result, we see the emergence of a loose commitment and the original ambitions are revised downwards by sometimes radically widening the scope of what counts as data journalism: the production of slightly enhanced charts and visualizations” (De Maeyer et al., 2015, p. 444).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

111

112

7  Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation

In addition, the use of big data can perpetuate gender biases. Working with data requires knowledge of mathematics, computer engineering, and statistics—areas, unlike journalism, in which women are still a minority. Other skeptical voices consider there to be no clear connection between data journalism and a more participative and plural society (Kreiss, 2016). Kreiss argues that readers feel more involved with news when they go beyond data and opt for a critical and analytical view. The best version of data journalism—that guided by ethical principles—can contribute to democracy in three ways. It can strengthen journalistic objectivity by ensuring that stories are supported by quantitative evidence; it can offer news media organizations new tools for enforcing government accountability; and it can increase citizens’ participation by giving them, through their own access to the relevant data, the opportunity to decide if those data support the journalist’s own conclusion (Parasie and Dagiral, 2013). The Panama Papers investigation fulfilled all three characteristics, and, as we will show below, it represents a step forward in the story of data journalism owing to its combining a massive and relevant leak with the cooperative work of hundreds of journalists whose reporting was guided by professional journalism’s core values.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Analysis In order to draw conclusions from the media discourse about the Panama Papers, we analyzed all the news reports, editorials, and opinion pieces arising from the Pulitzerwinning investigation that were published in four newspapers that worked with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalism (ICIJ): The Guardian (the United Kingdom), The New York Times (the United States), La Nación (Argentina), and El Confidencial (Spain). The selected media organizations, which were the biggest publications that were involved in the investigation in their respective countries, come from a range of journalistic cultures or media systems, as these are defined by Hallin and Mancini (2011): the Mediterranean or polarized pluralist model6 (Spain), the North Atlantic or liberal model7 (the United States and the United Kingdom), and models beyond the Western world (Argentina). The main purpose of this study is to confirm how the Panama Papers, the biggest leak in history at the time, led to changes in the way in which the media works with activists, who became a new source and to whom all the ethical principles that also guide traditional journalism were applied. In what follows, a metadiscursive analysis will be carried out on the basis of the narrative analysis principles of grounded theory (Corbin and Strauss, 1990). We selected all articles tagged as “Panama Papers” and all those contained in the dedicated sections produced by each newspaper between April 3, 2016, the day when newspapers started to publish information about the disclosure, and May 11, 2016, when the ICIJ decided to publish a version of the Panama 6  In this system, there is low newspaper circulation, strong state intervention, high political parallelism, external pluralism, and politically-oriented content, among other characteristics. 7  Media in this system are market dominated, newspapers have mid-range circulation levels, and there is a neutral commercial press.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Ethical Debates on Sources: Journalism Stands for Public Interest

Papers database from which private information had been removed. As a consequence of that decision, Mossack Fonseca announced its intention to pursue legal action against the ICIJ. We examined how media discourses in the different newspapers were constructed through the most salient ethical categories. These categories relate to: (1) dealings with sources; (2) transparency; (3) collaboration between journalistic organizations; (4) the watchdog function of journalism; and (5) the value of proximity.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ethical Debates on Sources: Journalism Stands for Public Interest One of the first debates that Süddeutsche Zeitung had to face was whether it should trust the information provided by an anonymous source who demanded “absolute anonymity along the whole process.” Here, Wolfgang Krach, editor in chief of the German newspaper, indicates that he and his colleagues let themselves be guided by one of the main characteristics of news: public interest: “Together with their partners, Süddeutsche Zeitung checked and compared thousands of documents John Doe had delivered to us. We double cross-examined with other publications and documents or files from lawsuits. Not in a single case there were any doubts. And the public interest here is obvious: The secrets of the Panama Papers need to be revealed.”8 The Guardian, El Confidencial, and La Nación were partners of Süddeutsche Zeitung in the investigation, so they also agreed to make use of the source’s documents, at all times interrogating the data he provided and comparing or contrasting them with information from other databases, such as Interpol’s list of wanted persons and European and US sanctions orders. This approach was described in a detailed “making of” article9 that was published in The Guardian. At the time when the leak was made public, The New York Times was not working with the ICIJ. On April 3, 2016, when some of the biggest news outlets across the world dedicated their front pages to the international scoop of the Panama Papers, editors at The New York Times were faced with an ethical dilemma over whether or not they should trust the information provided by other newspapers. The title’s deputy executive editor, Matt Purdy, addressed this issue in a special section on the Panama Papers that answered readers’ questions, one of which focused on why the paper had not mentioned the topic on its front page: “Times editors believe that they owe it to their readers to do their own evaluation of the material. And that is happening now. … We didn’t have access to the documents, and that is a very big issue. … This is a great trove of documents—certainly interesting and valuable—and it takes a while to know what to make of them,” he said.10

8  Krach, W. (April 4, 2016). What needs to be revealed. Süddeutsche Zeitung. Retrieved from: https:// panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/5703bed9a1bb8d3c3495b668. 9  Garside, J. (April 16, 2016). Panama Papers: inside The Guardian’s investigation into offshore secrets. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/16/panamapapers-inside-the-guardians-investigation-into-offshore-secrets. 10  https://publiceditor.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/04/04/why-no-big-splash-for-panamapapers/?searchResultPosition=6.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

113

114

7  Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Panama Papers leak had another particularity; it was almost impossible to confirm the whole story in a few hours. According to Purdy, “This was not a case of a single-fact story that we could simply confirm and go with. This was a case where hundreds of reporters had been working on it for a long time.” However, reporters and editors worked on a follow-up article that was published the day after, on April 4, 2016, and concerned the calls for the resignation of the prime minister of Iceland owing to his relationship with offshore shell companies. Purdy stated that the newspaper’s strategy was one of “integrating it with our own reporting” and stressed the paper’s unwavering commitment to comparing sources. Asked about why the newspaper did not take part in the investigation, Marina Walker, the deputy director of the ICIJ at that time, said that not all news organizations are suited to the “radical sharing” of information that these kinds of investigation require. The New York Times was quick to grasp the importance of the leak and devoted an article to the insights of the investigation started by the German reporters Obermayer and Obermaier, detailing even the search program that they used to hunt for specific names or business: Blacklight. As the exemplary value of comparing sources guided the job of reporters assigned to the Panama Papers, The Guardian also published Mossack Fonseca’ reaction. Among the four publications analyzed in this study, the British newspaper was the title that placed the most emphasis on the allegations made by the law firm, publishing its complete response. This raises another interesting question for future debates: Can the media publish information that has been obtained illegally? In its response to the media, Mossack Fonseca threatened to take legal action based on its own answer to that question: We will not answer any questions related to private information regarding our company founding partners as we do not see the public interest behind said inquiries. Likewise, we will not make any reference to the statistics and other “factual” information about numbers and amounts since they are far from being accurate. … You may consider this document as our response. However, it should not be considered as a validation of the information contained therein, and especially to [sic] the method by which said information was obtained. It appears that you have had unauthorized access to proprietary documents and information taken from our company and have presented and interpreted them out of context. We trust that you are fully aware that using information/documentation unlawfully obtained is a crime, and we will not hesitate to pursue all available criminal and civil remedies.11 Gerard Ryle, the director of the ICIJ office in Washington, told The Washington Post that he did not know if the data had been obtained through hacking. But the discussion then came back to newsrooms’ top priority: “Is an issue of global concern? Yes.” 11  Mossak Fonseca (April 3, 2016). Mossack Fonseca’s response to the Panama Papers. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/03/mossack-fonsecas-response-tothe-panama-papers.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Data Transparency and Journalists’ Ability to Hold Power to Account

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Data Transparency and Journalists’ Ability to Hold Power to Account Among the analyzed media, El Confidencial and La Nación considered transparency to be a value that has to be a priority for politicians. For that reason, the Spanish digital newspaper welcomed the resignation of José Manuel Soria, Spain’s minister of industry, after his relationship with the law firm specialized in offshore companies was revealed. “Soria’s resignation of is not related to a criminal offense, or even with irregularities perpetrated by him or his family. Democracy is the political option of the public opinion, and when a politician lies or silences the truth, he has to quit. Otherwise, we would be in a period of stagnation of public duties inconsistent with values protected by our Constitution,”12 stated El Confidencial’s opinions blog Columna Capital. On the other side of the Atlantic, La Nación also called for transparency in some of its editorials criticizing Mauricio Macri and his involvement in offshore companies. The Argentinian newspaper focused much of its coverage of the Panama Papers on the country’s president. “Transparency has been deeply devalued in recent days, not only in Argentina, but across the world. After the revelation of the Panama Papers, which link some presidents and prime ministers with offshore companies, a lot of governments have suffered damage to their credibility. … The problem is that the Panama Papers affair has swept away the value of transparency, and it is a storm that is difficult to face.”13 The Guardian devoted some articles to the link between Panama Papers and the family of David  Cameron, then the British prime minister. His father had an offshore company in Panama, and he contacted Mossack Fonseca to move the company to another location. By 2012, when David Cameron was already the leader of the Tories, the firm was based in Ireland. Some editorials encouraged him to explain the situation of the shell companies owned by his father at that time and not to dismiss the matter by characterizing it as being about “private issues:” “Neither this argument nor any other is going to resonate until the prime minister can again make himself sound like a man who wants to open up the whole offshore question, instead of closing it down.”14 As regards transparency, both The Guardian and The New York Times published articles highlighting the importance of leaks to current investigative journalism. They argued that modern societies could not have monitored the behavior of corporations that operate in the shadows and avoid paying taxes. In the era of big data, the new development, as the American newspaper pointed out, is that such information sometimes comes from activists.

12  Columna Capital (April 15, 2016). Por qué Soria tenía que dimitir y ha dimitido. El Confidencial. Retrieved from: https://blogs.elconfidencial.com/economia/columna-capital/2016-04-15/por-quesoria-tiene-que-dimitir-ya-sin-esperar-un-minuto-mas_1184172. 13  Dinatale, Martin (April 6, 2016). Devaluación de la transparencia. La Nación. Retrieved from: https://preview.lanacion.com.ar/opinion/devaluacion-de-la-transparencia-nid1886632. 14  Editorial. (April 6, 2016). The Guardian view on David Cameron: off-message on offshore. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/06/the-guardianview-on-david-cameron-off-message-on-offshore.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

115

116

7  Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The leak signaled something else that was a big deal but went unheralded: The official WikiLeaks-ization of mainstream journalism—the next step in the tentative merger between the Fourth Estate, with its relatively restrained conventional journalists, and the Fifth Estate, with the push-the-limits ethos of its blogger, hacker, and journo-activist cohort, in the era of gargantuan data breaches.15 Although journalistic criteria guided the publication of the Panama Papers more so than they did the publication activities that Wikileaks had undertaken in the years immediately beforehand, Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times at the time, argued that the investigation of 2011 represented “some kind of cosmic triumph of transparency.” As the ICIJ and its partners noted, there is another essential difference between the approach taken by Wikileaks and that taken by the newspapers involved in the Panama Papers investigation: the latter did not publish all the documents of the leak in unredacted form. Instead, they made an extra careful effort to avoid the release of “personal information of nonpublic figures, playing a gatekeeper role,” as The New York Times stated in an article in its media section. As El Confidencial indicated on May 9 in an article about the Panama Papers database as it relates to Spain, the information about 1,200 corporations, 558 shareholders, 166 intermediaries, and 89 beneficiaries or stakeholders is just a part of the 2.6 TB of documents from the leak. The publication argued, “Among [the documents] there are passports, banks accounts, notarial information, and certificates of incorporation. The search engine launched today does not offer access to these classified documents,” highlighting the importance of not revealing personal information that is not related to the public interest. The publication of part of the database—with restrictions—was harshly criticized by Mossack Fonseca, which announced that it would take legal action against the ICIJ for having taken that step. “As a responsible firm that respects press freedom, we have sought to engage in communication to avoid legal proceedings. However, because it has ignored our ‘cease and desist’ letter, the consortium is forcing us to take forceful legal proceedings to protect ourselves from such acts,” Mossack Fonseca said in a statement. “The use of private and stolen information is an offence in all countries where we operated.”16

Collaboration Between Media: The Importance of Sharing If transparency was an essential condition in facilitating the Panama Papers investigation, so too was cooperation. As the ICIJ acknowledged when it addressed the nonparticipation of The New York Times in the investigation, the model of “radical sharing” is

15  Rutenberg, J. (April 10, 2016). Panama Papers signals a shift in mainstream journalism. The News York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/11/business/media/panama-papers-leak-signals-ashift-in-mainstream-journalism.html. 16  El Confidencial (May 11, 2016). Mossack Fonseca demandará al consorcio de periodistas que investigó los papeles de Panamá. El Confidencial. Retrieved from: https://www.elconfidencial.com/ economia/papeles-panama/2016-05-11/mossack-fonseca-acciones-legales-papeles-panama-consorciointernacional-periodistas-investigacion_1198141.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

The Professionalization of “Leaktivism” and Social Change

not suited to all newspapers. Titles that participate in such international investigations cannot put aside any material to produce exclusives for themselves, and they need to agree on embargo dates. One year later, when The New York Times was working on the Paradise Papers leak, the reporter Michael Forsythe talked about the difference between being and not being part of the investigation. He noted that, in the case of the Panama Papers, “Like many reporters here, I spent a lot of time scrambling to make sense of what the I.C.I.J. had uncovered, writing follow-on stories. Breathing fumes.” However, when one year later he was sharing information with 400 colleagues (“new friends”) as part of the Paradise Papers, they realized how important sharing information is to investigations in the era of globalization: “Early on, just as the first documents were becoming searchable through the I.C.I.J.’s sophisticated in-house system, it became apparent just how much we would have to relearn journalistic habits acquired over decades of reporting. We would have to learn how to share.”17 Nacho Cardero, editor in chief of El Confidencial, noted that the Panama Papers investigation started “the day we realized that unity makes strength.” As he explained, “In a world with so many political interests and economic dependency, where there are so many voices that want to talk but cannot, where there are people who want to listen but are restrained from doing so, where investigative journalism is expensive and unaffordable, where technology makes distances shorter and information travels all over the world at the speed of light, … cooperation is becoming a key aspect for future journalism.”18 According to Cardero, the media partners involved heralded the “journalistic cooperation” that characterized this new way of working, which involved collaboration with hundreds of contributors from all over the world, with tight security measures and without any leaking. Such collaborative work may also be a way for newsrooms that have fewer and fewer journalists to avoid giving up on investigation work.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Professionalization of “Leaktivism” and Social Change In 2011, Wikileaks showed digital activism’s potential to revolutionize politics and society. Anyone with access to key information can become a whistleblower and a potential threat to those who try to take advantage of the global economic order. However, publishing raw data online, as Wikileaks did, without professional filtering performed by journalists, can pose a threat to national security, and even to certain people. “In their carefully constructed stories with WikiLeaks, The Times, The Guardian, and other partners redacted the names of sensitive sources mentioned in the documents. But later, some WikiLeaks-held reports spilled out online

17  Forsythe, M. (November 6, 2017). Scouring the Paradise Papers, With the Help of Almost 400 New Friends. The New York Times. Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/06/insider/ paradise-papers-appleby-leak-icij.html. 18  Cardero, N. (April 11, 2016). Los papeles de Panamá y el papel de la prensa independiente: el ‘making of’. El Confidencial. https://blogs.elconfidencial.com/espana/caza-mayor/2016-04-11/lospapeles-de-panama-y-el-papel-de-la-prensa-independiente-el-making-of_1181507.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

117

118

7  Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation

with names of sensitive sources, drawing accusations that lives were put at risk,”19 Rutenberg explained in The New York Times, where he pointed out the shift that the Panama Papers represented in this regard; the risks of leaktivism were minimized thanks to a filter of journalism operating based on the public interest. Nowadays, when there are more eyes then ever watching people and corporations dominate global governance, journalism is still necessary to select, organize, and disseminate news stories contained in massive data, while also minimizing invasions of privacy and disclosures of information affecting states’ security. In an opinion article in The Guardian, Richard Brooks, a former tax inspector, said, “The recent series of leaks poses a more potent threat: anybody contemplating hiding income offshore must now factor in the risk that many years later the details could make their way from an office such as Mossack  Fonseca’s into the wider world”.20 In a similar vein, Simon Jenkins, a columnist at the same newspaper, argued that “the instigator is that musketeer of the digital age, the whistleblower. But even the whistleblower depends on the press.” For this reason, the Panama Papers investigation represents a step forward in “leaktivism” and also a unique opportunity to test the effectiveness of the collaborative union of the Fourth Estate (the media) and the Fifth Estate (leakers and whistleblowers). This is what Micah White, cofounder of Occupy, argued in a column published in The Guardian and The New York Times, in which he places greater emphasis on the power of the media, even in this era of leaks:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Panama Papers is arguably the perfect leak. First of all, the size is sublime: over 40 years of records, 11.5m files and 2.6 terabytes of data from the world’s fourth largest offshore law firm. This is a full leak, a leak that dwarfs all previous leaks in human history. Second, the Panama Papers are being dissected via an unprecedented collaboration between hundreds of highly credible international journalists who have been working secretly for a year. This is the global professionalization of leaktivism. The days of WikiLeaks amateurism are over. The beauty of the Panama Papers is that the leak makes it abundantly clear that the people in every country face the same globalized enemy.21 However, this new collaborative work entails great challenges for mainstream journalism, which is “more accustomed to banging the phones and interviewing live human beings” than working with data, as the American outlet pointed out. However, the core business, “unearthing secrets,” is still important. Simon Jenkins also focused on changes in journalism, but he expressed far more concern about the health of democracy. In his view, investigative journalism is quite expensive, but the Internet has a power that no government can stop and “it has also upped the stakes in the battle between secrecy and disclosure.” “Freedom of information, and the facility with which

19  Rutenberg, J. (April 10, 2016). Panama Papers signals a shift in mainstream journalism. The New York Times. Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/11/business/media/panama-papersleak-signals-a-shift-in-mainstream-journalism.html. 20  Brooks, R. (April 4, 2016). Tax havens don’t need to be reformed. They should be outlawed. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/news/commentisfree/2016/apr/04/ tax-havens-reformed-outlawed-panama-papers.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

The Value of Proximity

whistleblowers can shift material into the public domain, have dramatically tilted the balance against data secrecy. This in turn has driven government and corporate interests into ever more frantic efforts to stamp on investigation,”22 he argued. However, newspapers, taking full advantage of new technologies, have fulfilled their function, whereas the political powers that should have acted after the disclosure of illegal activities had not: “Meanwhile, the British parliament has become a pathetic guardian of the public interest, caring more about tradition and theater than the independent scrutiny of public affairs,” he added. El Confidencial also defended the watchdog duty of the press, highlighting that audiences still demand this kind of in-depth, exclusive, and relevant information. In April 2016, the website’s readership was 21% higher than it had been in April 2015, rising to more than 16.5 million unique users. According to the publication, the increase was the result of its coverage of the Panama Papers. Further, all the media organizations involved in the investigation expressed a belief in the power of journalism to fight injustices and shape the world. As Micah White put it in The Guardian, “The release of the Panama Papers will be a success if it brings us even just one step closer to realizing that higher goal. The real significance of the Panama Papers is what the massive leak means for the possibility of social change. The Panama Papers represents the coming-of-age of leaktivism.” Real change, of course, will require more than public revelations made by the media. Nevertheless, such investigations give legal systems and politicians a basis for taking action, as The New York Times commented in its editorial of April 5: “After these revelations, will anything change? Many formal denials and pledges of official investigations have been made. But to what degree do the law and public shaming still have dominion over this global elite? A public scarred by repeated revelations of corruption in government, sports and finance will demand to know.”23

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Value of Proximity An examination in isolation of the news reports on the Panama Papers reveals that, after the leak, every newspaper covered the first political resignation that the investigation caused; the departure of Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson, prime minister of Iceland, two days after the release of Panama Papers. However, in the days that followed, each newspaper paid attention to or placed emphasis on specific aspects of Panama Papers in accordance with the values of proximity and local interest.

21  White, M. (April 5, 2016). The Panama Papers: leaktivism’s coming of age. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/news/commentisfree/2016/apr/05/panama-papersleak-activism-leaktivism. 22  Jenkins, S. (April 5, 2016). From Snowden to Panama, all hail the power of the press. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/news/commentisfree/2016/apr/06/simon-jenkinspower-of-press-panama-papers-investigative-journalists. 23  Editorial. (April 5, 2016). The Panama Papers’ Sprawling Web of Corruption. The New York Times. Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/06/opinion/the-panama-papers-sprawling-webof-corruption.html.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

119

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

120

7  Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation

The New York Times, for example, focused on the investigation’s consequences in North America and Europe, with headlines as “Obama Criticizes Tax Loopholes” or “Panama Papers Continue to Shake Leaders, Including Cameron and Putin.” The Spanish newspaper El Confidencial also reported on the resignation of José Manuel Soria, Spain’s minister of industry, on May 5. However, El Confidencial did not pay attention to politicians alone but also published an article about the film director Pedro Almodóvar and his offshore business. The New York Times is the outlet that talked the most about China, the United States’ great economic rival. The American outlet linked its coverage to the Chinese government’s tight control over the country’s media: “China Censors Mentions of Panama Papers Leaks.” In addition, thanks to its economic power, The New York Times has a wide network of correspondents who are able to file stories about regions such as Africa, where tax evasion is common, as Alan Cowel wrote in “Revelations from Panama Papers Are Old News for Africans.” On the other hand, The Guardian took a more European and domestic point of view that was dominated by the appearance of David Cameron’s family in the Panama Papers. From news reports to opinion articles (“Ten Questions the Prime Minister Has to Answer about the Panama Files”), the newspaper provided extensive coverage of this major political scandal. But it also viewed the consequences of the Panama Papers from a sociological perspective. Kate Lyons, Guardian Australia’s Pacific editor, argued that revelations of offshore companies are a big disappointment for thousands of young people who pay their taxes and cannot afford a house: “In a country where most young people cannot afford to buy a home, the fact that thousands of properties are bought through tax haven-based companies, by people who are already wealthy enough to restructure their finances to take advantage of tax havens, driving up house prices, and pushing out owner-occupiers, matters. And it especially matters to millennials.”24 The publication also talked about international issues such as the aforementioned resignation of Spain’s minister of industry, Almodóvar, UEFA, Russia, and the United States. The correspondents of the British newspaper additionally analyzed the Panama Papers revelations through a geopolitical lens. Natalie Nougayrède, a columnist at the newspaper, argued in an article that the Panama Papers could be considered as “Western manipulation”25 in Moscow. When Wikileaks released US State Department documents pertaining to Afghanistan and Iraq, she explained, the two giants were in a “reset phase,” while in 2016 they were in “a new cold war.” La Nación focused on Latin American issues, and especially on those related to Argentinian politicians such as Mauricio Macri, whose family was named in the Panama Papers as being involved in offshore companies. In 2017, a year later, an Argentinian court acquitted him of taking part in illegal activities. The newspaper 24  Lyons, K. (April 5, 2016). To millennials caught in the rent trap, the Panama Papers matter. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/news/commentisfree/2016/apr/05/ millennials-rent-trap-panama-papers-british-property-housing-young-people. 25  Nougardere, N. (April 4, 2016). Kill it, spin it—Putin will do anything to stifle the Panama Papers story. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/news/commentisfree/2016/ apr/04/panama-papers-vladimir-putin-russian-western-relations.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Conclusions

also talked about the football player Lionel  Messi,26 a local celebrity who owned, with his father, an offshore company that appears in the Mossack Fonseca database. Spain’s El Confidencial, aside from covering the big issues arising from the leak, followed closely the investigations launched by the Spanish tax agency in light of the Panama Papers. Further, it published a legal complaint made by the Spanish publishing group Prisa, which took legal action against El Confidencial, La Sexta, and Eldiario. es for publishing the name of the firm’s president, Juan Luis Cebrián, in connection with Panama Papers.27 In 2019, the lawsuit was dismissed.

Conclusions

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Internet has changed the rules of every business. The four selected newspapers took advantage of new technologies, massive leaks, and new forms of activism to create huge stories such as the Panama Papers. New visualization tools allowed journalists to develop multimedia pieces that made complex information more comprehensible and accessible. El Confidencial, a native digital publication, revealed itself to be quite sophisticated in this respect. Journalists developed an interactive news game called “Stairway to Tax Heaven,”28 in which players learn how to conceal their savings through offshore companies to avoid paying tax. And The Guardian published short explanatory videos under its compilation “Panama Papers, a Special Investigation,” and created a making-of podcast29 in which journalists who worked on the investigation talked about their experiences. However, this appealing way of presenting information did not distract the publications from their main objective: bringing to light the unfair system that allows powerful people and companies to avoid taxes. In this vein, The New York Times was the outlet that devoted the most news reports to the work of journalists and to what the Panama Papers might mean for the future of data journalism and leaks, while The Guardian used editorial articles from experts, and El Confidencial and La Nación preferred to voice the opinions of their editorial boards.

26  Ruiz, I., Jastreblansky, M., and Alconada, H. (April 3, 2016). Panamá Papers: apareció una nueva sociedad de los Messi en un paraíso fiscal. La Nación. Retrieved from: https://www.lanacion.com.ar/ deportes/futbol/panama-papers-aparecio-una-nueva-sociedad-de-los-messi-en-un-paraiso-fiscalnid1885782. 27  El Confidencial (November 12, 2016). Prisa demanda a El Confidencial por competencia desleal tras los papeles de Panamá. El Confidencial. Retrieved from: https://www.elconfidencial. com/comunicacion/2016-10-12/prisa-demanda-el-confidencial-competencia-desleal-papelespanama_1273872. 28  ICIJ, Le Monde, El Confidencial (April 4, 2016). “Stairway to (tax) heaven:” aprende a ocultar tu dinero en el extranjero. El Confidencial. Retrieved from: https://www.elconfidencial.com/ economia/papeles-panama/2016-04-04/papeles-panama-papers-aprende-ocultar-sociedad-enextranjero_1178192. 29  Johnson, P (April 26, 2016). Panama Papers: the biggest leak in history—Guardian Live event. The Guardian. Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/news/audio/2016/apr/26/panamapapers-the-biggest-leak-in-history-guardian-live-event.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

121

122

7  Data Journalism, Massive Leaks, and Investigation

Regardless of the format of articles, all newspapers highlighted the guidance of core ethical values such as collaboration and transparency in capitalizing on massive data sets and leaks to the greatest degree possible. In current newsrooms, where investigative journalism is almost a luxury, a collaborative approach may be the only way of processing enormous quantities of data and discovering interesting scoops that otherwise may remain unpublished. Despite the global nature of today’s world, proximity is, paradoxically, still an important strength: each newspaper focused on its local issues, emphasizing different topics to make the whole picture more comprehensive. From Wikileaks (2011) to Panama Papers (2016), data journalism became more conscious about its weaknesses. This was reflected in the debate between disclosure on the one hand and protecting privacy and national security on the other. Journalistic criteria—in other words, having reliable sources, comparing them, collaborating with other media outlets, and only publishing pieces on topics that are in public interest— can clarify professional journalism’s stance vis-à-vis the grey area of “leaktivism,” and the application of them definitely represents a step forward in the establishment and survival of data journalism in today’s newsrooms. Ultimately, as Westlund and Lewis (2017) states, data journalism has to be studied in relation to epistemological and ethical values and what they mean for the future journalism. The work of digital activists and journalists differs in terms of their objectives: the former aim to change the world, while the latter only pursue the truth. But revealing the dark areas of our society—the things that powerful people want to keep hidden—can also lead to social change and strengthen democracy.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Anderson, C.W. (2012). Towards a sociology of computational and algorithmic journalism. New Media & Society, 15(7), 1005–1021. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444812465137 Borges-Rey, E. (2016). Unravelling data journalism: a study of data journalism practice in British newsrooms. Journalism Practice, 10(7), 833–843. Boyd, D. and Crawford, K. (2012). Critical questions for big data: provocations for a cultural, technological, and scholarly phenomenon. Information, Communication & Society, 15, 662–679. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2012.678878. Carlson, M. (2015). The Robotic Reporter. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 416–431. 10.1080/21670811.2014.976412 Cohen, S., Li, C., Yang, J., and Yu, C. (2011). Computational journalism. A call to arms to database researchers. Proceedings of the Conference on Innovative Data Systems Research, 148–151. Coddington, M. (2015). Clarifying journalism’s quantitative turn. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 331–348. doi: 10.1080/21670811.2014.976400. Corbin, J. and Strauss, A. (1990). Basics of qualitative research: grounded theory procedures and techniques. Newbury Park, Calif: Sage Publications. In Hallin, D. and Mancini, P. (2008). Sistemas mediáticos comparados: Tres modelos de relación entre los medios de comunicación y la política. Barcelona: Hacer. Dader, J.L. (1997). Periodismo de precisión. La vía socioinformática de descubrir noticias. Madrid: Síntesis.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

De Maeyer, J., Libert, M., Domingo, D., Heinderyckx, F., and Le Cam, F. (2015). Waiting for data journalism: a qualitative assessment of the anecdotal take-up of data journalism in French-speaking Belgium. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 432–446. Elías, C. (2015). Big data y periodismo en la sociedad red. Madrid: Síntesis. Fink, K. and Anderson, C.W. (2015). Data journalism in the United States. Journalism Studies, 16(4), 467–481. Hallin, D.C. and Mancini, P. (Eds.). (2011). Comparing media systems beyond the Western world. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Howard, A.B. (2014). The Art and Science of Data-driven Journalism. New York: Tow Center for Digital Journalism. https://doi.org/10.7916/D8Q531V1 Kreiss, D. (2016). Beyond administrative journalism: civic skepticism and the crisis in journalism. In Alexander, J., Breese, E.B., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered: Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. Cambridge University Press, 59–76. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781316050774.005 LaFleur, J. (2014). Data and Transparency: Perils and Progress in Transparency. Politics and the Media: Accountability and Open Government. London: Reuters Institute. Lewis, S.C. (2015). Journalism in an era of big data. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 321–330. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2014.976399. Lewis, S.C. and Westlund, O. (2015). Big data and journalism: epistemology, expertise, economics, and ethics. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 447–466. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670 811.2014.976418 Manovich, L. (2011). Trending: the promises and the challenges of big social data. Debates in the Digital Humanities, 2, 460–475. goo.gl/piKvnD Martinisi, A. (2013). Data journalism and its role in open government. Selected papers of the Vth International Scientific Conference e-governance, 58–68. Meyer, P. (1973). Precision Journalism: A Reporter’s Introduction to Social Science Methods. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. Parasie, S. and Dagiral, E. (2013). Data-driven journalism and the public good: computerassisted reporters and programmer-journalists in Chicago. New Media & Society, 15(6), 853–871. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444812463345. Solop, F. and Wonders, A. (2016). Data journalism versus traditional journalism in election reporting: an analysis of competing narratives in the 2012 presidential election. Electronic News, 10(4), 203–223. https://doi.org/10.1177/1931243116656717. Corbin, J. and Strauss, A. (1990). Basics of qualitative research: grounded theory procedures and techniques. Newbury Park, Calif: Sage Publications. In Hallin, D. and Mancini, P. (2008). Sistemas mediáticos comparados: Tres modelos de relación entre los medios de comunicación y la política. Barcelona: Hacer. Westlund, O. and Lewis, S.C. (2017). Four conceptual lenses for journalism amidst big data: towards an emphasis on epistemological challenges. Wormer, H. (2007). Figures, statistics and the journalist: an affair between love and fear. Some perspectives of statistical consulting in journalism. Springer, 91(4), 391–397. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10182-007-0041-2.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

123

124

8 Semi-automated Journalism Reinforcing Ethics to Make the Most of Artificial Intelligence for Writing News José Luis Rojas Torrijos Universidad de Sevilla

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Introduction: Bots as an Innovation in News Production Journalism is experiencing times of rapid change and digital transformation marked by the emergence of disruptive technologies, new business models, changes in audience behaviors, and the resulting obligation to reconsider news production and distribution processes that affect the way in which the profession is practiced. In order to understand how the game rules are changing in this new media landscape, it is essential to do so through the prism of innovation. Innovation in the field of journalism has to do with both the repercussion of technologies (Spyridou et al., 2013) and the introduction of changes in products, processes, and services, which do not always have to be new, but can also be based on the combination or reformulation of already existing ideas or resources (Storsul and Krumsvik, 2013). In addition to their high degree of novelty, new developments tend to be so not only because of their impact on industry and society, but especially for their creative leveraging of new tools for searching for and applying solutions that provide the media and consumers with value added (García-Avilés, González and Ferris, 2015, p. 5) and engage audiences more closely (Pavlik, 2013). In recent years, artificial intelligence (AI) apps based on bots and algorithms for automating diverse newsroom routines and tasks, such as information search, retrieval, classification, and treatment, figure among the new developments that have most disrupted news production processes. As Newman (2017, p. 31) notes, this technology is employed for specific journalistic tasks and services, like generating alerts, notifications, and recommendations for readers, fact-checking and the intelligent automation of newsroom workflows both for the online coverage of live events and, above all, for robot journalism. The use of computer software involving “a self-contained step-by-step set of operations to be performed, such as calculation, data processing, and automated reasoning” (Lindén, 2017, p. 62) for generating news has been called, among other things, “automated journalism” (Van Dalen, 2012), “robotic journalism” (Carlson, 2015), and “algorithmic journalism” (Harcup, 2014, p. 9). These software processes are based on what is commonly known as natural language generation (NLG), owing to their capacity for coding with algorithms and for automatically transforming structured data into normally brief texts that are News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

The Spread of Automated Journalism in Newsrooms

understandable for all and sundry and which more or less resemble those written by humans (Reiter and Dale, 2000). Therefore, news automation implies, on the one hand, identifying and selecting a series of routine and repetitive tasks that are undertaken on a daily basis in newsrooms and which can be coded by bots and algorithms; and, on the other, creating and leveraging structured data sets that, through programming, facilitate the instant production of texts for specific news coverage. In addition, as with the application of any technological development to professional practice, in all the stages of the production process (data collection, preparation, and dissemination) human editorial intervention—namely, the presence of an editor or copywriter who fine tunes the machine’s writing skills and who supervises the results—is essential to a greater or lesser extent (Wu, Tandoc Jr., and Salmon, 2019). Thus, whether it be through partnerships with specialized technological companies or by developing in-house software, the media have discovered in bots a way of expediting and broadening their coverage, multiplying the production of news stories or addressing new themes that were not dealt with before for, among other reasons, the lack of time or newsroom staff.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Spread of Automated Journalism in Newsrooms Automated journalism is a reality that has been progressively introduced by the international mainstream media. This is proved by the different studies published in recent years which help us to identify the type of coverage for which this technology is currently being used, and to determine how its application influences the role of journalists and how machine–human collaboration has been forged in newsrooms. Further, studies of this sort have even contributed to assess the additional possibilities that automation offers journalism beyond the publication of routine stories, including the promotion of other ways of reporting that contribute to enhance news quality. In 2015, a report produced by Celeste Lecompte (2015) and published by the Nieman Lab of Harvard University analyzed the gradual introduction of automated tasks with bots and algorithms in a growing number of newsrooms, with the aim of broadening coverage, engaging audiences with stories and topics of interest to them, and expediting the production of breaking news to keep them duly informed on all types of devices. According to this report, the areas that best adapted to this technology from the outset were financial and sports news, ahead of others like the weather, election results, and opinion polls. The reason for this is none other than their very nature, insofar as both areas involve large quantities of statistical data. This favors both the management of ordered data and the programming of newsroom routines due, moreover, to the cyclic and repetitive nature of sports competitions and stock market information. Indeed, it is the sports field in which news began to be generated automatically as a pilot experience, which would subsequently be repeated in other information fields (Rojas-Torrijos, 2019b). In this connection, one of the media outlets that has paved the way for experimenting with this technology is the US Associated Press (AP), which in 2014

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

125

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

126

8  Semi-automated Journalism

partnered with the firm Automated Insights to employ WordSmith, an automated writing software, with which it started to cover a large number of university sports competitions held weekly in the United States, which would have been impossible to do with human resources alone. Following this, the agency automated other fields, especially information on the stock prices and profits of hundreds of companies, a service whose great demand led to the production of 4,500 news pieces a year (Lecompte, 2015). AP’s initial steps in the automated coverage of sports and financial news offered the agency a number of insights into the possibilities offered by bots. The stories produced were basically short releases and brief items, based on statistical data, which allowed the agency not only to broaden its coverage to include more principal actors (teams and companies), but also its local reach. Similarly, as those in charge of the agency claimed at the time, bots were supposed to handle routine tasks and news that otherwise would not have been covered, thus allowing journalists to devote more time to reporting and quality coverage (Mullin, 2015). Following in the footsteps of AP, news agencies like AFP and Reuters would also begin to explore the opportunities offered by automated journalism and even data visualizations to enhance different types of coverage. In parallel, other news media created specific departments for employing this technology to produce general interest news (Lecompte, 2015), like investigative reporting (ProPublica), police information on homicides (Los Angeles Times), and earthquake warnings and reports (Los Angeles Times and Oregon Public Broadcasting). Subsequent studies have just confirmed the relentless deployment of this technology in newsrooms. For instance, while Graefe (2016) had already identified up to 11 news automation software providers (five based in Germany, two each in the United States and France, and one each in China and the United Kingdom) in a Tow Center for Digital Journalism report, a year later Fanta (2017), in a Reuters Institute study, referred to 15 European and US agencies publishing bot-generated content. For their part, Túñez, Toural, and Cacheiro (2018) identified 21 companies, 16 news media (mainly American and German), and 13 agencies as the global leaders in automated journalism. Thanks to partnerships between news media and technology providers or the development of in-house software tools by some media, automated text production is becoming increasingly more agile and sophisticated. Yet, to date, the use of bots has contributed more to increasing profits and productivity than to a direct and ostensible improvement in text quality. At any rate, the spread of automated journalism poses a number of editorial challenges for the media, particularly in relation to enhancing machine–human collaboration to produce more and higher-quality news content.

Advantages and Limitations of this Technology for Professional Practice Ever since algorithms and bots were first leveraged to produce news, many critics have cautioned that the widespread use of this technology may endanger newsroom jobs. In contrast, authors like Van Dalen (2012) have underscored the many advantages of this innovative technology for professional journalistic practice. For instance,

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Advantages and Limitations of this Technology for Professional Practice

reporters can now devote more time to investigative journalism, in particular, and to doing a better job, in general, since it allows them to focus more on creation and reporting or on covering stories that were not previously included on the news agenda. For his part, Graefe (2016, pp. 7–8) considers that this innovation offers journalists valuable opportunities thanks to its potential for producing a larger number of stories more rapidly and with fewer errors; for covering the same stories in different languages and from different angles; and for customizing news or for its production based on public demand or user metrics. Nevertheless, he observes that this technology has three important limitations: the dependence on information sources that may also contain inaccuracies or biases; the impossibility of covering topics on which there are no structured data available; and the fact that bots do not question, explain, or establish causalities, for which reason they cannot accomplish the mission of guiding or shaping public opinion (Lewis and Westlund, 2014). Graefe (2016) also refers to the quality of automated writing, which, even though it is inferior to the human kind, in all likelihood will continue to improve with further advances in NLG technology. This improvement is more evident for Van der Kaa and Krahmer (2014, p. 1), who give credence to machine-written news because “The key elements or the work of a journalist show strong similarities with the tasks of a robot writer.” Other authors even go so far as to assert that “readers are not able to discern automated content from content written by a human” (Clerwall, 2014, p. 527) or that automated news stories can be more credible for the public than those written by humans because they do not contain opinionated bias (Haim and Graefe, 2017, p. 1055) and because they are largely based on hard numerical data (Graefe et al., 2018). As automation has been experimented with in newsrooms and journalists have familiarized themselves with its application, this innovation has become to be conceived as more of an ally than as a threat and to be valued as a tool that is useful for publishing certain news, which would otherwise be unviable. As a result, newsrooms and journalists now understand that a division of tasks between humans and robots is required, for they have to work “together” in writing news stories (Wolker and Powell, 2018). Thus, automation has not only involved a reorganization of newsroom workflows, but has also recuperated the role of technology in journalism, not now as a mediator but as a news producer and distributer (Lewis, Guzman, and Schmidt, 2019). This has meant that the professional debate has shifted from the concern that humans may be substituted by machines toward the realm of ethics. Specifically, it is currently revolving around the level of responsibility of the people intervening in database creation and the selection and hierarchization criteria employed and, therefore, around the importance of the editorial decisions that have to be made and their impact on news accuracy (Túñez, Toural, and Cacheiro, 2018, p. 751). The implementation of innovative initiatives in journalism should also be contextualized by ethics, understood as “the difficult practical task of applying norms and standards to ever new and changing circumstances” (Ward, 2010). Thus, in the new digital landscape in which it is necessary to assess what is adequate in each situation, “the key for journalists and for democratic societies is the process those who produce the news go through in making their decisions” (Rosenstiel and Mitchell, 2003, p. 3).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

127

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

128

8  Semi-automated Journalism

As affirmed by Breese and Luengo (2016), in a context in which new formats, narratives, business models, and technological innovations are modifying the way in which news is produced, civic values and professional news standards are destined to play a decisive role in shaping the landscape in which the media will have to operate in the years to come. The reactivating power of ethical codes thus appears to be a solution for leveraging innovation in a more adequate fashion. Yet, this ethical solution should be implemented in a dual sense. On the one hand, ethical codes also need to be reviewed to incorporate those new tools and developments that influence professional journalistic practice (Micó et al., 2008; Díaz-Campo and Segado, 2014) and which have brought about a substantial change in the interaction between professionals and citizens (Suárez-Villegas, 2015, p. 394). In their New Guiding Principles for a New Era of Journalism, McBride and Rosenstiel (2014, p. 3) insist, for example, on the importance of reinforcing transparency (disclosing how information has been accessed and acknowledging and rapidly correcting errors) and engaging the public to create community. For their part, Díaz-Campo and Chaparro (2018, p. 1143) propose a framework based on the ethical obligations and principles that should govern the application of any type of software to professional practice, from obtaining information (employing appropriate methods to retrieve data, possible prejudices, accuracy, and responsibility) to its elaboration (controlling and verifying technology), and dissemination (transparency when revealing the sources and methods employed, legality, and the external monitoring of results). In this context, the use of bots poses a number of specific ethical challenges directly related to human preferences when selecting data and how these should be programmed to produce news (Kraemer, Van Overveld, and Peterson, 2011; Dörr and Hollnbuchner, 2017). Therefore, these challenges have to do with the influence of human subjectivity on the design of algorithms, which is not always easily measur­ able, with identifying possible biases and discriminations and even with the possible impact of opacity on the attribution of responsibilities. However, the ethical solution does not only lie in the fact that journalism should redefine its traditional principles, established in these codes, in order to enable the profession to make room for innovation. It is more a matter of journalism acquiring a new vision that can cope with change so as to make professional ethics the guiding thread that “anchors” and stimulates innovation (Alexander, 2016, p. 22), in order to make it sustainable over time and to prevent it from being buried by the next new development. In this respect, Singer (2014, p. 78) advocates for “adapting” that permanent will to accommodate journalistic innovation by ensuring that the profession’s norms and values are those that guide that adaptation from the start. Journalism would thus offer “a proactive response to inevitable and ongoing changes rather than a reactive one that leaves journalists perpetually playing catch-up,” with the burnout and time that this involves. Those numerous new developments that the media can implement from an ethical angle and plan over time in their newsrooms also include algorithms and bots (Mittelstadt et al., 2016). Further, these pose their own ethical challenges differing from those faced by journalists, like a greater demand for transparency and accountability in their use, with a view to avoiding editorial biases and possible inaccuracies (Diakopoulos, 2014, p. 28) and to providing the public with useful information.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Best Practices: A Semi-automated Journalism that Enhances Professional Values

Best Practices: A Semi-automated Journalism that Enhances Professional Values The debate on the ethical challenges posed by the new media landscape should be accompanied by a series of analyses of the best recommendations for putting them into practice. Accordingly, the debate should also be extended to the analysis of those best practices that may help to optimize the capacities of innovative technologies, with an eye to improving professional practice and achieving a more ethical and higher quality journalism. In this regard, Zion and Craig (2014, p. 1) recommend exploring those best practices that may favor the application of such ethical principles and lead to a better journalism in the digital age. Those best practices include verification, the inclusion of links and the correct attribution of information, aggregation and curating, liveblogging and tweeting for monitoring breaking news, rectification and depublications, collaboration, audience moderation and participation, and differentiating between the public and private on social networking sites. The mainstream media that have invested most in AI for automated news generation have also developed best practices in an attempt to respond to the principal ethical implications of machine–human collaboration in editorial decision-making and its repercussions on news content quality. Therefore, the implementation of best practices in newsrooms serves to evaluate to what extent this technology is helping journalism to offer better news coverage and how safeguarding the profession’s values allows innovation to be more efficient. This necessary machine–human collaboration has led to the emergence of “semiautomated journalism,” a concept that is not only a more advanced state of automation, but also a point at which technology and the decision-making and storytelling capacity of editors and copywriters converge. Bots are demonstrating their usefulness in news media for their capacity to do the following:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

(1) To produce rapidly a larger number of news stories enhanced by statistics in order to engage a wider audience and to reach specific information niches. (2) To satisfy the need of many users to receive breaking news on all types of devices. So, this begs the question of how semi-automated journalism can reinforce traditional journalistic values such as accuracy, depth, rigor, verification, and the need for the signifier to be appealing and information to be exhaustive and appropriate (Kovach and Rosenstiel, 2003). Accordingly, an analysis is performed below on the extent to which this coverage can be useful and interesting for the citizenry, highlighting the need for journalism to provide a news market as saturated as the current one with value, content, and meaning.

Departure Point for Making Public Interest News This semi-automated journalism initially found its feet through experimental projects and coverage developed mainly by local US news media. Specifically, in 2014, the Los Angeles Times started to experiment with the use of AI to offer information on the patterns and typologies of crimes perpetrated in the metropolis on the basis of police data

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

129

130

8  Semi-automated Journalism

retrieved from public records. In 2015, NBC, also in its Los Angeles newsroom, ran the “Structured Stories” project. This involved generating news about police chases in the city, which were written automatically employing a database and then enhanced and elaborated on by reporters. Each story then became part of the database in order to serve as a context for subsequent stories of a similar nature. Thus, bots were not only used to transform numerical data into texts, but also to reconstruct an event through storytelling with the help of a journalist. In 2016, The Washington Post developed a software tool called Heliograf, initially conceived to broaden and expedite the news coverage of the Rio Olympic Games (Brazil). Two years later, it was also used to cover the PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games (South Korea). In both cases, the bot offered real-time coverage of the different competitions with permanent updates (results, medal counts, podiums, previews, and summaries) through a Twitter timeline embedded in its website, which were then elaborated on by journalists into more detailed stories and reports (RojasTorrijos, 2019a). The success of this pilot experience allowed The Washington Post to fine tune and extend the use of this technology to others types of coverage, like elections (Peiser, 2019).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Relevance and Appeal Lies in Local Coverage This technology is also well-suited for covering local news. Promoting local journalism, which plays a key role in creating community (López and Maciá Mercadé, 2006) by addressing issues that have a direct impact on the daily lives of citizens, is a strategy that, in the transition toward new business models, has been adopted by some news media to engage citizens who, moreover, may become subscribers willing to pay for content. This has been the course followed by the British Press Association, which produces some 30,000 semi-automated news pieces a day (Marr, 2019). To this end, it employs a technology called Radar (reporters and data and robots), which allows journalists to write generic stories that are then reproduced automatically in a variety of adapted versions with information from the different local publications to which it offers its services (Newman, 2017, p. 32). Specifically, it offers coverage to 35 local and regional news media belonging to 14 UK communication groups, including Archant, Independent News and Media, Iliffe Media, Johnston Press, Newsquest, the Midland News Association, and Trinity Mirror. Since the implementation of this technology in 2017, the result of its partnership with the startup Urbs Media, the Press Association now has a team of five reporters dedicated to producing semi-automated stories. Even though Radar was initially developed for the coverage of election results, the scoreboards of sports competitions and brief numerical pieces on stock market prices, it currently serves to cover a wide of range of topics, including incidents, transport, education, the environment, public health, and social policies (Delcker, 2019). In many cases, the stories coming from the local newsrooms to which it offers its services are published by the Press Association without any modifications. In others, however, its journalists edit, contextualize, and flesh them out with information and statements obtained through their own inquiries, thus transforming them into much longer and more crafted news stories.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Best Practices: A Semi-automated Journalism that Enhances Professional Values

Increasing local coverage has also been one of the goals of the news service of the Dutch TV channel RTL Nieuws’ editorial robot Adam (automatic data article machine). This technology, launched at the end of 2019, has already produced over 2,400 stories dealing with safety on roads, canals, and rivers all over the Netherlands (RTL Nieuws, 2019). In this case, the bot writes stories based on huge quantities of data that have previously been gathered, analyzed, and edited by journalists. This technology was developed by RTL Nederland’s in-house computer experts, journalists, and data analysts in one year, receiving funding to this end from the Google News Initiative, which has also supported the Press Association.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Combining Speed and Verification to Increase Quality Another outstanding case is that of the BBC which, through its News Lab, has been experimenting for years with all types of technologies adapted to digital and mobile media and to novel forms of news consumption. In the field of algorithmic journalism, at the end of 2019, the BBC developed a software tool called Salco (semi-automatic local content) for the purpose of producing semi-automated news stories. This program allows journalists to prepare story drafts that the bot then uses as a basis for generating texts with graphics summarizing the most important information. Following this, journalists verify the bot-generated stories before publishing them in their respective sections. On December 13, 2019, the BBC experimented with this technology in its coverage of the general elections in the United Kingdom. According to the corporation’s spokespeople, a total of 689 online news stories with the election results for each one of the country’s constituencies were published and distributed in a differentiated manner (Molumby and Whitwell, 2019). On the election night, the BBC also adapted the texts generated by Salco to produce 40 radio news stories, which were then broadcast on the corporation’s respective local stations. These stories contained statistics relating to each constituency, with the aim of helping the stations to broadcast the stories from an eminently local angle. The BBC has employed this same software tool for informing citizens about the services provided by the hospitals of each locality or county, based on statistics provided by the National Health Service (NHS). This semi-automated information dealing with a matter of enormous public interest, which is generated from a database provided by the NHS on a monthly basis, allows readers to compare the performance of their local health center with those in the rest of the country. For this coverage, the BBC generates on average 100 news stories a month.

Promoting Reporting and Investigation In addition to broadening local coverage and expediting that of elections, sports events, and stock prices, the media have also leveraged AI for promoting investigative journalism. In this regard, special mention should be made of initiatives like that implemented by AP, which has already begun to experiment with a software tool with which reporters retrieve key information from a huge database, thus allowing them to devote more time to investigative journalism; and that of BuzzFeed

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

131

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

132

8  Semi-automated Journalism

News, which in 2015 designed an algorithm based on automated learning to track flight patterns resembling those operated by the FBI and the US Department of Homeland Security. This media outlet published news about the aerial surveillance carried out by these planes, mapping thousands of flights for more than four months (Aldhous, 2017). In 2017, ProPublica developed a bot that tracked thousands of congressional press releases during three years to extract the words and phrases most frequently used by each member of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The data gathered by this bot allowed for making comparisons between politicians and parties, thus serving as a basis for reporters inquiring into the proposals and priorities of each one of them in light of public opinion. Ojo Público is an interesting example of how automation can help to expedite investigative journalism. In 2019, this Peruvian media outlet analyzed thousands of data pertaining to state public procurement in Peru, identifying political and financial relationships by means of an algorithmic model that assessed corruption hazard scenarios in the country. Going by the name of Funes, the algorithm identifies, selects, and provides data that is then used by journalists to obtain further information from other sources and to write investigative reports. All these best practices in the use of this technology are, first and foremost, examples of how to make the most of the possibilities offered by automation to improve journalistic practice as regards storytelling. As explained by the BBC’s News Lab (2019), “automated journalism isn’t about replacing journalists or making them obsolete. It’s about giving them the power to tell a greater range of stories—whether they are directly publishing the stories we generate, or using them as the starting point to tell their own stories—while saving them the time otherwise needed to analyse the underlying data.” But, above all, this semi-automated journalism demonstrates the huge potential of AI for news coverage, with the necessary human editorial criterion. The aforementioned examples show how innovation can be better leveraged journalistically when news coverage is grounded in the profession’s values and ethical codes. Because this facilitates the existence of editorial filters that guarantee the accuracy of sources and meet the demands of the professionals tasked with news making. Even though it is true that automation seems to adapt better to those journalists undertaking tasks that do not imply misusing their specific capacities and skills, everything points to the fact that “human and automated journalism will likely become closely integrated and form a ‘man-machine marriage’” (Graefe, 2016, p. 47).

Ethics, the Pillar of Strategic Innovation in Journalism After an experimental stage in the use of this technology, the media are now seeking new formulas with which bots can improve news quality even more by broadening and diversifying coverage. As has been seen in the previous section, it is not now only a question of leveraging automation to increase and expedite the publication of news so as to satisfy the real-time information needs of a specific audience (sports results, stock prices, local news, etc.).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ethics, the Pillar of Strategic Innovation in Journalism

All these increasingly more advanced semi-automated processes represent best practices based on the integration of ethics and technology to improve journalism, not only making it more productive and agile, but also more accurate and, therefore, more valuable for society. As already observed by Marconi (2016), “a more informed and efficient society by enabling journalists to conduct deep analysis, uncover corruption, and hold people and institutions accountable,” thus fulfilling the classic mission of public watchdog. Thus, the news media are currently facing the huge challenge of addressing innovation in an ethical manner, in accordance with their social remit. To meet it, it would first be necessary to accept that the future of the news will not be inevitably technological, but that for innovation to make sense and to be lasting it should be understood as an editorial process that newsrooms should embrace. As Caswell (2019) notes, “meaningful innovation in journalism must produce news products that are genuinely useful to real people, month after month and year after year. To do that they must be rooted in something familiar and human.” This vision of innovation, however, does not yet appear to be sufficiently widespread in the media. Posetti (2018) cautions that the news industry suffers from a “problem of approach” when attempting to understand what is innovation and how it should be used. After interviewing 39 media executives and officers in several countries, this authoress concluded that journalism innovation was “the key to the viability of news media in the digital age” (p. 9), but news organizations have been led by technology, investing in an interminable succession of “shiny things,” instead of promoting more “strategies that start with, and focus clearly on, the needs and behaviours of ‘end users’” (p. 25). Therefore, this poses the question of whether this recent and ongoing technological innovation, which is being constantly leveraged by journalism, is “ordinary” or rather “existential” (Caswell, 2020). To the author’s mind, ordinary innovation is that which has always been applied in many news media to find efficient ways of responding to changes in audience behavior, benefitting from technological development. But it is insufficient for meeting the “extraordinary challenge that threatens their very existence.” Accordingly, Caswell proposes a new innovation model, which he calls “existential” and which involves re-orientating editorial strategy toward a series of objectives, including the following: to go to greater lengths to gain a better understanding of audiences; to give the news product greater value added and to make it more competitive by adapting it more to the interests of users; and to forge closer ties with users so as to engage them and to restore their trust in the news media. In summary, the idea is that this transition toward the future sustainability of journalism should uphold the profession’s civic values and professional criteria in editorial decision-making, including those relating to the use and application of technology. And in this reconsideration of innovation it is essential that journalists accept that they should handle this technology in a responsible manner so as to make it as ethical as possible (Kunova, 2020). An ethical use of editorial innovation, such as that represented by the use of bots and algorithms for automated news writing, will allow the news media to continue to search for solutions to enhance their coverage and to meet public demand for news more satisfactorily.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

133

134

8  Semi-automated Journalism

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Aldhous, P. (2017). We trained a computer to search for hidden spy planes. This is what it found. Buzzfeed. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/peteraldhous/hidden-spyplanes#.hlN9ElJz3 Alexander, J.C. (2016). Journalism, democratic culture, and creative reconstruction. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E. and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 1–28. BBCNewsLabs. (2019). Stories by numbers: experimenting with semi-automated journalism. https://medium.com/bbc-news-labs/stories-by-numbers-how-bbc-news-is-experimentingwith-automated-journalism-3d8595a88852 Breese, E. and Luengo, M. (2016). News innovations and enduring commitments. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E. and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 282–290. Carlson, M. (2015). The robotic reporter: automated journalism and the redefinition of labor, compositional forms, and journalistic authority. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 416–431. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2014.976412 Caswell, D. (2019). Editorial innovation in news. Medium. https://medium.com/bbc-newslabs/editorial-innovation-in-news-fcf3aaf3d288 Caswell, D. (2020). Journalism innovation in the 2020s. BBCNewsLabs. https://bbcnewslabs. co.uk/news/2020/journalism-innovation-2020s Clerwall, C. (2014). Enter the robot journalist. Users’ perceptions of automated content. Journalism Practice, 8(5), 519–531. Delcker, J. (2019). This story was not written by a robot. But one day it might be. Politico. https://www.politico.eu/article/robot-reporters-newsroom-algorithms-artificialintelligence Diakopoulos, N. (2014). Algorithmic Accountability Reporting: on the investigation of black boxes. New York: Tow Center for Digital Journalism. https://academiccommons. columbia.edu/doi/10.7916/D8ZK5TW2 Díaz-Campo, J. and Chaparro, M.Á. (2018). Los desafíos éticos del periodismo en la era del big data: análisis de códigos deontológicos latinoamericanos. Palabra Clave, 21(4), 1136–1163. https://doi.org/10.5294/pacla.2018.21.4.8 Díaz-Campo, J. and Segado, F. (2014). La adaptación de los códigos de ética perio­ dística europeos a Internet y las TIC. Ámbitos. Revista internacional de comunicación, 26. Dörr, K.N. and Hollnbunchner, K. (2017). Ethical challenges of algorithmic journalism. Digital Journalism, 5(4), 404–419. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2016.1167612 Fanta, A. (2017). Putting Europe’s Robots on the Map: Automated Journalism in News Agencies. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. https://reutersinstitute. politics.ox.ac.uk/our-research/putting-europes-robots-map-automated-journalismnews-agencies García Avilés, J.A., González, J.L. and Ferris, J.L. (Eds.). (2015). Innovar En Periodismo. Murcia: Diego Marín. Graefe, A. (2016). Guide to Automated Journalism. New York: Tow Center for Digital Journalism. https://www.cjr.org/tow_center_reports/guide_to_automated_journalism.php

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

Graefe, A., Haim, M., Haarmann, B., and Brosius, H.B. (2018). Readers’ perception of computer-generated news: credibility, expertise, and readability. Journalism, 19(5), 595–610. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884916641269 Haim, M. and Graefe, A. (2017). Automated news. Digital Journalism, 5(8), 1044–1059. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2017.1345643 Harcup, T. (2014). Oxford Dictionary of Journalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kovach, B. and Rosenstiel, T. (2003). Los Elementos Del Periodismo. Madrid: Ediciones El País. Kraemer, F., Van Overveld, K., and Peterson, M. (2011). Is there an ethics of algorithms? Ethics and Information Technology, 13(3), 251–260. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10676-0109233-7 Kunova, M. (2020). How to make artificial intelligence in newsrooms more ethical. journalism.co.uk. https://www.journalism.co.uk/news/how-to-make-artificial-intelligencein-newsroom-more-ethical/s2/a752505/?utm_source=Daily Lecompte, C. (2015). Automation in the Newsroom. How algorithms are helping reporters expand coverage, engage audiences, and respond to breaking news. Niemanreports.org. https://niemanreports.org/articles/automation-in-the-newsroom Lewis, S. and Westlund, O. (2014). Big data and journalism. Epistemology, expertise, economics, and ethics. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 447–466. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670 811.2014.976418 Lewis, S.C., Guzman, A.L., and Schmidt, T.R. (2019). Automation, journalism, and human–machine communication: rethinking roles and relationships of humans and machines in news. Digital Journalism, 7(4), 409–427. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811. 2019.1577147 Lindén, C.G. (2017). Algorithms for journalism: the future of news work. The Journal of Media Innovations, 4(1), 60–76. https://doi.org/10.5617/jmi.v4i1.2420 López, X. and Maciá Mercadé, J. (2006). Periodismo De Proximidad. Madrid: Síntesis. Marconi, F. (2016). The year of augmented writing. Nieman Lab. https://www.niemanlab. org/2016/12/the-year-of-augmented-writing Marr, B. (2019). Artificial Intelligence can now wrote amazing content—what does that mean for humans?. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2019/03/29/ artificial-intelligence-can-now-write-amazing-content-what-does-that-mean-forhumans McBride, K. and Rosenstiel, T. (2014). New guiding principles for a New Era of journalism. In McBride, K. and Rosenstiel, T. (Eds.). The New Ethics of Journalism. Thousand Oaks: CQ Press, 1–6. Micó, J.L., Canavilhas, J., Masip, P., and Ruiz, C. (2008). La ética en el ejercicio del periodismo: credibilidad y autorregulación en la era del periodismo en internet. Estudos Em Comunicação, 4, 15–39. Mittelstadt, B.D., Allo, P., Taddeo, M., Wachter, S., and Floridi, L. (2016). The ethics of algorithms: mapping the debate. Big Data & Society, 6, 1–21. https://doi. org/10.1177/2053951716679679 Molumby, C. and Whitwell, J. (2019). General election 2019: semi-automation makes it a night of 689 stories. BBCNewsLabs. https://bbcnewslabs.co.uk/news/2019/ salco-ge

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

135

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

136

8  Semi-automated Journalism

Mullin, B. (2015). How the Associated Press is using automation to rethink the way it does news. Poynter.org. https://www.poynter.org/news/how-associated-pressusing-automation-rethink-way-it-does-news Newman, N. (2017). Journalism, Media and Technology Trends and Predictions 2018. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. https://reutersinstitute.politics. ox.ac.uk/our-research/journalism-media-and-technology-trends-and-predictions–2018 Pavlik, J. (2013). Innovation and the future of journalism. Digital Journalism, 1(2), 181–193. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2012.756666 Peiser, J. (2019). The rise of the robot reporter. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes. com/2019/02/05/business/media/artificial-intelligence-journalism-robots.html Posetti, J. (2018). Time to Step Away from the “Bright, Shiny Things’? Towards a Sustainable Model of Journalism Innovation in an Era of Perpetual Change. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac. uk/our-research/time-step-away-bright-shiny-things-towards-sustainable-modeljournalism-innovation-era Reiter, E. and Dale, R. (2000). Building Natural Language Generation System. New York: Cambridge University Press. Rojas-Torrijos, J.L. (2019a). La automatización en las coberturas deportivas. Estudio de caso del bot creado por The Washington Post durante los JJ.OO. de Río 2016 y Pyeongchang 2018. Revista Latina De Comunicación Social, 75. https://doi.org/10.4185/ RLCS-2019-1407 Rojas-Torrijos, J.L. and Toural, C. (2019b). Periodismo deportivo automatizado. Estudio de caso de AnaFut, el bot desarrollado por El Confidencial para la escritura de crónicas de fútbol. Doxa Comunicación, 29(2), 235–254. https://doi.org/10.31921/doxacom.n29a12 Rosenstiel, T. and Mitchell, A.S. (2003). Thinking Clearly. Cases in Journalistic DecisionMaking. New York: Columbia University Press. RTL Nieuws. (2019). RTL Nieuws introduceert redactierobot ADAM. https://www. rtlnieuws.nl/nieuws/artikel/4914671/adam-robot-nieuws-journalistiek-innovatie-rtlnieuws-google-dni Singer, J.B. (2014). Getting past the future: journalism ethics, innovation and a call for flexible first. Comunicaçao E Sociedade, 25, 67–82. https://doi.org/10.17231/comsoc.25.1860 Spyridou, L.P., Matsiola, M., Veglis, A., Kalliris, G., and Dimoulas, C. (2013). Journalism in a state of flux: journalists as agents of technology innovation and emerging news practices. International Communication Gazette, 75(1), 76–98. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 1748048512461763 Storsul, T. and Krumsvik, A.H. (2013). What is media innovation? In Storsul, T. and Krumsvik, A.H. (Eds.). Media Innovations. A Multidisciplinary Study of Change. Gothenburg: Nordicom, 13–26. Suárez-Villegas, J.C. (2015). Nuevas tecnologías y deontología periodística: comparación entre medios tradicionales y nativos digitales. El Profesional De La Información, 24(4), 390–395. https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2015.jul.05 Túñez, J.M., Toural, C., and Cacheiro, S. (2018). Uso de bots y algoritmos para automatizar la redacción de noticias: percepción y actitudes de los periodistas en España. El Profesional De La Información, 27(4), 750–758. https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2018.jul.04 Van Dalen, A. (2012). The algorithms behind the headlines. Journalistic Practice, 6(5–6). https://doi.org/10.1080/17512786.2012.667268

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

References

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Van der Kaa, H. and Krahmer, E. (2014). Journalist versus news consumer. The perceived credibility of machine written news. In Proceedings of the Computation+Journalism conference. New York, October 24–25. https://research.tilburguniversity.edu/en/ publications/journalist-versus-news-consumer-the-perceived-credibility-of-mach Ward, S. (2010). Ethics in a Nutshell. Center for Journalism Ethics. University of Wisconsin. https://ethics.journalism.wisc.edu/resources/ethics-in-a-nutshell Wolker, A. and Powell, T. (2018). Algorithms in the newsroom? News readers’ perceived credibility and selection of automated journalism. Journalism, 1–18. https://doi. org/10.1177/1464884918757072 Wu, S., Tandoc Jr, E., and Salmon, C.T. (2019). Journalism reconfigured. Assessing human–machine relations and the autonomous power of automation in news production. Journalism Studies, 20(10), 1440–1457. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616 70X.2018.1521299 Zion, L. and Craig, D. (Eds.). (2014). Ethics for Digital Journalists: Emerging Best Practices. New York: Routledge.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

137

138

9 Ethical Challenges in Incorporating Artificial Intelligence into Newsrooms Teresa Barceló-Ugarte, José Manuel Pérez-Tornero, and Pere Vila-Fumàs Universidad San Pablo-CEU, CEU Universities, Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona, RTVE

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Introduction Artificial intelligence (AI) is inspired by how the mind functions (Alpaydin, 2016), and aims to make computers and artificial systems do “the same kind of things that the mind can do” (Boden, 2017). In this sense, it is often said that AI is the type of intelligence that machines, or computers, show when performing a series of specific operations that are considered to be characteristic of human intelligence (Vocento Media Lab, 2017). To this end, computers combine “data, algorithms and processing capacity” (European Parliament, 2019), which are organized into three operational dimensions: (a) computational theory; (b) programming algorithms or formulas; and, finally, (c) the devices or hardware through which the algorithms are applied (Marr, 2010). In recent decades, as AI increased its capabilities, it was incorporated into new fields of human activity. This phenomenon has been reflected through a series of technological advances such as the progress of digitalization, the generation of Big Data, cloud computing, the widespread use of mobile systems, and the development of the Internet of Things. Accordingly, AI has become a vector for the transformation of social life in its multiple dimensions: work and production; consumption and services; and education, leisure and daily life (European Parliament, 2019). Further, AI has recently become notable in the field of communications and journalism. AI tools and systems are beginning to play a major role in journalistic workflows and newsroom operations. They form part of the work environment and assist in the management of archives, provide help and support in the production of content, facilitate the personalization of content, make it possible to automatically analyze the impact of messages, and, in general, they impose a new framework of action on journalistic activity. However, we are still far from having a suitable conceptual framework for studying the impact of AI on journalism. Although the incorporation of AI into journalistic routines has given rise to various conceptualizations, the lack of general agreement is shown in issues such as the terminological dispute that exists when it comes to naming the new field of study. Thus, terms such as artificial journalism (Túñez-López, Toural-Bran, and Valdiviezo-Abad, 2019), automated journalism (Carlson, 2015), News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Transformation of Journalism

algorithmic journalism (Diakopoulos, 2015; Dörr, 2016), or robotic journalism (Oremus, 2015), among others, have been used to refer to this area. There have also been many attempts to establish the categories that could be used to describe and investigate the new field of professional innovation and research (Túñez-López, Toural-Bran, and Valdiviezo-Abad, 2019) in its different dimensions—work-related, technological, economic, and deontological and ethical—but we are still far from a shared conceptual framework. Not only does this hinder research, but also innovation. In this chapter we attempt to provide a conceptual framework to the relationship between AI and journalistic ethics. To do so, we need to have at least a conceptual scheme that allows us to classify and divide the journalistic work within an audiovisual newsroom into areas or phases (Salazar, 2018). To this end, we use the classification of journalistic tasks that a public television station, RTVE, uses in its own line of research and innovation in the field of AI and audiovisual information—and that has publicly been stated through different reports (OI2, 2019). Upon describing this topic, the various ethical challenges that arise in relation to the areas identified, and the various technologies and AI systems applied in them are presented. Therefore, the different phases of the journalistic work start from the moment in which a newsworthy event is produced until, once communicated, the audiovisual material is archived for later consultation, going through the writing and production phases, among others. In all of them, we consider the set of AI tools and systems that help and complement the journalist’s work. So, we describe the multiple intersections between two sets of factors: (a) the characteristics of journalistic tasks in the different phases of work in a TV newsroom; and (b) the possible implementations of AI systems in each of them. We then identify the main ethical questions and challenges that arise in each of these areas of intersection. It is clear that our objective is conceptual and theoretical. We try, therefore, to create a framework of understanding that allows us to identify possible research and empirical studies, of course without conditioning their results. This objective seems to be a priority at a time when the journalistic profession and journalism itself are undergoing a profound transformation accompanied by a radical technological change, which has introduced a profound change in the dominant paradigms in the media ecosystem and in the role that journalists play in it.

The Transformation of Journalism Leading organizations such as the Associated Press, Forbes, Reuters, The New York Times, and many others already use AI in their work and rely on it to automatically generate a large number of journalistic texts in a shorter time. But they are also using it to eliminate some of the errors that are often attributed to the human factor. For example, the Associated Press first launched an automatic text production system using sports data in late 2013, and later used a similar system to generate economic and corporate reports (Marconi and Siegman, 2017). According to this organization, the advantages of using AI in journalism include: (a) reducing the workload of journalists, allowing them to spend more time on more complex tasks; (b) improving communication and collaboration among journalists; (c) allowing

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

139

140

9  Ethical Challenges in Incorporating Artificial Intelligence into Newsrooms

journalists to filter large data, texts, images, and videos; (d) helping journalists to communicate with their audience; and (e) enhancing the creation of new types of journalism. To this end, AI has been systematically using Automated Insights technology for many years, generating more than 4000 short news items every quarter. The main uses of automatic text writing are in sports news, business news, and election results. On the other hand, the Associated Press managed to produce more than 50,000 news items per year through a system called “RADAR” (OI2, 2019). Also, thanks to the use of AI, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) has been able to analyze 2.6 terabytes of emails, documents, and databases, which resulted in the so-called Panama Papers (Marconi and Siegman, 2017). Recently, the journalism laboratory of the Luca de Tena Foundation and the Vocento Media Lab published some examples of real cases of media using AI (Luca de Tena Foundation, 2018; Vocento Media Lab, 2017; Luca de Tena Foundation, 2020): ●●

●●

●●

●●

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

●●

●●

●●

●●

●● ●●

The New York Times uses machine learning to look for patterns in its subscriber acquisition campaign data. In addition, AI is also being used in content production and management. The Blossom tool stands out, suggesting what content should be published on social networks because of its viral potential. Editor is an algorithm that recognizes people, locations, organizations, or concepts while the journalist writes an article. The Washington Post uses Oracle Virality to find out which stories are going viral in the first 30 minutes of publication. They also have MartyBot, which alerts the reporter when the deadline is approaching or if the time to deliver the piece has passed. In addition, it uses the Own advertising tool for brands to use their own content to produce sports news with the help of another robot, Heliograf. The BBC has an aggregator called “Juicer” that categorizes content by people, places, and organizations, although not in real time as The New York Times Editor. YLE, the Finnish public broadcaster, has Voitto to report on municipal elections and ice hockey. Los Angeles Times has developed the “Quake Bot” to report in real time, without human intervention, when an earthquake is detected in or around the city. In addition, they have a Data Desk, which focuses on data, and a Crime Alert Desk for Los Angeles neighborhoods. Sports Illustrated uses the Arkadium tool, as does the Los Angeles Times, to generate computer graphics. The Associated Press, the first to automate stories, along with The Washington Post, uses Automated Insights to generate presentations of any kind, from reports based on data from public department websites to minor league baseball rankings, giving staff more time for in-depth reporting. Le Monde used the Syllabs tool to produce 150,000 web pages (in four hours) during the last French legislative elections. Reuters uses machine learning algorithms to write stories. Yonhap, South Korea’s leading news agency, uses Soccerbot to write about English Premier League football matches.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Ethical and Deontological Keys in Journalism ●●

●●

Getty Images has an AI tool that recommends the best choice of images to accompany a story. Panels uses customizable filters and an algorithm that learns how an editor selects an image and optimizes its performance over time.

These initiatives show how AI is profoundly transforming journalism. Many journalistic practices, from finding information to contrasting sources, are being complemented by AI. In other tasks, AI tools are even partially replacing the activities of journalists. It is very likely that many thousands of journalistic texts around the world today owe their existence to AI (Thurman, Lewis, and Kunert, 2019), and that there is a progressive integration of AI into the daily work of journalists, who are beginning to consider it, despite undeniable controversies, “as a means and a tool, not as something that will displace them in the future” (Martínez, 2012). Thus, AI is becoming an ally of the communicators, practicing what has been called “increased journalism,” allowing informing on a larger scale and with greater accuracy, before an excess of information. At the same time, it is a competitor of human work that, besides generating changes in the labor structures, produces substantial transformations in the assignment of responsibilities and duties which affect both the managers of the new communication ecosystem, as well as the journalists in their traditional roles. We will now address the ethical and deontological questions around AI that pose a challenge to the media system and to the journalistic profession.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ethical and Deontological Keys in Journalism Traditional journalism has progressed with very concrete ethical values that have been formulated throughout a long tradition of theories and rules of conduct. From the beginning, it was accepted that the essential function of journalism implies an ideal of autonomy, together with the ideals of enlightenment and modern thought: “The central purpose of journalism is to tell the truth so that people can have the information they need to be autonomous” (Kovach and Rosenstiel, 2014). In this perspective, the values that stand out are: (a) the autonomy of people and their information needs to achieve that autonomy; and (b) the truth value of such information. In this initial paradigm, the separation between two very different actors is noted, on the one hand, people and, on the other, journalists. The connection between them occurs through a mechanism that is both subtle and complex; the journalist must recognize that which guarantees the autonomy of the person, and leads to providing the truthful information that would ensure such autonomy. This distinction, of course, is very clear insofar as journalists have means of information that are not already in the possession of the people; but it is much less clear when the journalist ceases to be an intermediary between the facts and their audience. It is worth identifying the great questions related to ethics and deontology that are derived from this paradigm that summarizes the traditional approach to the journalistic profession (Ethical Journalism Network, 2015). Namely: 1. Truth and accuracy: Journalists cannot always guarantee the “truth” but getting the facts right is the fundamental principle of journalism. One must always strive for accuracy, and ensure that all relevant facts are verified, and it must be stated when information cannot be corroborated.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

141

142

9  Ethical Challenges in Incorporating Artificial Intelligence into Newsrooms

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

2. Independence: Journalists must be independent voices. They should not act, formally or informally, on behalf of specific interests, whether political, business, or cultural. 3. Fairness and impartiality: Most stories have at least two sides. While there is no obligation to present all points of view in every piece of journalism, stories should be balanced and presented with context. Objectivity is not always possible, and may not always be desirable (for example, when reporting acts of extreme brutality or cruelty), but reporting fairly builds credibility and trust. 4. Humanity: Journalists should not harm anyone. What we publish can be hurtful, but we must be aware of the impact of our words and images on the lives of others. 5. Accountability: A sure sign of professionalism and responsible journalism is the ability to take responsibility for actions related to the professional practice. These are the ethical and deontological challenges of traditional journalism. However, the new media context in which we live has created new conditions for the demands of journalistic ethics. Today, people have in their hands digital media and social networks that empower them not only to obtain information, but to process and elaborate it, leaving aside, in many cases, journalistic mediation. They even have the means to guarantee the veracity of the information that they themselves process. What role should journalists play in this new context and what would their ethical obligations be? The most widespread response has been to strengthen the role of journalists as conductors or moderators of public space. In that sense, it corresponds to the journalists promoting and extending the social conversation that occurs spontaneously in society. James Carey (1989) has defended the idea that, perhaps, the purpose of journalism today is only to amplify social conversation. This would be tantamount to supporting the idea that journalism should essentially be dedicated to creating community and sustaining democracy. Alternatively, something that does not differ much from the initial values of journalism, journalists are intended to act as watchmen and sentinels who motivate their audiences to move beyond their comfort zones—consuming news that only reinforces their previous convictions and prejudices—and, in the same vein, give voice and visibility to the forgotten and marginalized members of the system. In short, the intention is that journalism is able to offer a variety of viewpoints that do not necessarily coincide with the traditional ones. Probably both values are inseparable, and are concretized in what Kovach and Rosenstiel (2014) consider essential elements in the duty of journalism: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Become an intelligent information collector. To serve as a leader of a permanent discussion forum. Empowering audiences. Provide a reference model. Be a community builder.

In our view, these new functions attributed to journalism can easily be related to specific ethical challenges. Thus, the function of gathering information and serving as a model of reference must be associated, especially, with the duties of truthfulness and impartiality already mentioned with reference to the role of traditional journalism.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Ethical Requirements Related to Artificial Intelligence

As far as the function of forum leader, community builder, and empowerment is concerned, the ethical demands that would correspond to it do not coincide with any of the ethical challenges of classical journalism. But they are almost the same as those that Habermas (1987) formulated when characterizing the conditions of a democratic public sphere. This especially applies to conditions that refer to the equitable distribution of communication competencies, and equality among participants.

Ethical Requirements Related to Artificial Intelligence Besides these general ethical requirements of journalism, we should add those of AI. In our view, the best and most recent expression of AI responsibilities has perhaps been formulated by the EU expert group (European Parliament, 2019). Namely:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

1. Human agency and overview: AI systems should enable equitable societies by supporting human agency and fundamental rights and not by reducing, limiting, or misleading human autonomy. 2. Robustness and security: Reliable AI requires algorithms to be sufficiently safe, reliable, and robust to handle errors and inconsistencies during all phases of the AI systems’ life cycles. 3. Data privacy and control: Citizens must have complete control over their own data, while the data that revolves around them is not used to harm or discriminate against them. 4. Transparency: The traceability of AI systems must be guaranteed. 5. Diversity, non-discrimination, and equity: AI systems must take into account all human skills and requirements, and ensure accessibility. 6. Social and ecological well-being: AI systems must be used to enhance positive social change, as well as environmental sustainability and responsibility. 7. Accountability: Mechanisms must be implemented to ensure accountability of AI systems and their results. It is not difficult to match journalistic demands with those of AI in general. In doing so, they could all be synthesized into three broad categories: 1. Human responsibility: The need to strengthen the human factor that is present in both, as well as the need to demand responsibility, well-being, and ecological respect and that of non-discrimination and equity. The need for robustness, security, and respect for privacy can also be added here. 2. Truthfulness and transparency: Truth, independence, precision, and impartiality are easily matched with the need for transparency. 3. Equity of communication skills, to ensure constructive social conversation and a democratic functioning of the public sphere. Therefore, from our point of view, it is easy to unify the ethical demands in both systems, journalistic work, and AI systems. It is enough to consider them as an integrated structure of autonomous functioning in which the task of both parts, human and nonhuman, must be considered as a whole.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

143

144

9  Ethical Challenges in Incorporating Artificial Intelligence into Newsrooms

However, for a more precise analysis, it is convenient to consider the areas into which journalistic work is divided, taking as a reference the model of analysis formulated in the studies carried out by the RTVE-UPM (Polytechnic University of Madrid) chair, identifying in each area each of the pertinent demands.

The Incorporation of Artificial Intelligence into Workflows: The Working Model Proposed in RTVE First of all, it is convenient to classify and arrange the field we want to analyze and to know its specific areas, and hence study how ethical and deontological questions of a very different nature arise in each of them. The workflow developed by RTVE has been taken as a reference for the development of this analysis, focusing on how this has given rise to an innovation strategy through the implementation of AI. It should be noted that no comparable framework of any public television in Europe has been published on this subject. So, RTVE can be considered a pioneer in this field, and we therefore take it as a reference point. In its research, RTVE has distinguished between six phases of work in the communication process, in which different AI tools are already available or are planned to be implemented in the short term: ●●

●●

●●

●●

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

●●

●●

News detection phase: From the moment a newsworthy event occurs, until the news reaches the newsroom and it is decided to cover the news. Information gathering and structuring phase: From the moment it is decided to cover the news and the phase of gathering information, obtaining images, audios, or direct testimonies begins. Journalistic writing phase: Elaboration of the news, in which the journalist compiles all the information and elaborates the piece. The phase of publication of the information in the different channels: That goes from the linear emission to the publication in websites or portals of access to data bases. This phase also includes aspects related to the personalization of the distribution or even of the content. Archiving and conservation phase: Once the communication process has been completed, a complete metadata of the audiovisual material is required, prior to archiving the content for later use. Reception and use phase: The different aspects related to the analysis and evaluation made by the audience and the influencers on the contents, even in real time.

Phase 1: Pre-alert or Journalistic Alert and Event Monitoring Systems We have focused in the news detection phase on all the alert or pre-alert systems that can help journalists work on events or facts that can be turned into journalistic information. The aim of these systems is to complement the traditional sources of information for journalists by means of automatic devices: information agencies, press offices, social actors, etc. Many of these warning systems are composed of devices for capturing information, or notifying journalists, but sometimes they even elaborate information in immediate response to the event in question.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

The Incorporation of Artificial Intelligence into Workflows: The Working Model Proposed in RTVE

A few references will help us to understand the area to which we are referring. In March 2014, Los Angeles Times published the first news story written by an AI tool that responded to an automatic warning device designed to detect seismic movements. It was a 4.4 magnitude earthquake that became the focus of the news. An algorithm that was fed by official sources was the first to offer the news, only 3 minutes after it occurred (Salazar, 2018). On the other hand, it is now possible to have bots that automatically and continuously track information that appears in different sources, including social networks. These automatic tools can detect, in such information, the presence of words or small texts related to the previously selected areas of interest. Assuming that an incident occurs, it then begins to be recorded when reflected in different social networks, from different sources, both individuals and local public bodies or some local media. The pre-alert system would collect this initial information that appears on social networks conveniently filtered, geolocated, and grouped—and would communicate it in a personalized way to the editors of the section or sections that are going to cover this event. Thus, each professional will only receive information in their area of interest, at any given time. This task is especially delicate and complex. Information on events in Spanish, which appear on the Web, may refer to Spain or to other countries that use the same language. This is the case of information referring to cities such as Guadalajara or Mérida, written in Spanish, where the analysis system must try to differentiate whether it refers to Spain or not. Once the alarm has been triggered, it is also possible to automatically create an event presentation and monitoring screen, aimed at professionals, where the available information related to this event is presented at all times. In this case, it is a question of carrying out a more precise filtering of the information present on the network, automatically selecting the information published by official media agencies and the media. The AI tools that could be integrated in the first phase of a journalistic alert would: ●●

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

●●

●●

●●

detect the event and geolocate it, group the information that appears on the Web, understanding that it is the same event and make a basic interpretation of what is happening, launch the pre-alarm to the journalist or the section of the newsroom that should cover that event, generate the monitoring screen of the event with information from other media, official bodies, and others.

The news provided by these pre-alerts systems is not verified or compared; these validation tasks are the journalist’s own. However, these systems do give the journalist the opportunity, in case the information is true, to get ahead of other sources and offer images and information before other media. RTVE has tested this type of technology with already developed products, such as Dataminr (Figure 9.1). Also, together with Carlos III University, it is investigating new local pre-alert systems. The project called “Social Media Radar” (Figure 9.2) continuously explores the information that appears on social networks, filters it, and presents it on tablets and smartphones through systems such as Telegram. It is currently being tested in Castilla la Mancha, Extremadura, and Catalonia.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

145

146

9  Ethical Challenges in Incorporating Artificial Intelligence into Newsrooms

Figure 9.1  Dataminr pre-alert system display.

Figure 9.2  Social Media Radar pre-alert system developed by UC3M and RTVE.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ethical Considerations

By identifying this field of application and taking into account its workflows, it becomes uncomplicated to identify the major issues affecting the field of journalistic ethics in this particular area. With regard to human responsibility, the deontological and ethical objective would be for the journalist–AI ecosystem to confirm that the journalist has the ultimate responsibility in the final analysis. Only the journalist can guarantee the necessary skills to ensure the analysis of adequate information and the making of relevant decisions. In such cases, it may be advisable to establish filters and firewalls, both in the decisions of the AI system and in the dissemination of its alerts. These filters may be random, intentional, selective, or even mandatory in certain cases. But all must involve the journalist. Regarding veracity and transparency, both the functioning of the AI system and the criteria for the selection of alerts should be transparent and open to analysis and public discussion by the community of users of the system, and also among its audiences.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

The Incorporation of Artificial Intelligence into Workflows: The Working Model Proposed in RTVE

Finally, with regard to the equity of communication skills, in order to ensure a constructive social conversation, the different warning systems should be shared with communities of experts who will guarantee their validity and ensure that the skills with which the information system is enriched can be shared by its audiences.

Phase 2: Action Once the journalist or the news section is alerted and it is decided to cover a news item, the tasks of gathering information, obtaining images, audios, or direct testimonies begin. The journalist should give some basic instructions to a bot so that: ●●

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

●●

It collects, in an automatic and structured way, the audiovisual information available in the archive about the character or the information to be covered, and organize it into work folders. It is supported by external audiovisual information that could be used in the preparation of the documentation. It would also include a search for audience content, which has appeared on the network on this topic.

Everything suggests that the use of the so-called Semantic Web could be a key element in this work. The Semantic Web is a concept linked to the extended Web. Any authorized user of the Internet or networked information systems can find answers to their questions in a faster and easier way, thanks to better defined information (Carlos III University, 2016). The aim is to provide the Web and information systems with more meaning (more semantics) to obtain solutions to common problems in the search for information, by the use of a common infrastructure, through which it is possible to share, process, and transfer information easily. The extended Web, based on meaning, is supported by universal languages that solve the problems caused by a web without semantics, in which sometimes access to information becomes a difficult and frustrating task. The Semantic Web would be an extension of the current Web, where searches can be made without focusing only on the parameters searched for, but also on their meaning. That is, a space where information can be interpreted by both human agents and computerized agents. From the RTVE Documentary Funds Directorate, and in coordination with the EBU (European Broadcasting Union) and other European public televisions, some changes in the structure of the Documentary Funds archive are being undertaken, with the aim of adopting the Semantic Web model for these funds in the future, and as a spearhead for other services within RTVE. Ethical Considerations

With regard to human responsibility. the ethical and deontological objective in this case would consist of the selection and comparison of sources that would obligatorily include the activity of the journalists, and would be subject to constant evaluation and revision. In this respect, it is fundamental to evaluate the veracity and transparency of the sources and the systems of organization of the information.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

147

148

9  Ethical Challenges in Incorporating Artificial Intelligence into Newsrooms

Finally, as far as the equity of communication competences is concerned, it should be ensured that AI systems do not systematically, or with a bias, privilege any source of information, and that these could be continuously enriched.

Phase 3: Elaboration of the News With the information available at the work desk, the journalist could elaborate the news for its later publication. In this phase, three AI tools can be incorporated to support the journalist’s work: ●●

●●

●●

In the editorial office, as the basic text of the news is written, the system, depending on what is written, shows complementary information and accompanies the editor in their task. In this task of accompaniment, several levels and intensities are distinguished, and in the future comments and notes may be suggested, depending on the information available. In the verification of contents and detection of fake news, helping the writer to discover possible deceptions in the use of images or external content that could be the result of malicious manipulation. Finally, a tool to help in the selection and use of own images.

Ethical Considerations

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

With regard to human responsibility, it is important to ensure the participation of the journalist in the programming phase of the AI systems, as well as in the training, supervision, and evaluation phases. As for truthfulness and transparency, as we have expressed regarding other phases, both the functioning of the AI system and the criteria for selecting alarms should be transparent and susceptible to analysis and public discussion by the community of users of the system, as well as among their audiences. Finally, concerning the equity of communication competencies, to ensure a constructive social conversation, the different writing systems should be shared with communities of experts that guarantee their validity, and ensure that the capacities with which the information system is enriched can be shared by its audience.

Phase 4: Publication The process of disseminating a news item, traditionally known as a broadcast, has long been complemented by publication in other media via broadband or mobile phones, using devices with a great capacity to manage audiovisual content. The use of these resources allows access to information at any time, place, and device of interest. The introduction of technologies for automatic processing of audiovisual content and the use of AI tools must also allow the personalization of the information offered. Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the MIT Media Lab, already imagined in 1995 the existence of machines that would filter, classify, select, and handle multimedia, written or audiovisual information for each user (Negroponte, 1995, p. 16). Such personalization obviously starts with the knowledge of our audience, one by one, and the construction of an offer that is adapted to each user. Thus, for example,

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

The Incorporation of Artificial Intelligence into Workflows: The Working Model Proposed in RTVE

when providing sports information, while the broadcast offers information on the sports followed by the majority, especially first-division football, we find that many users are not necessarily interested in that information, but are interested in other sports that are not reported. The same is true in the cultural field or in the weather forecast. This situation, which we are not aware of in the world of broadcasting, can be present in the new environment of personalized communication. In this fourth phase of production, we can incorporate three AI tools: ●●

●●

●●

One that handles information about the interests and preferences of each of the individuals, who make up our audience. A second that is capable of automatically classifying content that is created, so that it can be offered to users interested in this type of information. A third, capable of creating more than one presentation on the same newsworthy event, adapted to each user. This can be the case, for example, for weather information for a coastal town; the same aspects are not of interest to a city dweller as they are to a surfer or sailor.

Ethical Considerations

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

With regard to human responsibility, it should be considered that AI can be used for the construction of more-or-less closed user communities and that, by doing so, the functions of community builders are being fulfilled. It is therefore a matter of ensuring the openness of these groups, their exposure to information that does not consolidate their comfort zone, and that ensures an authentic and inclusive social dialog. With regard to truthfulness and transparency, it would be desirable for all the algorithms and user selections of the AI system to be transparent, known, and modifiable by each of the users. They should also be subject to criticism and open evaluation. Finally, as far as the equity of communication competences is concerned, it would be necessary to assume that the different active user communities could share their knowledge about the filters and choices of the system, discuss them, and make them their own by modifying them or by influencing them.

Phase 5: Archiving Once the communication process has been completed, in this phase of the workflow the audiovisual production is archived for later use. The aim is to prepare the contents and document them, to be archived in an appropriate way, to allow its consultation or an accessible and simple reuse in the future. The novelty in this case is that the archive, in addition to being consulted by documentalists or journalists, can be automatically accessed by AI tools. The information that describes each of the contents goes beyond the simple structure of a video plus some audios and some metadata. It is about storing it as knowledge, adding semantic and ontological metadata. This additional information, which describes the content, meaning, and relationship of the data, must be provided in a formal way, so that it can be automatically evaluated by processing machines. The aim is to improve the process by extending the interoperability between computer systems, using intelligent agents (programs that search for information without human operators).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

149

150

9  Ethical Challenges in Incorporating Artificial Intelligence into Newsrooms

Given the amount of information generated daily, this process needs to be directed, as far as possible, toward AI tools that automate it. These tools must be capable, with a low percentage of error and minimum supervision, of: ●● ●● ●● ●● ●● ●● ●●

separating the video into shots and sequences, detecting relevant frames, passing the audio to text and analyzing it, recognizing characters, entities, and environments; either through image or sound, sorting the news according to content, structuring the information, storing it in the archive system.

Ethical Considerations

Human responsibility here concerns the requirement for openness and conservation. That of verification and transparency is related to the open possibility of suppression of documents that may violate human rights, and to the good and loyal use of all the contents archived, respecting all the rights involved. Finally, it is the public availability of such archives that can ensure the truly equitable distribution of communication competencies.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Phase 6: Analysis and Evaluation of the Audience The last phase of the communication process, which cannot be overlooked, is the collection, analysis, and understanding of the information generated about us by our users. It is a matter of having information that is as precise as possible, about consumption, opinions, evaluations, and feelings of our audience, both about the different facets of the programs, as well as about the presenters or the formats. The analysis of feelings is an area of natural language processing (NLP), whose objective is to analyze the opinions, feelings, assessments, attitudes, and emotions of people toward certain entities such as products, services, organizations, individuals, problems, events, topics, and their attributes. The aim is to extract an opinion, analyze it, and determine its polarity: positive, negative, or neutral (Henriquez et al., 2017). In this case, the tools are based on tracking, collecting, and processing information, which is published by both individuals and opinion leaders in the various media related to social networks. These systems usually use ontologies and automatic learning. The information must be collected, analyzed, classified, and presented automatically. The process is continuous and the information generated is practically in real time, as events happen. An example of the use of these technologies is the development of the SMART platform (Monitoring and Alert System in the Network of Spanish Radio and Television), which is being researched jointly by Carlos III University and RTVE. One of the objectives of this work is to deepen the intelligent analysis of large data for the prediction of audience and the impact of contents, in addition to having greater knowledge of the audiovisual business, in order to improve the public service of RTVE contents.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Conclusions

Ethical Considerations

The aspects mentioned in the publication and writing phases are entirely applicable here (Figure 9.3).

Figure 9.3  Summary of AI phases in workflows.

Conclusions

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Artificial intelligence is currently at an early stage of development, and its applications cannot yet be evaluated through empirical research. However, many of the ethical challenges they pose can and should be examined at the very moment when their application is decided, because as Latorre (2019) has pointed out: humans find it very difficult to coexist with more and more intelligent machines (…) computers that run complex algorithms frighten us because it seems that they can decide for themselves and subject us to their will (…) the essence of our nature is at stake. If we create machines that surpass us intellectually, what is the place of humans? Perhaps it is this fear, or the foreseeable scenarios that we imagine that force us to anticipate and prevent ethical problems. The European Parliament argues that it has adopted two resolutions aimed at regulating the use of AI and robotics, in 2017 (European Parliament, 2017) and more recently, in 2019 (European Parliament, 2019). Hence, any AI system has to be analyzed and examined in its context (Marconi and Siegman, 2017). The conceptual framework that we have presented helps us to precisely question the viability of AI applications that can be incorporated into newsrooms, and thus to address the challenges we face. Taking the ethical dimension into account will help us to strengthen the necessary relationship of trust between journalists and their audiences, just when this trust

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

151

152

9  Ethical Challenges in Incorporating Artificial Intelligence into Newsrooms

seems to be breaking down. According to Digital News Report 2019, only 43% of Spanish users usually trust the information they receive, compared to 32% of skeptics (Vara-Miguel et al., 2019). Media credibility has fallen by eight points since 2017. This loss of confidence not only occurs in traditional information media but is aggravated by news published on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, or WhatsApp. In our view, only a true ethical review, with guarantees of transparency and interaction, will ensure that AI is incorporated into newsrooms in an efficient and sustainable manner. However, this implementation is not automatic; it requires giving any innovation in this field an ethical dimension and allowing open debates between all those involved, one way or another, in the field of journalism. The conceptual framework that we have presented here aims to contribute to this innovation and to make journalism richer and of higher quality.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Alpaydin, E. (2016). Machine Learning. The New AI. Cambridge: MIT Press. Boden, M. (2017). Inteligencia Artificial. Madrid: Turner Noema. Carey, J. (1989). Communication as Culture. New York: Routledge. Carlos III University. (2016). Guía Breve de Web Semántica. https://www.w3c.es/ Divulgacion/GuiasBreves/WebSemantica Carlson, M. (2015). The robotic reporter. Automated journalism and the redefinition of labor, compositional forms, and journalistic authority. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 416–431. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2014.976412 Diakopoulos, N. (2015). Algorithmic accountability. Journalistic investigation of computational power structures. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 398–415. https://doi.org/10.1080/2167 0811.2014.976411 Dörr, K.N. (2016). Mapping the field of Algorithmic Journalism. Digital Journalism, 4(6), 700–722. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2015.1096748 Ethical Journalism Network. (2015). The 5 Principles of Ethical Journalism https://ethicaljournalismnetwork.org/who-we-are/5-principles-of-journalism European Parliament. (2019). Libro blanco sobre la inteligencia artificial. Un enfoque europeo orientado a la excelencia y la confianza. COM(2020) 65 final, Bruselas. https:// ec.europa.eu/info/sites/info/files/commission-white-paper-artificial-intelligencefeb2020_es.pdf European Parliament. (2017). Normas de derecho civil sobre robótica. P8_TA(2017)0051 (February 16). Habermas, J. (1987). Teoría de la acción comunicativa. Madrid: Taurus. Henriquez, C., Pla, F., Hurtado, L., and Guzmán, J. (2017). Análisis de sentimientos a nivel de aspecto usando ontologías y aprendizaje automático. Procesamiento del lenguaje natural, (59), 49–56. http://rua.ua.es/dspace/handle/10045/69091 Kovach, B. and Rosenstiel, T. (2014). The Elements of Journalism. New York: Three Rivers Press. Latorre, J.I. (2019). Ética Para Máquinas. Barcelona: Ariel. Luca de Tena Foundation. (2018). Inteligencia artificial: para qué puede usarse en periodismo y qué están haciendo los medios (November 6). https://www.laboratoriodeperiodismo.org/ inteligencia-artificial-para-que-puede-usarse-en-periodismo-y-que-estanhaciendo-los-medios

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

Luca de Tena Foundation. (2020). Guía para introducir la inteligencia artificial en las redacciones. https://laboratoriodeperiodismo.org/guia-para-introducir-la-inteligenciaartificial-en-las-redacciones Marconi, F. and Siegman, A. (2017). The Future of Augmented Journalism: A Guide for Newsrooms in the Age of Smart Machines. Associated Press. https://insights.ap.org/ uploads/images/the-future-of-augmented-journalism_ap-report.pdf Marr, D. (2010). Vision. A Computational Investigation into the Human Representation and Processing of Visual Information. Cambridge: MIT Press. Martínez, O.R. (2012). Periodismo en la era digital. Revista mexicana de comunicación (131). http://mexicanadecomunicacion.com.mx/rmc/2012/09/27/periodismo-en-la-eradigital Negroponte, N. (1995). El Mundo Digital. Barcelona: Ediciones B. OI2. (2019). La inteligencia artificial aplicada a informativos 2019–2020. Barcelona. http:// www.gabinetecomunicacionyeducacion.com/sites/default/files/field/adjuntos/ informe1.pdf Oremus, W. (2015). No more pencils, no more books (October 25). http://www.slate.com/ articles/technology/technology/2015/10/adaptive_learning_software_is_replacing_ textbooks_and_upending_american.html?via=gdpr-consent Parlamento Europeo. (2019). Una política industrial global europea en materia de inteligencia artificial y robótica. P8_TA-PROV(2019)0081 (February 12). Salazar, I. (2018). Robots and artificial intelligence: new challenges of journalism. Doxa Comunicación (27), 295–315. https://doi.org/10.31921/doxacom.n27a15 Thurman, N., Lewis, S., and Kunert, J. (2019). Algorithms, automation, and news. Digital Journalism, 7(8), 980–992. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21670811.20 19.1685395 Túñez-López, M., Toural-Bran, C., and Valdiviezo-Abad, C. (2019). Automatización, bots y algoritmos en la redacción de noticias. Impacto y calidad del periodismo artificial. Revista Latina de Comunicación Social (74), 1411–1433. https://doi.org/10.4185/ RLCS-2019-1391 Vara-Miguel, A., Negredo, S., Amoedo, A., and Moreno, E. (2019). Digital News Report España 2019. Navarra: Facultad de Comunicación, Universidad de Navarra. http:// www.digitalnewsreport.es/los-usuarios-espanoles-se-previenen-de-la-desinformaciony-demandan-a-los-medios-mayor-profundidad-y-vigilancia Vocento Media Lab. (2017). ¿Quieres saber qué implica el auge de los robots para los medios? El periodismo en la era de la inteligencia artificial (June 23). https://medium. com/@VocentoLab/quieres-saber-qué-implica-el-auge-de-los-robots-para-los-medios73acfb908615

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

153

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved. News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

155

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Journalistic Innovation at the Service of the Public

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved. News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

157

10 Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know Michaëla Cancela-Kieffer Agence France-Presse

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Introduction1 Read these words aloud: gigabyte, terabyte, petabyte, exabyte, zettabyte. Now try to guess what they really mean without referring to your old Maths and/or Greek etymology lessons: how many zeros? Numbers get harder and harder to comprehend. And, as journalists like myself might fail to correctly answer those questions, so might the readers. However, understanding data has never been more important. In 2019, the word “love” was posted online 23,211 times every minute, 188 million emails were sent, and almost 10,000 users took a Uber ride—every minute (source: Domo, Data Never Sleeps). Every move we make generates bytes of data for private companies and governments. And as the datafication of our society becomes a reality, data science and artificial intelligence (AI) will help those who own that information to analyze and predict needs, behaviors, and changes—while revolutionizing every aspect of our lives—from healthcare and manufacturing, to journalism and transportation. Algorithms will make decisions based on all that data. The COVID-19 pandemic is the saddest proof of the importance of data. Decisions are made based on information about the spread of the virus and countries that have poor local data are at most risk. On the other side of the coin, concerns over civil liberties arise when governments consider collecting data about every move we make to enforce social distancing. 1  This chapter does not in any way represent the views of my employer, Agence France-Presse. It is not an expert article either. Although I am passionate about data journalism and AI, it is not my specialty. I just hope to humbly contribute to the global debate about the way journalists should cover the world we live in, from the perspective of public liberties, a field I fell in love with as a law graduate before becoming a journalist. I have spent more than half of my career roaming the world to meet real people and try to honestly report what they feel and experience. Although we must understand machines and better explain their impact, we should never just stay behind our screens. Journalism also needs to stay on the ground. All my acknowledgements go to the “real” experts who helped me with one-to-one interviews: Victoria Baranetsky, Alberto  Cairo, Judith Duportail, Robert Gebeloff, Bahareh Heravi, Alexandre Lechenet, Simon Rogers, and Nicolas Kayser-Bril. This article was edited by my friend and excellent colleague Marianne Barriaux. It was encouraged by Maria Santos-Sainz, journalism professor at the Bordeaux Aquitaine Institute of Journalism. And made possible by the patience of my son Santiago. A big thank you to María Luengo Cruz and Susana Herrera Damas for encouraging me to write about this topic. News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

158

10  Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know

This disruption is happening as journalism has to adapt to an era of information warfare that presents, as Emily Bell writes, “both a personal and existential threat” for the media. Basically, there has never been so much information available, but it has never been more abstract, fragile, and elusive. Last but not least, an increasing number of people do not get their news from “traditional media;” 55% of Americans get it on social media “often or sometimes,” according to the Pew Research Center (2019). Not only are we losing ground due to a lack of training when it comes to accessing, understanding, and explaining crucial information that might shape our societies— such as that generated by data and algorithms—but we are also unable to reach the recipients. So, where does journalism stand? Is there still a role for the Fourth Estate and how can it be maintained? Are journalists still able to help the public understand the environment we inhabit? This chapter advocates for an approach to journalism that would embrace The Disruption with the ultimate purpose of defending its core mission, safeguarding “the people’s right to know.” As society becomes increasingly more complex, new intellectual and practical datadriven tools are needed for journalism to thrive. The time might also have come to concentrate on what really matters. For instance, do we still need to dedicate countless resources to the soundbits of politicians that can easily be found in their social media accounts? It is also time for creativity and radical collaborative journalism involving other disciplines—the obvious ones being mathematics and coding.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

A Look at the Founding Fathers Some 2500 years ago, Greek citizens started debating about almost everything, including the very existence of their gods. Protagoras, a famous philosopher, had wondered if those gods were not the product of our imagination, while sophist intellectuals would tour this wealthy part of the world questioning every belief (Mossé, 1971). The rich city-state of Athens was directly ruled by its citizens, who would decide on matters as important as going to war. But philosophers such as Plato had doubts about the efficiency of direct democracy. Thucydides, author of The History of the Peloponnesian War, also had his reservations. The aristocrat who would later be considered the greatest of Greek historians was very critical of the Athenian political culture. As Josiah Ober writes, “what the demos collectively opined was given, through the act of voting, the status of fact.” But “Athenian political culture was based on collective opinion rather than on certain knowledge and on the assumption that opinion could be translated into practical reality through democratic political process” (Ober, 1993). Information and opinion would be delivered by public speakers—in fact all citizens were trained for that—and speakers were involved in a contest for public attention: “They could not afford to make the issue seem too difficult for an audience to comprehend within the chronological constraints imposed by an oral presentation (…) They

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

A Look at the Founding Fathers

were interested parties, and thus looked at the world from a predetermined perspective” (Ober, 1993). How would the citizens then be able to make informed choices? This is the context in which Thucydides designed a method to describe reality, separating facts from opinion. The ultimate goal of his book was to give a thorough account to citizens of what happened during the war so that they could, in the future, make informed choices. In his writings he clearly tells the reader what the checked facts are and what can be considered a personal opinion. These were his words:

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

And with regard to my factual reporting of events of the war, I have made it a principle not to write down the first story that came my way, and not … to be guided by my own general impressions: either I was present myself at the events which I have described or else I have heard of them from eyewitnesses whose reports I have checked with as much thoroughness as possible [emphasis added] (o.v. 411 BCE). (Thucydides, 1972, p. 48) That method would later be called “History.” More recently, Australian author Keith Windschuttle (1999) argued that Thucydides created the method that defines “journalism” long before it existed. In his book Journalism, Ethics and Society, David Berry (2016, p. 40) agrees: “It’s fair to credit him (Thucydides) with a spirit of journalism, to produce information that would serve a civic debate [emphasis added].” Edmund Burke’s notion of the Fourth Estate also clearly establishes what journalists’ role should be in society. And also does nineteenth-century writer Thomas Carlyle in The French Revolution (Berry, 2016). The “spirit” of journalism is much older than the word itself. It is “the attempt to be culturally objective and self-critical, rather than subjective and self-defensive” (Windschuttle, 1999). This attempt to be “culturally objective and self-critical” has been a pillar of democracy from its very beginning, long before the birth of the Fourth Estate and republican forms of governance. “Without democracy, there can be no journalism. When democracy falters, journalism falters, and when journalism goes awry, democracy goes awry” writes James Carey (2007, p. 13). Looking back at Greece’s Athenian democracy could be inspiring today. Never has the agora been so vast; it is formed by billions connected to the Internet. The twentyfirst century’s public speakers are also, and more than ever, involved in a contest for “people’s attention.” Also, as the oldest forms of journalism are disrupted, going back to the essence of journalism could be of great help. James Carey recalls in his essay that “journalism” comes from the French word “jour,” “day” in French, and refers to the practice of recording daily events. Once a private practice, it became a way of recording events for entire communities. It transferred “a private habit onto the community: the keeping of a collective record of the facts and events” (Carey, 2007, p. 8). But is it not also that “the Fourth Estate, armed to the teeth with a new confronting rationality, distributes information into the public domain enabling and empowering the public to produce new forms of critical thought” (Berry, 2016, p. 67).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

159

160

10  Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know

What has all of this to do with data journalism, computational journalism, and algorithms? It seemed important, in an era of doubt and disruption, and as many new storytelling formats emerge, to dig deep in our history to understand what is essential and has always been. History tells us that the common ground could not be simpler; citizens need to make informed choices. And as Athenians did 25 centuries ago, world citizens need—probably more than ever—to separate facts from opinion in a very complex world overloaded with information and disinformation. Without neglecting experiments such as “gonzo journalism,” or other forms of journalism where subjectivity is assumed, journalism based on facts could not be more crucial if the aim is to “empower the public to produce new forms of critical thought” and go beyond the traditional “he said—she said” cycle made even worse by social media and spin doctors. Today’s facts can be found in people’s testimonies, but also in court proceedings, police reports, hospital records, diplomatic cables, air quality monitoring stations, customs clearance records, mobility reports, census monitoring, and so on. All of these can be easily aggregated and analyzed to become data available for governments and private interests to make informed decisions. If the press is to fulfill its role, it is therefore central that it be able to access this new mine of information and act as a watchdog of its use, to ensure that it is for social good. Journalists must be able not only to access data and algorithms, but need to have enough skills to “source, verify, and scrutinize” them in order to be able to help citizens “relate themselves to the world beyond them and to vanquish the true from the false, the gold from the bullshit” (Nguyen, 2018, p. 6).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Using Data for Social Good Is an Old Thing John Snow, often presented as a role model by data journalists, did exactly that much earlier, even before statistical science even existed as a discipline. A physician, he was in London when a major cholera outbreak reached the district of Soho in August 1854. Snow decided to map the cases and observed that they were clustered around one contaminated pump. He was able to prove that water, not air, was the way the disease was spreading, therefore helping fight this terrible illness. In the Foreword of News, on numbers and public opinion in a data-driven world (Nguyen, 2018), an illuminating book that should be mandatory for every journalism student, its editor An Nguyen recalls that as soon as 1920, Walter Lippmann ardently argued for this approach in his book Liberty and the News, inviting journalists to adopt scientific rigor, using “measurement, analysis, and comparison” (as cited in Nguyen, 2018, p. 23). Another very early adopter was Philip Meyer, the father of “precision journalism,” who realized the power of journalism based on data some 50 years ago. Sometime in the 1960s, Meyer read a dystopian novel in which politicians use computer simulations to predict how various statements and policies could affect the electorate. He then became passionate about social science research methods. He felt he had to understand them and it was the basis of his application to Harvard University to study those methods. In 1968, a year after he completed his Nieman Fellowship at Harvard, he won a Pulitzer prize with the Detroit Free Press for creating a detailed survey to

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

A Look at the Founding Fathers

understand the real roots of the Detroit riots in 1967. He later spent more than 20 years teaching students on how to build stories from public records, using computer-assisted reporting. In 1989, the Missouri School of Journalism founded the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Journalism (NICAR), whose mission has been to make government data sets available to journalists and train them “in the art of acquiring, cleaning and analyzing data” (Investigative Reporters and Editors, about NICAR section). In its broader sense, data journalism now covers “precision journalism, computerassisted reporting and computational journalism” (Interview with Alberto Cairo, Knight Chair in Visual Journalism at the School of Communication of the University of Miami, UM). The first and second borrow techniques from social sciences. The idea is to access data in order to have valuable statistical information and use computers to analyze it. Computational journalism is the latest layer and combines computational skills such as coding and journalism. It has finally gained ground outside the United States with journalists such as Paul Bradshaw or Simon Rogers, the 2009 founder of The Guardian datablog, credited by some academics to be the inventor of the expression “data journalism” (Rogers, 2011). As Simon Rogers, now data editor at Google, says, “data brings a sense of certainty” in a very uncertain world. So how ready are journalists for this data-driven world? As this chapter is being written, the coronavirus pandemic is proving more than ever how crucial basic data literacy is. Governments are making decisions based on data and media publish daily charts and maps based on the numbers they are provided with. The New York Times had a dedicated team of 30 people working around the clock to keep track of the figures for its charts. Some media act like real watchdogs and try to go beyond official statements, investigating how the data is gathered, asking questions such as, “are we counting the elderly in retirement homes?” As Swedish physician Hans Rosling (2018, p. 20), professor of international health and author of Factfulness, once wrote: “It is not the numbers that are interesting … It is what they tell us about the lives behind the numbers.” In this major crisis, data illiteracy has also generated controversies. One has been around the number of confirmed deaths versus countries’ population. Belgium would then have the worst situation, in terms of deaths per capita. But what deaths were really counted in each country? How many postmortems were conducted? For every journalist, the pandemic has revealed the multiple lies behind numbers when one does not question the sources. Some media took the numbers for granted, without raising questions. Most of the time, they did not contextualize and forgot to mention how the raw data was gathered, taking several weeks to do so. On a more positive note, it has been a real-life learning process for many. “The simple fact that journalists and educated readers were debating about ratios is a giant step ahead,” journalist and designer Alberto Cairo told me in April 2020. It was also a great collective learning experience at AFP, where the data and graphics department built its own global database of the pandemic with official tallies collected in every country by our bureaus.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

161

162

10  Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know

Where Do We Stand?

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Pulitzer Prizes Several studies have proved how extensively data is now being used in the media. Statistical information has become a “crucial tool to shape public opinion” (Nguyen, 2018, p. 4) and has also become widely used by journalists. As Andreas and Greenhill (2010, p. 1) put it, “if something is not measured, it does not exist” and will therefore not be “recognized, defined, prioritized, put in the agenda and debated.” According to the 2019 State of Technology in Global Newsrooms report by the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ), a study based on more than 4100 responses from journalists and managers in 149 countries, “the increasing reliance on data marks the biggest change in the way journalists practice their profession today.” Among the respondents, 61% say they analyze and use data to create stories at least weekly, compared to 36% two years earlier. Only 16% of journalists never use datarelated skills. Journalism with data is now popular in newsrooms and made easier by the many free tools available online—Datawrapper, Tableau, Flourish, to name some—to present data in engaging, fancy, colorful ways with maps and interactive charts. A look at this year’s Pulitzer prizes also demonstrates the central role data journalism has taken in investigative journalism. The Anchorage Daily News collected its own data in Alaska, one village after another, and eventually found that 70 communities had no police protection and also had some of the highest rates of sexual assault. With ProPublica, it won the public service prize. The Washington Post, winner of the “explanatory reporting” award, analyzed multiple temperature data sets to find the locations around the globe where the temperature has already climbed by more than 2°C degrees, showing how dangerous new hot zones are spreading around the world. Four other awards, Breaking News, Investigative Reporting, Local, and National Reporting, were won by organizations that also used, at some point, elements of data journalism by analyzing public data, building databases, or using clear graphics to explain a complex story. Data journalism is flourishing and serving the best investigative journalism.

Big Wins … and Many Failings The day-to-day work of newsrooms, however, is still miles away from this ideal. Even though six out of ten respondents of the ICFJ survey say they analyze and use data to create stories at least weekly, the way they do it might not always serve the people’s right to know by sourcing, verifying, and scrutinizing the data. A striking study done by Cardiff University led by Stephen Cushion shows how basic skills are still lacking (Cushion and Lewis, 2016). The authors focused on the “widespread everyday encounters with the world of data” in newsrooms by conducting a content analysis of UK television, radio, and online news (Cushion and Lewis, 2016). How did journalists who have to deal with data sets and statistical claims perform? Based on a review of 6916 items conducted in October and November 2015 in the

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Where Do We Stand?

United Kingdom, the authors found that one in five items (22%) featured a statistical reference, a ratio that increased to one in three in online news. However, most references, two out of three, were fairly vague, providing only limited context. Most of the time, they appeared in stories about politics, business, social policy, and health. Much less often in stories about crime and terrorism, a sometimes highly controversial topic where statistics could help get the facts straight. A further analysis also showed that 20.6% of the sources were politicians, followed by business and government departments (both 12.3%), while other sources such as NGOs (7.3%), academics, regulatory bodies, etc. were far less prominent. And even more surprisingly, nearly three-quarters of party-political statistical references came from Conservative politicians. My own travels across Spain and Portugal as a teaching fellow for the Google News Initiative in 2018 and 2019 have also shown me, in a more empirical way, that there is a great appetite for data journalism: 32% of some 3500 people I trained registered for workshops about basic data tools. At the beginning of these workshops I would show two charts (see below), one of them a misrepresentation of how climate has changed over the years. A very large majority of my “students,” most of them professional journalists, would fail to identify the manipulation. The first chart used by climate skeptics shows average annual global temperatures in Fahrenheit in a scale from 0 to 110 degrees compared to another scale using only the 55 to 60’s scale. The first one is misleading: as climate scientists well know, a five degree change can be dramatic. Therefore, showing the entire scale from 0 to 110 is wrong: it tends to underestimate the gravity of the situation. Many participants in the workshop would not catch the difference at first. We would laugh together and agree we all really need to be more critical with numbers and charts. Now, take The New York Times, which has been rewarded several times for its data journalism projects. Its newsroom of some 1600 journalists has “several dozen” journalists who are really data-savvy, according to Robert Gebeloff. Across the globe only a handful of countries and institutions are producing data journalism with real impact, fulfilling the ideal of the people’s right to know. For the last edition of the Data Journalism Awards, in 2019, applications were sent from 62 countries but shortlisted projects came from just 26 countries and, as in previous editions, the United States and the United Kingdom were leading the path. Eventually, 5 out of 12 winners came from the United States. The recently-created Sigma Awards have been won in all continents except Africa, but they are still dominated by the United States, 3 prizes out of 12 and 25% of those shortlisted, although these statistics must be taken with caution. The prize was only recently created and made public in January of this year, and entries closed a month later.

It Might All Come Down to Education Bahareh Heravi (2018), who is the director of the Data Journalism Programme at the School of Information and Communication Studies at University College in Dublin, listed some 219 universities offering data journalism courses across the world in 2018. Her investigation shows that the United States also has the largest offerings: 146, leaving at the time only 63 courses outside of North America.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

163

164

10  Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The United Kingdom was the second-largest provider of data journalism courses at the time of the study (12), followed by Canada (8), and the Netherlands. It is interesting to note that the countries that have the highest number of data journalism courses tend also to be those who have won the highest numbers of awards. Spain is an interesting example of the impact of good training; even though “old school” journalists are the norm, the passion of a group of investigative journalists for the discipline led to the creation of a private “investigative and data journalism master’s degree” as early as 2012 by Unidad Editorial, the owner of the El Mundo newspaper. Great work has since then been produced by an entire generation of young, well-trained journalists who followed the masters and are now working at El Pais, Eldiario.es, El Confidencial, or Datadista, to name a few, and prizes were won, including the Pulitzer prize, for the Panama Papers. As Nicholas Diakopoulos (2019) writes in Automating the News, how algorithms are rewriting the media, there is plenty of room for improvement. In the United States for instance, half of the journalism programs by the Accrediting Council on Education in Journalism and Mass Communications had no class in basic data journalism. Journalist Bahareh Heravi told me this might change as a first batch of PhD graduates who studied data journalism might become professors “in the next few years.” Many journalists seem eager to learn (79% would like to receive some training according to ICFJ’s survey), and appear to think it improves quality and raises productivity while better engaging their audiences. But the offer within the newsrooms does not seem to meet training demand. Only 35% of newsrooms offer training on data analysis. Clearly managers do not see it as a priority and seem less convinced that data journalism will increase news revenue (only 4 out of 10). It might very well be a generation gap, as the survey also tells us that managers’ median age is 42, which means they went to university before the datafication of society existed and have little training themselves (only 22%). Two out of ten managers also fear it decreases productivity, probably because data journalism is often associated with large teams involving a journalist, a developer, a graphist, and long preparation work.

Data Journalism Can and Must Be Simple and Local The reality is that data journalism does not always need such heavy investment and there are many resources online to learn for free. As Bahareh Heravi (Conference: “Big or Small data?” 2019) puts it, most of the time it is about “small data” rather than “big data” and can sometimes be done by just one reporter. There are many possible approaches and some, at the local level, can have an incredible impact, and maybe, in the long run, be part of the answers to the complex local news crisis. Is there better news than that which uncovers facts close to you on matters as important as health, crime, environment, or housing? According to an OECD report (2018) about sub-national entities, “sub-national governments” (regions, municipalities, counties, etc.) spend more than 30% of total government spending. How often are they held accountable?

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Where Do We Stand?

Journalists with basic data skills can access open data portals at the local and regional levels and better monitor how the public money is being employed. They can check which neighborhoods are exposed to pollution, crime, and other hazards. That data can be broken down into a map so that readers can have personalized information and act on it. Even though we must not put world news aside, technology now allows for “personalized experiences” and so does journalism. The “granularity” of the data drives that change. We can now have very detailed maps of neighborhoods through demographics, crime statistics, sensors, and satellite images, and also compare them with what happens elsewhere, to uncover disparities and inequalities. That is also the kind of “small data” that Bahareh Heravi talks about. A variety of free tools make it possible with basic data skills that can be learned by the multiple free courses available online. Who would not like to know that bicycle accidents happen too often around one’s corner and, with facts at hand, ask for a red light to be installed? Who would not like to know that in some hospitals mortality rates are higher than in others? That cancer cures are not available everywhere in the same country? Once they get the data, journalists can find out where the problems are. Data journalism is not the enemy of the good old chronicle. They go hand in hand; once one gets the facts one can go on the ground and meet actual human beings to better understand what the problems are. It could very well happen the other way around, where one can detect a local problem empirically and “check the data” to see how widespread it is and if it happens elsewhere. This type of information is the one a reader might want to pay for, now that many newspapers are trying to survive by going behind paywalls. There are many interesting examples of local data journalism that have proven successful. What the Anchorage Daily News did by finding out that 70 communities across Alaska had no local police of any kind is a perfect example; data was collected locally and combined with crime statistics to establish a possible correlation between the level of rape and the insufficient police protection. The people behind the numbers were also very prominent in the story, with local interviews that helped the reader understand the emotions and sufferings of local populations. Agence France-Presse, where I have worked for 20 years, did something similar in 2019 about femicides. Journalists across France investigated every single femicide committed over more than six months, conducting many interviews with family members and people with direct knowledge of the cases. What had been general assumptions about the reasons behind the phenomenon became “facts.” They found that break-ups were the direct cause of murders in at least 20% of the cases. The stories behind the numbers were also told with powerful profiles of the victims. The OECD study (2018) about “sub-national governance” found that, just within its 35  member countries, there are no less than 133,000 municipal-level entities “enjoying some autonomy with regards to their budget” and “elected by universal suffrage.” This is where many decisions affecting citizens’ lives are taken. Data journalism skills, such as computer-assisted reporting, can help journalists monitor how money is spent.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

165

166

10  Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know

Local Reality Check Sadly, as Alberto Cairo told me, local newspapers barely allocate resources for data journalism. When the crisis hits, those teams are not seen as a priority. It might be a mistake, as data journalism can be a unique way to uncover realities that matter to local citizens.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Role of Nonprofits and Press Agencies If the local news deserts keep expanding, data journalism will not be in good shape, unless, maybe “non-profits do the work,” Cairo said. Interestingly, regarding local data journalism, one of the media organizations that has won many prizes for its datadriven projects is a nonprofit organization that often focuses on local projects. ProPublica, a US nonprofit investigative journalism organization, does not rely on sales, but on donations. Journalism comes first, not profits. Editorial choices are solely measured in terms of “impact” rather than audience, a notion not so often used in Europe. As ProPublica’s White Paper explains, “funders are attracted by the potential to spur change.” A change in the minds of the readers whose awareness and understanding of important issues are raised, and a change “beyond their minds” in “the real world:” changes in “behaviors, policies, practices, legislations …” Therefore, it is easier for ProPublica to make choices based on the ideal every decent journalist wants to follow: defend the “people’s right to know.” And ProPublica often does it by scrutinizing data, especially at the local level. ProPublica focuses on “explanatory journalism” and “investigative journalism” and has found that its stories have much more impact when they target “particular, specialized audiences.” For instance, in 2010, ProPublica and NPR News jointly undertook an investigation of traumatic brain injuries (TBI) to American troops in the post-9/11 war zones and the Pentagon’s failure to adequately recognize the frequency and severity of these injuries. “The reporting was strong, detailed, powerful and—despite initial denials by defense officials—entirely accurate. It was widely disseminated. But only when the stories began to be first reprinted in and then published in partnership with Stars and Stripes, the independent newspaper published by the military, was the Pentagon moved to change policies, alter practices, and appropriately recognize and support the injured” (ProPublica White Paper about impact, 6). Not surprisingly, ProPublica often partners with local news organizations through its local reporting network, because it says, “the strongest accountability reporting these days often relies on a mix of specialized skills that can be scarce in local newsrooms, including data, research, design and social media.” Large press agencies like Associated Press and the UK’s Press Association are also helping smaller newsrooms with data-driven stories. AP has an award-winning database where local data is already “cleaned” and ready to use so that its clients can publish stories with the local numbers. It has also created a “DataKit” available to all, to help the media manage data projects. The Press Association has created a joint venture with an AI startup, Urbs Media, to produce automated local content called “Radar.” Their software customizes the story to each local area. For instance, when new data on

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

The Elephant in the Room: A World of AI and Automation

local council spending comes out, the software is able to tease out the relevant information for each locality. It was described as a “particular promise” in the search for better public-interest news by the Cairncross Review, a report about the challenges facing high-quality journalism in the United Kingdom.

The Elephant in the Room: A World of AI and Automation In summary, the good news is that data is increasingly at hand. At least 126 countries now have access to information laws to guarantee the rights of citizens to access government information (UNESCO, 2014). In many cases, that information can be directly accessed via open data portals. In others, the information can be accessed via freedom of information requests. However, while data, the “new gold,” seems within reach, many of us are still not able to really mine it, as we have seen. “In the day-to-day practice datasets are routinely turned into graphics and interactives with very little news value or journalistic content. Innovation is seen more in the presentation than in the journalism” (Stoneman, 2015). As all the reports mentioned earlier prove, “with the world awash in data, the need for data and statistical training is more crucial now than ever,” writes Nicholas Diakopoulos (2019, p. 250) Worryingly, because they lack basic statistical skills, many journalists, while using data to legitimize their stories, forget to treat it as any other source. “Data is not objective, and it is rarely complete,” recalls Paul Bradshaw (Onlinejournalismblog.com, “Data journalism and gatekeeping”): “it has biases and blind spots,” and without some maths literacy, some might forget to check “who collected it, how it was collected and what questions were asked, of whom, when and where?” the basic questions any journalist should always ask.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Data, the Central Commodity With that first step in mind, journalists must also realize that data is not just a new, valuable source for all the stories they cover, it is also the story. Data has become the central commodity. Data generated by users is the most valuable commodity in the global economy. The digital economy accounts for 15.5% of the world GDP (Foreign Affairs, Data governance report, 2020). As the UN writes in its first digital economy report, “in virtually every value chain, the ability to collect, store, analyze and transform data brings added power and competitive advantages.” “We are made of data: the way we speak, we love, our behavior, our daily activities are data,” says cyber technologies researcher Eleanor Pauwels (2020). Computer scientists have created algorithms that can sort that massive amount of data and use it to predict patterns. “You are always watched by algorithms,” she says. Taken from that perspective, how do journalists cover that story? So far, the media industry has embraced “data” from its business and marketing side, with data analytics and other tools to retain audience and better engage. The better off also resort to algorithms to recommend personalized content to their audiences. Some companies,

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

167

168

10  Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know

like Bloomberg, are experimenting with automation and AI to improve the efficiency of the newsroom. But explaining how data is changing the world has not taken center stage. And it should, if journalism is to fulfill its core mission, that of bringing valuable information to the public.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Media and the Digital Divide The second urgent step is to better understand and cover the way data is used to feed AI and algorithms that already govern our lives in many aspects. Many employers in the job market are already looking for people with AI-related skills that can be summarized in several categories such as trainers, people designing algorithms to train AI systems; explainers, people able to interpret the outcomes of AI systems and explain them to the public; architects, who will organize them; and, eventually, ethicists or sustainers, people responsible for setting up the guidelines, and ensuring they are upheld so that AI systems are accountable (Wilson et al., 2017). It is happening in front of us, right now. Could not journalists fit into at least two of these categories, as “explainers” and “ethicists,” who ensure the ethical guidelines are upheld? There are already so many aspects of our lives impacted by algorithms: who we see on Tinder and therefore who we date, what content we see online and what ads are shown to us, what scores we have as Uber users or Deliveroo bikers and the amount we could be granted for a loan. Although none of us have ever been trained for it, we need to learn how to explain and scrutinize those algorithms for the sake of the people’s right to know. Some of them are used in the public sector, others are created by private companies. Decisions are made based on criteria fed to the algorithms not known by the public that can, if they fail, have dire consequences, including violating basic human rights such as the right to be born free and equal, the right to be presumed innocent, the right to privacy, or the right to freedom of expression and opinion, to name only a few. Examples abound. Many of us have, for instance, heard about risk assessments used by the US police and courts to predict the likelihood of a person committing a crime, based on calculations that use many variables such as gender, family criminal history, and many other personal questions. A high-risk score could result in a harsher sentence to prevent a repeat offense. In Europe, a company based in Finland, DigitalMinds, created a form of technology for recruitment eliminating human participation in the process, in order to make it “more reliable.” Candidates were asked to provide access to their email accounts so that an algorithm could assess their personality. It would, for example, focus on how active people were on social media and how quickly they reacted to emails. After media reports about the program by AlgorithmWatch journalists and Finland’s national public broadcasting company, DigitalMinds project was discontinued in 2019. Now, let us talk about love. The dating app Tinder, said to have around 60 million users, has never publicly revealed how its algorithm works. According to press reports, for several years it used a rating system for its users called “Elo score.” If you were liked very often, your score would go up. Your swipes would have more value and therefore a more positive impact on the score of whoever you, in turn, liked. Tinder said that rating has been abandoned.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

The Elephant in the Room: A World of AI and Automation

One very important piece of information about the way the algorithm in Tinder might be used has remained relatively unknown. Jessica Pidoux, a Swiss doctoral researcher in digital humanities, found that its 27-page patent, US 2018/0150205A1, opted for a “patriarchal model,” favoring matches between men who are older, better educated, and wealthier than their female counterparts. The whole story was very well covered by French freelance journalist Judith Duportail, who wrote an interesting book about it. “The way those algorithms are calibrated will determine who you meet, who you have the right to love and touch, it has enormous consequences,” Judith Duportail told me. “And nobody checks if they respect gender and race equality, or just in simple words, our dignity.”

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Algorithm Beat ProPublica can be considered one of the pioneers in the field of investigating algorithms. As early as 2016, it created a special section called “Machine Bias” which probes “algorithmic injustice and the formulas that influence our lives” (ProPublica. org, Machine bias series). Thanks to ProPublica, many Americans are now aware that risk assessment scores used by the criminal justice system can be flawed. Many investigations were conducted by Julia Angwin and her team. She now leads her own media, The Markup, which could be another model to follow. The first risk assessment story was in part made possible by a freedom of information request to disclose risk scores assigned to more than 7000 people arrested in one Florida county in 2013 and 2014. These scores were meant to determine whether they were at risk of committing another crime in the future. ProPublica then checked if the prediction model was right and discovered that the “score proved remarkably unreliable” and had a racial bias against African-Americans. So far, there are only a handful of investigative media organizations focusing on the subject across the world. In the United States, they are helped by a very small group of media attorneys specialized in First Amendment litigation, who help them “unseal” public information. There are only around a dozen of them working for news organizations, according to Victoria  Baranetsky, general counsel at The Center for Investigative Reporting.

Algorithms Created by Private Companies Investigating “privately” owned algorithms is even more difficult. In the European Union, people can now ask how their data is used and set some limits to it, thanks to the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Around 25 countries have also signed a “Declaration of cooperation on Artificial Intelligence,” where signatories consider they must “prevent the harmful creation and use of AI applications,” but there is no specific legislation to allow scrutiny of privately owned algorithms. A major obstacle is that, when privately owned, algorithms are considered trade secrets. As a result, some of the tools used to uncover how algorithms work could put journalists at risk of legal liability (Baranetsky, 2018).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

169

170

10  Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Facebook and Google Last but not least, some of the major players in the algorithm world, namely Facebook and Google, not only have major influence on our lives but they are also major stakeholders in the media industry. The first has 2.6 billion monthly users who are exposed to content determined by the algorithms of Facebook and its other platforms, WhatsApp, Messenger, Instagram, and whose data has famously been used for political purposes by third parties such as Cambridge Analytica, as revealed by The Guardian and The New York Times in 2018. On a day-to-day basis, very few media organizations investigate Facebook algorithms and their impact on users all over the world. ProPublica, The Intercept, or BuzzFeed do, to some extent. But who knows ProPublica outside of the United States? Its audience is small and US-based: around 6.56 million visits from December 2019 to May 30, 2020, of which 84% came from the United States (source: SimilarWeb). During the same period, the NYT had 443 million visits (78% from the United States). As far as Google is concerned, its share of the global search market was 87.35% (Statista) in 2019. Google also owns YouTube, the world’s second largest search engine, and Android, the world’s dominant operating system, or Gmail and Google Maps, all free and all of them precious sources of data. As Amnesty Tech writes, “Google and Facebook use (data) to analyze people, aggregate them into groups, and to make predictions about their interests, characteristics, and ultimately behavior—primarily so they can use these insights to generate advertising revenue.” The algorithms they design help them sell targeted ads and manipulate people to keep them engaged on the platforms, in the never-ending fight for our “attention.” The information Google has is so precise that during the COVID-19 pandemic, it has been able to produce detailed reports on mobility, with variations in movements in places such as “grocery stores,” “pharmacies,” and “parks.” Google and Facebook have strong ties with the media industry, either as ad brokers or via generous innovation funds to help the media survive the crisis they faced after both platforms took over most of the online advertising market the press depended on. During the COVID pandemic, for example, Facebook has announced a $100 million program to support the media industry during the crisis. Google has also announced a relief fund. In the past, both companies have allocated at least $600 million ($300 each) to innovation funds for media organizations, according to figures publicly released by both. I have myself benefited from one of those programs as a Google News Lab teaching fellow for a year and I am grateful for it. I am currently part of a transnational working group on AI put together by the LSE with Google News Initiative (GNI) funding. I am also a member of a team which just finished an MOOC about feminine leadership in the media, also supported, among others, by the GNI. In addition, Agence FrancePresse, where I work, has fact-checking contracts with Facebook. Nevertheless, a question for all of us: If platforms exert a subtle “soft power” on the media, who monitors the platforms? Mainstream media needs to dedicate many more journalists to investigate algorithms and platforms in general. Nonprofit media are part of the solution, provided their funding comes from sources that are keen to defend

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

The Elephant in the Room: A World of AI and Automation

the people’s right to know. AlgorithmWatch, for instance, is a German nonprofit, like ProPublica or Reveal in the United States. Nicolas Kayser-Bril, who works for AlgorithmWatch, uncovered the DigitalMind story mentioned earlier and reported it to the Finnish data protection ombudsman in late 2018. He told me that public service media such as the BBC, or the German publicservice broadcasters, could be another place to exert the duties of the Fourth Estate. This seems especially true as the world power seems to be shifting from governments to tech platforms such as Google, Facebook, Amazon, or Alibaba.

Training A whole set of new skills are needed. The pioneers in this field have data and/or computational skills. To name some, Professor Nicholas Diakopoulos, author of Automating the News who first described what he calls the “algorithm beat,” holds a PhD in Computer Science. Julia Angwin, in charge of the Machine Bias Series and now editorin-chief at The Markup, has a BA in Mathematics. Nicolas Kayser-Bril started coding as a teenager. “Effective algorithmic accountability reporting demands all of the traditional skills journalists need in reporting and interviewing as well as a domain knowledge of a beat, familiarity with public records requests, and ability to write about data-driven results clearly and compellingly, along with a host of new capabilities such as scraping and cleaning data, designing audit studies and using advanced statistical techniques. Crowdsourcing methods benefit from strong social media engagement skills,” writes Nicholas Diakopoulos (2019, p. 232) before concluding: “Good luck finding a single person who can do all these things.”

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Interdisciplinary Collaboration Hopefully, journalists are not alone. The AlgorithmWatch report contains dozens of references of independent civil society organizations across Europe that work, in one way or another, for better algorithm accountability. Without losing their independence, journalists can also get some help from their experts. Amnesty International, for example, has created Amnesty Tech, a collective of advocates, hackers, researchers, and technologists, who focus among other things on “accountability in the design and use of new technologies” and the “systemic threat to our rights posed by the surveillance-based business model of big tech companies.” Data activists who defend the use of data for “social good” can also be a valuable source for journalists who need help finding data, mobilizing citizens to help gather the data, or understanding the way algorithms work. Judith Duportail, who wrote the book about Tinder, did not have computational skills. But she met people who did have them. As with past ground-breaking data journalism achievements, such as the Panama Papers investigation, collaboration is essential. As a matter of fact, many prize-winning projects in data journalism or algorithmic accountability are the result of work conducted by several organizations together. It is even key, as many of these algorithms cross borders. Last but not least, understanding algorithms and AI will become essential to better fight misinformation.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

171

172

10  Journalism, Algorithms, and the People’s Right to Know

Conclusion Year after year, the Reuters Institute Digital News Report surveys find that the news media do a better job at breaking news than explaining it. In its last delivery, published in May 2020, we read that almost two-thirds of the people surveyed feel the media are good at keeping people up to date (62%), but less than half (42%) think the media do a good job in holding the rich and powerful to account. Even more importantly, only 29% agree that the news media cover topics that are relevant to them. Data journalism and algorithm journalism are both very important disciplines that the media should focus on to distribute relevant content, deserve the title of “Fourth Estate,” and pursue the “people’s right to know.” As the “disruption” is unfolding at an incredible pace, we cannot wait until a data-savvy Generation Z takes the reins, or it will be too late.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Andreas, P. and Greenhill, K.M. (2010). The politics of numbers. In Sex, Drugs and Body Counts. Cornell University Press. Baranetsky, V. (2018). Datajournalism and the law. Columbia Journalism Review. Berry, D. (2016). Journalism, Ethics and Society. Routledge. Carey, J. (2007). A short history of journalism for journalists: a proposal and essay, p. 13. Cushion, S. and Lewis, J. (2016). More light, less heat: rethinking impartiality in light of review into the reporting of statistics in UK News Media. In Nguyen, A. (Ed.). News, Numbers and Public Opinion in a Data Driven World. Bloomsbury Publishing. Diakopoulos, N. (2019). Automating the News: how algorithms are rewriting the media. Harvard University Press. Foreign Affairs. (2020). Data governance report. Foreign Affairs, 2020. Heravi, B. (2018). Data Journalism in 2017: a summary of results from the global data journalism survey. Springer. Accessed from https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/ 978-3-319-78105-1_13 Initial survey available at: https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/rBG05/1 Heravi, B. (2018). Big data or small data. In The Conference. Malmö, Sweden. Mossé. (1971). History of a Democracy, Athens. Original title in French: Histoire d’une démocratie. Athens: Editions Le Seuil. Nguyen, A. (2018). News Numbers and Public Opinion in a Data Driven World. Bloomsbury Publishing. Ober, J. (1993). Thucydides’ criticism of democratic knowledge. In Rosen R.M. and Farrell J. (Eds.). Nomodeiktes: Greek Studies in Honor of Martin Ostwald. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 81–98. OECD. (2018). Subnational governments around the world. A report by the OECD published in 2018. Pauwels, E. (2020). In iHuman – Artificial intelligence and us. Arte TV (documentary 2020). Pew Research Center. (2019). Americans are wary of the role social media sites play. Available at: https://www.journalism.org/2019/10/02/americans-are-wary-of-the-rolesocial-media-sites-play-in-delivering-the-news

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

References

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Rogers, S. (2011). Fact are Sacred, the Power of Data. Faber & Faber. Rosling, H. (2018). Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About The World – And Why Things Are Better Than You Think. In a Nutshell Publishing. Stoneman, J. (2015). Does Open Data Need Journalism. Oxford: The Reuters Institute. Available at: https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/research/files/ Stoneman%2520-%2520Does%2520Open%2520Data%2520need%2520Journalism.pdf Thucydides. (1972). History of the Peloponnesian War. Penquin. (o.v. 411 BCE) UNESCO. (2014). A. Aers un droit d'accès à l'information publique A report by UNESCO. Wilson, H.J., Daugherty, P.R., and Morini-Bianzino, N. (2017). The jobs the artificial intelligence will create. MITSloan Management Review. Available at: https://www. maximo.ae/media/1306/the-jobs-that-artificial-intelligence-will-create-2-1.pdf Windschuttle, K. (1999). Journalism as the Western tradition. Australian Journalism Review. Available at: https://search.informit.com.au/documentSummary;dn=20000622 4;res=IELAPA.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

173

174

11 Ethical Dilemmas in the Personalization of News from Voice Interfaces Luis Miguel Pedrero-Esteban and Beatriz Gas-Gozalbo Universidad Nebrija, Universidad San Pablo-CEU, CEU Universities

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Mediatization of Consumption in the Digital Ecosystem Under the promise of individual efficiency and satisfaction, which is supposedly brought by smart personalization of the digital information, leisure and entertainment demands, lies the risk of a partial and biased configuration, without veracity filters, neutrality, or equilibrium. The introduction of 57 indicators in Google search, with which the Alphabet company of today tried to bring the search results closer to the habits and interests of each individual, implied the start of the customization of the online environment for each user: “It is an attractive possibility, a return to the Ptolemaic universe in which the sun and everything else revolves around us” (Pariser, 2012, p. 21). Due to the birth of digital, the number of subjects who are connected through multiple networks and technologies has multiplied exponentially: 4.5 billion individuals in the world (59% of the population) have access to the Internet and a telephone service in 2020, and according to the real-time intelligence data of the GSMS—an organization that brings together 800 mobile phone operators and 200 related companies—the number of mobile phone lines has surpassed 9.8 billion, with 5.2 billion clients. Most of the world’s population has a phone terminal in their hands, and by 2023, this number will reach 30 billion interconnected devices, half as M2M (Machine to Machine), three per person, and ten at home (Cisco, 2020). The interaction with these technologies not only provides the immediate supply of any virtual content, but increases its adequacy to our expectations, and even makes possible the offering of content to us in advance. We have naturalized the perception that screens—from computers, tablets, or smartphones—reflect who we are and what we explore in cyberspace, an objective sought by the large technology corporations during the past few years. As argued by Eric Schmidt when Google Instant was launched in 2010, a tool that predicts what one is searching for as a term is typed into the browser, and “the clients want Google to tell them what they should do next” (Farrar, 2010). Beyond the other interests, there is an irrefutable reason why the personalized filters are indisputably useful for the Internet users, who are overwhelmed by the stream of information that flows daily through the networks. It was calculated that in 2020, in News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Mediatization of Consumption in the Digital Ecosystem

just one minute, 59 million messages were sent through WhatsApp or Messenger and 190 million through email; 400,000 apps were downloaded; 4 million searches were performed in Google; 195,000 tweets were published; 695,000 pictures were scrolled in Instagram; 2.5 million Snaps were created; and 4.7 million videos were viewed on YouTube, or 764,000 hours in Netflix (Lewis, 2020). Such a whirlwind of simultaneous and non-stop stimuli become themselves an obstacle for finding the truth that interests us, and this is where artificial intelligence (AI) becomes important as a tool that deciphers the preferences of each individual, offering the ideal content with respect to the user’s profile (Lee, 2018), through the use of algorithms that act as recommendation engines. Starting with the browsing time and the digital tracking of each user, the algorithm recognizes one’s tastes, and ever more selectively filters the proposals of personalized consumption. Thus, the question is: Do we freely choose what we like or interests us when we move around the Internet, or if in practice, does the data of our online activity make us become merchandise, exposed to manipulation at the service of economic or ideological interests? The tracking of our Internet prints allows for predicting and even provoking our decisions, which turns this knowledge into a treasure trove of unmeasurable value for companies and organizations willing to act upon them. As verified by a few research studies, it was by starting with this tracking that Cambridge Analytica, through the social networks, influenced the vote of thousands of Americans in the presidential elections of the United States in 2016 (Howard et al., 2017; RodríguezFernández, 2020). The personalization tools have been erected in finite recipes and series of steps aimed at obtaining a result, a type of automatization of thought, as Pascal’s calculator or Turing’s universal machine were in the past (Fernández-Vicente, 2020). Their advocates argue that the algorithms provide a view of the world customized to the user, and warn that they have become irreversibly established in our interaction with the Internet. In fact, one of the most profound areas of technological progress in the last decade has been the development of AI and its growing integration into multiple areas. The media industry is one of the actors that has decidedly adopted the opportunities provided by AI for the treatment of data, algorithms, and automatization of journalism, present from the initial stages of news production to the last phases of its reception and consumption (Zamith, 2019). Journalistic bots, news applications, ad hoc newsletters, or alerts and notification services (Pedrero Esteban and Herrera-Damas, 2017) have become instituted into essential tools for the users’ reception of a selection that is adapted to their preferences of content and form. The traditional communication logics and routines are now conditioned by processes that have reformulated the profession even up to its nomenclature, complemented with tags such as “automated journalism,” “robojournalism,” “computational journalism,” or “high-tech journalism” (Manfredi and Ufarte, 2020). The impact of this phenomenon is part of the emergent human machine communication (HMC) field of research, a discipline that has burst onto the scene as a response to the growing number of technologies designed to work as “sources” and not as mere message “channels.” The objective of the HMC is to analyze and understand the new contexts of the human–computer, human–agent, or human–robot interactions, aside from the social and cultural implications of the devices and programs that assume

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

175

176

11  Ethical Dilemmas in the Personalization of News from Voice Interfaces

roles that until now have been reserved for people (Lewis, Guzman, and Schmidt, 2019). The technology of these interfaces exceeded their reach as mediators and turned them into de facto communicators of messages, which invites the reflection on the implications derived from this condition (Anderson and De Maeyer, 2015). It is within this context that the approaches to the reception and decoding of the mediatized information are founded, information that is mediatized by voice assistants—Alexa, from Amazon, or Google Home, from Google, among others—that incorporate personalized systems of news selection according to the profiles of each user. When faced with the significant increase in the number of these devices with this technology at home, and given the trend in their use as a vehicle of news access, which subverts the mediation of the traditional social communication channels (Kischinhevsky, 2020), the discussion on their ethical dimension, or as named by Lafrance (2018), the editorial responsibility of the algorithm, is deemed necessary.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Birth and Evolution of Voice-Based Assistants The changes in habits, relationships, and skills fostered by the Information and Communication Technologies (García-Ruiz and Pérez-Escoda, 2020) has established usability and access speed as the preferred indicators of interaction with the Internet. In an increasingly accelerated society, which has turned immediacy into an almost inexcusable demand, the improvement of the networks, the devices, and the interfaces (Scolari, 2018) provide evidence of the obsession for reducing the factors that condition online navigation. This is where the possibilities of using the voice, as the connection vehicle (VUI, voice user interface) without the need for a screen, keyboard, or mouse, are perceived with enthusiasm, not only due to their simplicity, but overall, for their versatile character that is compatible with other tasks, because it saves time. Based on these issues, we find the conviction that the voice, considered the third revolution of the Internet after the Web and the mobile phone, will facilitate a new relationship between people and the ecosystem of contents and digital services. The process of voice interaction is comprised of five phases; the first is centered on automatic recognition (ASR, automatic speech recognizer), when the spoken message is received and transcribed thanks to linguistic models that translate phonemes to characters. The second is the understanding of the natural language (NLU, natural language understanding), whose aim is to understand, within the written words, the intention of the broadcaster, at the morphological and semantic levels. In the third phase, the management of dialog (DM, dialog management), it is decided what to do or how to respond, and information is searched to provide an answer. In the fourth phase, a response that makes sense is constructed (RG, response generation). In the last stage of voice synthesis (TTS, text to speech), the response created is converted to audio through a synthetic voice based on phonetic models (Ábalos, 2019). As described by Lleida and Ortega (2016), research on automatic systems of speed recognition and the experiments to control a machine through spoken language started in the second half of the twentieth century, although as early as in the 1930s, some rudimentary devices had already appeared that were able to identify sounds through analog electronic systems. The first documented device that was able to recognize a voice was Audrey, built by Bell Labs in 1952. Its main

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Birth and Evolution of Voice-Based Assistants

objective was to code the speaking of the numbers 0 to 9 so that dialing a phone number could be solicited. Although the system became able to exactly understand up to 90% of the phonemes of specific individuals (not everyone), it needed a 2-meter-high rack and demanded a high power consumption, which made it commercially unviable. It was also verified that in most cases the recognition of the numbers was faster and cheaper by pushing a button instead of speaking the successive numbers (Lea, 1980). Over time, the success in translating orders from isolated sounds served as the catalyst for dedicating more resources to the automatic recognition of speech. In 1962, IBM presented the machine Shoebox, able to interpret 16 words in English. It was the first physical manifestation of a technology that would culminate two decades later with the dictation system Tangora. Its development was possible thanks to contributions from research advances in lexical, syntactic, semantic, and programmatic understanding of language from centers such as the CMU, SRI, BBN, and MIT (Lleida and Ortega, 2016). Among these, the Harpy system, created by the CMU with a vocabulary of 1011 words—that of a 3- or 4-year-old child—was a significant advance due to the introduction of the use of finite state networks to compile acoustic, lexical, and syntactic information in a single search. It was the first system that utilized language models to determine which word sequences made more sense when found together, thus reducing recognition errors (Newell, 1978). If the experiences during the 1950s were the first stage in this area, and the 1960s experiences represented the second generation, Harpy signified the pre-adolescent stage or third phase in the design of speech recognition systems, which were now based on the identification of patterns and spectral analysis, founded on linear prediction and medium-sized vocabularies (hundreds of words), with the speaking of isolated or concatenated words that were dependent on the speaker. The aim of these developments was to reduce the rigidity of the grammar of the commands to reach a more natural communication model, an objective that would be reached in the 1980s with the convergence of speech recognition systems and statistics. A great jump in the vocabulary was thus produced, from hundreds to thousands of words, independently of the speaker and with a stream of continuous speech. In the 1990s, the period of adolescence, or fourth generation of speech technologies begun. The speech recognition systems were brought out from the laboratories thanks to improvements in signal processing and acoustic and language modeling. Supported by their calculation abilities, the new processors allowed for the development of applications with vocabularies consisting of thousands of words, which soon derived into dictation systems of a continuous flow of speech and interactive voice portals with recognition and synthesis of speech, such as in the talking computers from SS Enterprise in the Star Trek series (1966) and HAL 9000 in the film 2001, A Space Odyssey (1968), or the microprocessor installed in the smart car KITT (Knight Industries Two Thousand) from the Knight Rider series (1982). In the early 2000s, the speech recognition technology seemed to stagnate, and significant improvements were lacking, but instead high error rates were found that were too high for users to adopt this new communication interface. A firm intent was needed from the important hardware and software companies—Microsoft, Apple, Google, or Nuance—due to their research and commercialization of these developments, together with the irruption of cloud storage and the subsequent possibility of

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

177

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

178

11  Ethical Dilemmas in the Personalization of News from Voice Interfaces

access to vast amounts of data, to integrate the speech recognition systems into the applications oriented toward mobile devices. The so-called voice-activate virtual assistant (VAVA), or simply digital voice assistant (DVA) were thus crystallized, whose first and more showy example was Siri, launched by Apple on October 14, 2011, as a novel characteristic of the iPhone 4S. Apple developed this functionality after acquiring Siri Inc. in 2010, a spin-off that emerged from the AI center SRI International—financed by DARPA (the Department of Defense of the United States)—and projected as a branch of the military project CALO (Cognitive Assistant that Learns and Organizes), a name that was inspired by the Latin word “Calonis,” which means “the soldier’s servant.” The technical areas impacted by the project were conversational interface, recognition of the personal context, and delegation of services. At the technical level, in Siri the recorded sounds were transmitted through the Internet to a server, which analyzed them before sending the answers to the smartphone system (Welt, 2012). The speech recognition systems from Google and Microsoft work in the same manner, utilizing the microphones in the browser to teach the Internet how to listen. The spoken data are sent to servers in the United States and contribute to the constant improvement of the rate of recognition. In 2012, Google bet on Google Now, a personal assistant that utilized natural language to offer voice-enabled searching, but did not provide two-sided conversations. For this, in May 2016, Google designed Google Assistant as an extension of Google Allo, an instant messaging application that intended to compete against WhatsApp and iMessage (Cruz, 2019). In April 2013, Microsoft presented a preview of Cortana, which was finally launched in January 2015, as a personal assistant for helping users perform basic tasks and to provide answers to their questions. Faced with the possibilities provided by these application, and to increase online sales starting with the shopping patterns of their clients (Galloway, 2017), Amazon introduced the virtual assistant Alexa in November 2014. In the beginning it was only available to those who had a subscription to their Prime service, but in June 2015, it was extended to all users. The great novelty was that instead of being integrated into the already-existing electronic devices (in particular the smartphones), Alexa was linked to a new home device, the “smart speaker.” The new gadget soon became a very popular device for providing support for day-today tasks such as the use of home appliances (activation and adjustment of lighting, heating, and security systems), the creation of product lists and online shopping, or to facilitate the functions of alarms and alarm clock, telephone calls, and instant messaging. The users became used to performing a varied number of activities through this new and intuitive machine, from resolving doubts about general knowledge to listening to anecdotes, although what was truly unprecedented was that with these actions, the demand for audio content was progressively reinforced (Kischinhevsky, 2020). Alexa capitalized on the knowledge and pre-disposition of use achieved by the voice assistants of the mobile phones, and thus the smart speakers gained a presence in homes at a faster pace than that reached by the smartphones of their day, especially in English-speaking countries. In the first semester of 2018, the Amazon speaker allowed talking in English, which was soon adapted to the North American, British, Indian, and Australian accents, and during that year and the following one, the German, Japanese, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and Hindi languages were added. On

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Voice Assistants and the Personalization of News

its part, Google Assistant, which started with 8 languages, increased to 30 in 2019, including, among others, Chinese, Danish, Dutch, Korean, Russia, Thai, and Arabic. The Siri assistant, also present in the HomePod speaker from Apple since 2018, is available in 21 languages that include a few other dialects. Not so many options are provided by the assistants from Samsung (Bixby) and Microsoft (Cortana): the first answers to English, Chinese, German, French, Italian, and Korean, while the second adds Portuguese and Japanese, although Korean is not available. The main alternatives promoted in the Asian market are solidified in DuerOS, a stake from the Chinese search engine Baidu; AliGenie Voz, the voice assistant developed by the Alibaba Group for its speaker Tmall Genie; and Xiao Ai, the virtual assistant from Xiaomi. The increase in the types of models and number of languages has favored the expansion of devices whose penetration into the homes in the Unites States multiplied from 7% in 2016 to 24% in 2020 (equivalent to 60 million people), according to data from the Smart Audio Report which is published annually by NPR and Edison Research. Close to two-thirds of the owners of these devices stated that it made their life “easier,” and almost half (46%) used the telephone’s voice assistant more frequently since the acquisition of a smart speaker (National Public Radio, 2020). The worldwide sales of these devices in 2019 set a record with 146.9 million units, 70% more than in 2018. The market grew by 52% only in the last trimester, and five of the main sellers exceeded their figures from previous seasons: Amazon set its penetration as 31.7%, higher than Google (25.3%), Baidu (11.6%), Alibaba (11.4%), and Xiaomi (9.4%). The set of devices equipped with voice assistants in the world was estimated to be 3.25 billion toward the end of 2019 (Canalys, 2020).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Voice Assistants and the Personalization of News The voice assistants are programmed for processing and understanding natural language systems (natural language processing [NLP] and natural language understanding [NLU]), searching for the efficient communication between people and machines not only of a conversation, but also of the intentions and other additional data that are intrinsic to people’s speech. Linguistics, data science, and AI are involved in this technology, whose aim is to identify and recognize the requirements of the user by responding to their demands in a progressively personalized manner. A similar specificity brings with it unquestionable advantages in terms of simplicity and efficiency, but at the same time entails worrying risks related to the consumption of information. Indeed, while the reading of news in paper or on the screen allows each individual to establish their own and self-directed rhythm to assimilate them—even allowing the reader to return to the article to review expressions or phrases that are not well understood, and just as with the television information it is supported by visual and sound narratives that are complemented reciprocally—audio only appeals to listening. It has been demonstrated that sound has a smaller ability to capture our attention (Cruces, 2017), especially if the listening is not active or reinforced with headphones. Due to this, the ease of reception of the news in this manner implies the danger of a less conscious attention, and inevitably, more permeability toward manipulation. This risk is accentuated when combined with the systems of personalized recommendations; the algorithms and automatization have become omnipresent in

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

179

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

180

11  Ethical Dilemmas in the Personalization of News from Voice Interfaces

contemporary times, increasingly determining the nature of the contents that reach the users. Surprisingly and controversially, the computing capacities and the automated technologies have resulted in an increase in the making of decisions for humans and have even been partially replaced by these solutions (Broussard, 2018). What we read, see, or hear—just as in other daily activities, increasingly answer to mathematical models and systems based on data with different degrees of transparency—are related to how they work and what their interests or implications are (Thurman, Lewis and Kunert, 2019). Due to this strategy, a new search paradigm has been defined, where the digital products “find” the individual; this delegation ends in the dilution of the critical skills of the Internet users in the shaping of their own menu, as they accept the proposals decided by the mathematical models in their name, without question. A habit as this could result in bias in the consumption of contents through smart speakers, devices without a visible interface, and whose interaction still faces limitations that are intrinsic to technology (the spoken orders are sometimes not understood, or not immediately), and the user’s own ability to express themselves (who do not always follow the protocols of formulation when invoking the assistant). In a generalized manner, the main solicitations in the interaction with the speakers are music and weather consultations (both exceed 75% of the demands). These are followed by the management of alarms and questions about current events, both totaling 50% of the requests according to the Smart Audio Report of 2020. Nevertheless, the information-related use has increased during the COVID-19 pandemic, when a third (35%) of the adults and half of those aged 18–34 have resorted to the smart speakers to learn of changes in the coronavirus events. As a whole, the percentage of users who utilize them to listen to the news increased from 55% to 62% between the spring of 2019 and spring of 2020, an increase that was also repeated in the United Kingdom: the number of those who have utilized smart speakers to listen to the news has increased from 39% to 60% during the coronavirus lockdown (Voxly Digital, 2020). When asked about the advantages of this channel, the users positively evaluated the speed and ease of access to news items, but recognized the difficulty in naming the source: around a quarter of the United Kingdom and almost one out of ten (7%) Americans did not remember the outlet that produced the news updates (Newman, 2018). This is perhaps the main challenge for the editors of information media, who have assumed that in the coming years, the voice (speech) will decisively affect their business: “the future of news is humans speaking to a machine,” affirmed the BBC and Facebook consultant Trushar Barot. And this is the reason behind the implementation of different strategies for their distribution through this interface (Barot, 2017). Radio broadcasters try to take advantage of their experience with audio to ensure a privileged position in smart speakers, even more so with the disappearance of analog receivers—almost a third of North Americans aged 18–34 do not have a radio at home (Edison Research, 2017). At first they centered on the re-packaging of the news bulletins and made the stations directly available and customizable, but soon began to design new formats that were customized for the device. As an innovative development, we find the National Public Radio (NPR), as it added algorithms to their mobile app NPR One to help the users discover new content. The tool tracks the behavior of the user to show programs that are in line with their preferences. NPR One knows when a listener stops listening, which provides the producers with indicators for

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Voice Assistants and the Personalization of News

deciding how to maintain the audience’s interest. It also identifies who listened to a story to which a rectification was added, to later send them this additional information to their first spot of their timeline of proposals (Lafrance, 2018). Here we find an important use of the personalization algorithms, oriented not only toward discovering or facilitating audio that are subjectively attractive to each user, but also so that listening is coherent and contextualized. Even more so, the important news—local and national—reaches all the listeners. This means that they are not excluded by the personalization filters; the NPR editors attribute this range of relevance to certain stories, and only allow choosing among those defined as “non-essential” (the sections on culture and sports, for example). Consumption through the application and the smart speakers allows the NPR editors to measure the time dedicated to the different subjects or genres, and utilize this result to configure the selection of news: “It may be that Syria does not interest you; in this case, we will tell you if something important occurred and if you need to know, but we will avoid sending you the news updates. It is the ability to dismiss some events and delve into others where the power of personalization is rooted in” (Lafrance, 2018, p. 34). Although the editorial efforts of NPR for creating a critical selection of news are a model example of personalization of smart speakers, we should warn that this channel is loaded by default in the Echo devices from Amazon, the best-selling product range in the market at the global level. Even if any web developer could introduce a site in the Flash Briefing (name of the functionality that provides access to the last-minute news), the fact that Amazon places a communication media as pre-determined grants it a competitive advantage. It has been verified that most of the users do not modify the standard adjustments of the mobile phones, computers, any type of software, either because they do not want to or do not know how to. Thus, a competition and ethical problem arises, as the oligopoly that is factually exerted by the technology companies—Amazon, Google, Apple—of the smart speakers in the Western market, provides them with a great amount of knowledge about the behavior of their users, but also conditions the news sources they have access to. There are already editors who have warned about the need to regulate the inclusion of predetermined services in these devices, which are present in the living-room or kitchen of an increasing number of homes in a greater number of countries, but in most cases under the dominating control of entities rooted in the United States. One of the operators who has more energetically defended the convenience of this control is the public British Corporation BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation), which has developed its own virtual voice assistant named Beep for British citizens to access the news, the weather forecast, or their programs by talking to this interface. With their contrasted desire to apply public service strategies when adopting and promoting technological innovations, it designed, through their BBC Research and Development department, an interactive audible creation for children to test the ability of the voice assistant and AI to create engagement. Thus, the Inspection Chamber was born, a science fiction comedy whose narration takes place starting with the orders each listener formulates at specific moments of the action, which helps with establishing a more intense connection with the story. Debuted in November 2017 and available only for Alexa voice assistants from Amazon, the 20-minutes piece allowed the BBC to delve into the perceptions and

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

181

182

11  Ethical Dilemmas in the Personalization of News from Voice Interfaces

feelings of the listeners toward future interactive productions. After a qualitative research on the different target ages, it was shown that most had enjoyed it when feeling that they had the control of the story, and wanted a greater degree of intervention. Many became more involved when listening to how the voice assistant called them by name and referred to personal facts (the location or the songs from their playlists). Starting with this study, the BBC pointed their research toward the creation of personal experiences utilizing the profile of the users together with other external sources of data, and trying to provide more options of interaction in the dialog with the assistants (Cooke, 2018). Between 2017 and 2020, the BBC accumulated nearly two million users per week through the voice assistants, utilizing them to serve almost one billion pieces of content. The development of Beep was achieved with the Microsoft AI technology Azure, because, in the words of Andy Webb, the chief of the Voice + AI division of the British corporation, “Microsoft shares many of the perspectives of the BBC about the role of voice assistants and the ethics that must guide their use” (Kinsella, 2020). The objective is not to compete or substitute the assistants from Amazon or Google, but to provide the users with more search engines whose algorithms are not based solely on the tracking of digital consumption.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ethical Demands in the Automated Personalization of Spoken News Such are the parameters which pose the greatest risks as pillars for the personalization of news in voice assistants. When a user formulates the order What’s my Flash Briefing or What’s the News into an Alexa speaker, or Listen to the News in one with Google Home, they are offered the sequential listening of audio clips that allows fast forwarding, rewinding, or interruptions with the simple voice commands Next, Previous, or Cancel. In the beginning, the voice assistants hardly read the texts available online, but later the platforms began to integrate MP3 files—and also MP4 for models with screens—and opened up a new scenario of possibilities in terms of advertising agreements with developers of content designed for these devices (Kischinhevsky, 2020). The dilemma comes from the lack of transparency with respect to the criteria utilized to select the news and their hierarchy in the playlist, aside from, of course, the sources from which these are offered. Although it includes renowned radio stations, television stations, and news agencies (in the United States, Amazon and Google have agreements with NPR, ESPN, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, BBC News, or Reuters, among others), new actors are also available, who may not have previous experience in the production of media content, but whom, of course, comply with the requirements imposed by the platforms, such as performing daily updates. “These new authors range from religious programs to ultra-segmented spaces about different subjects, such as commercial aviation or a virtual visit to a zoo” (Kischinhevsky, 2020). Already in 2018 there were 250 content providers in the Flash Briefing from Alexa, with an available repertoire of more than 5000 audio files (Catalano, 2018). As compared to the screen-based interfaces, which allow the user to evaluate the interest or subjective relevance of the content starting with varied and complementary elements interpreted by sight and sound (texts of different size, typography, colors,

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ethical Demands in the Automated Personalization of Spoken News

images, videos, and animations, etc.), the margin for discovering and choosing information summaries in voice assistants is very limited. Either a prior and deep search of the available providers is performed (an action that cannot be done with voice commands but with the mobile phone applications), or it is the system itself that configures the news bulletins by applying the aforementioned personalization algorithms. And when faced with this circumstance, which news items are chosen? What search patterns are utilized by the tool? Are there underlying commercial agreements that alter neutrality in its use? Some questions could be answered starting with the experience of the Google Assistant virtual assistant, introduced by Google in November 2019, to personalize news selection (Gannes, 2019). Through the order OK Google, Play Me the News, the owner listens to the more recent and important events according to the available publishers (The Washington Post, The New York Times, NPR, etc.), although this tool relies on the search history, the location, and the interests of each user so that its continuous use contributes to the news playlist being adapted to the owner’s tastes. This is the same logic utilized by Google Discover; a function in the terminals with the Android operating system, it is a news summary and dissemination service that chooses and provides the contents on the screen that the algorithm determines as being more relevant for each individual. In the first months after its implementation in Spain, the application promoted websites that were commonly identified as creators or propagators of hoaxes, such as Mediterráneo Digital or DiarioGol. As denounced by some media, the reason for the recommendations of these sources by Discover was due to the Click Through Rate (CTR), a metric measurement based on the quantity of clicks and not on the relevance or exactness of the content (Cid, 2019; Del Castillo, 2019). Google maintains that these tools do not intend to supplant communication media, as they are not based on them, but on the materialization of the original ethos (behavior) of the company; to facilitate the users with the control of the content stream that flows in the Internet (Lafrance, 2018). The geolocalization, the browsing history, the commercial interest of the user, or the behaviors of other subjects categorized as similar, are detected as part of the criteria that guide the algorithms in the automated selection of news for the owners of smart speakers. These types of practices not only compromise the veracity of this selection, but also the reliability of the tool and the questioning of these systems as access channels of current events. If the application of the technology to the distribution and consumption of information processes does not include the precautions that guarantee their veracity, context, and rigor, the essential aims of journalism are not complied with and due to its inappropriate use, a greater danger is incurred: manipulation. The acceptance of personalized news recommendation systems with AI without validation filters and verification of reliability of the content, implies, in practice, an open road to distortion and disinformation, the basis of the so-called fake news, and the cause of phenomena of massive persuasion in the shaping of opinions and the making of decisions of the citizens in the current digital environment (Pedrero, 2020). It is necessary to program algorithms that are able to detect false information, as it is being experimented on, for example, in the Chinese news personalization platform Toutiao (Lee, 2018).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

183

184

11  Ethical Dilemmas in the Personalization of News from Voice Interfaces

This demand increases when faced with the surprising advances in voice synthesis, which already allow for the creation of simulations or deep fakes of audio from any person and with increasing quality and easiness. Thanks to the machine learning technologies, and with no more than six hours of original recordings, the algorithm can learn and train itself to exactly replicate the voice characteristics of a person: tone, articulation, timbre, and intensity, which could also change throughout the life of a person (García Cantero, 2020). What would be then, the limits for creating and disseminating interviews that did not exist or listen to speeches that were never spoken? How could one recognize the falseness of an audio news item supported by testimonies of their protagonists who may have been fabricated? The debate on the implication of AI in journalism and its intermediation in the construction of informational stories is intensified, as its expansion moves forward to new uses and devices. What ethical solutions could help with facing the dilemmas posed by these innovations? To start with, and although all the actors involved are aware of this influence, the technology companies—Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon—are the ones who for now invest more in AI and automated learning than the media industry. Thus, there is a need for the media to become truly involved in the transparent, trustworthy, open, and plural application of AI, by demanding that the platforms differentiate the news sources in their voice assistants (for example, with a sound signal when they come from reliable publishers and with explicit authorship) and questioning their presence if these rules are not defined. Credibility is and always will be an essential characteristic of journalism, the pillar on which its function and its meaning are set apart from the processes and technologies (Salazar, 2018). For this, the collaboration and dialog between humans and machine—literally speaking—should be oriented toward the continuity of this demand, the only manner with which to achieve the desired exercise of journalism that is committed, responsible, and ethical.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Ábalos, N. (2019). La comunicación humano máquina es hoy más natural y efectiva. Telos, 111, 42–29. https://bit.ly/3fMdqLo Anderson, C.W. and De Maeyer, J. (2015). Objects of journalism and the news. Journalism, 16(1), 3–9. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884914545728 Barot, T. (2017). The future of news is humans talking to machines. Nieman Lab. Available at https://bit.ly/2XYm8A3 (accessed September 18, 2020). Broussard, M. (2018). Artificial Unintelligence: How Computers Misunderstand the World. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Canalys. (2020). Global Smart Speaker Q4 2019, Full Year 2019 and Forecasts. https://bit. ly/3dAnPZ9 (accessed February 27, 2020). Catalano, F. (2018). As Alexa’s flash briefing tops 5000 skills, content providers learn more about what you want to hear. GeekWire. https://bit.ly/31hrKay (accessed May 26, 2019). Cid, G. (2019). Sexo, extremismo y muertes falsas: cómo Google está inundando de basura tu móvil. El Confidencial (November 24, 2019). Available at http://bit.ly/2Drzfyt Cisco (2020). Cisco Annual Internet Report (2018–2023) White Paper. https://bit.ly/3e0rz7c (accessed May 7, 2020).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

Cooke, H. (2018). User testing the inspection chamber. BBC Research & Development. https://bbc.in/2VewZUB (accessed June 29, 2018). Cruces, F. (Dir). (2017). ¿Cómo leemos en la sociedad digital? Lectores, booktubers y prosumidores. Madrid: Ariel y Fundación Telefónica. Cruz, C.D.L. (2019). La evolución de los Asistentes Virtuales en 8 años y para qué los utilizan los usuarios. Blogthinkbig.com. https://bit.ly/2BBb2IG (accessed April 25, 2019). Del Castillo, C. (2019). Google Discover: las fake news inundan los móviles Android en plena lucha contra la desinformación. eldiario.es. http://bit.ly/2pUcksC (accessed November 26, 2019). Edison Research. (2017). The Infinite Dial 2017. https://bit.ly/3cvPHgs (accessed March 9, 2017). Farrar, J. (2010). Google to end serendipity (by creating it). ZDNet. https://zd.net/3hrqdV2 (accessed August 17, 2019). Fernández-Vicente, A. (2020). Hacia una teoría crítica de la razón algorítmica. Palabra Clave, 23(2), e2322. https://doi.org/10.5294/pacla.2020.23.2.2 Galloway, S. (2017) The Four. The Hidden DNA of Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google. New York: Random House. Gannes, L. (2019). Hey, Google, play me the news. Blog Google (November 11, 2919). Available at http://bit.ly/2P1skSn (accessed November 19, 2019). García Cantero, J. (2020). La inteligencia artificial resucita la voz de Franco. El País. https://bit.ly/2Y0Sb0V (accessed February 6, 2020). García-Ruiz, R. and Pérez-Escoda, A. (2020). Comunicación y educación en un mundo digital y conectado. Icono 14, 18(2), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.7195/ri14.v18i2.1580 Howard, P., Bolsover, G., Kollanyi, B., Bradshaw, S., and Neudert, L. (2017). Junk News and Bots during the U.S. Election: what were Michigan voters sharing over Twitter? Data Memo 2017. Oxford, UK: Project on Computational Propaganda. Kinsella, B. (2020). BBC voice assistant beep launches in beta in the UK. https://bit. ly/31e0xFG (accessed June 2, 2020). Kischinhevsky, M. (2020). De las síntesis informativas a los resúmenes para altavoces inteligentes, desafíos al periodismo radiofónico de carácter local. Estudios sobre el Mensaje Periodístico, 26(1), 167–175. https://dx.doi.org/10.5209/esmp.67296 Lafrance, A. (2018). El poder de la personalización. Cuadernos de Periodistas. http://bit. ly/2GtxQaQ (accessed March 22, 2018). Lea, W.A. (Ed.). (1980). Trends in Speech Recognition. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Lee, K. (2018). AI Superpowers. China, Silicon Valley and the New World Order. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Lewis, L. (2020). Infographic: what happens in an internet minute 2020. All Access. https://bit.ly/3bz7D9N (accessed March 10, 2020). Lewis, S.C., Guzman, A.L., and Schmidt, T.R. (2019). Automation, journalism and human-machine communication: rethinking roles and relationships of humans and machines in news. Digital Journalism, 7(4), 409–227. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811. 2019.1577147 Lleida, E. and Ortega, A. (2016). Reconocimiento del lenguaje hablando. In Gonzalo, A.L. (Coord.). Tecnologías del lenguaje en España. Comunicación inteligente entre personas y máquinas. Ariel: Fundación Telefónica. https://bit.ly/2Yx17fY Manfredi Sánchez, J.L. and Ufarte Ruiz, M.J. (2020). Inteligencia artificial y periodismo: una herramienta contra la desinformación. Revista CIDOB d’Afers Internacionals, 124, 49–72. https://doi.org/10.24241/rcai.2020.124.1.49

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

185

186

11  Ethical Dilemmas in the Personalization of News from Voice Interfaces

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

National Public Radio. (2020), The Spring 2020 Smart Audio Report. Available at https:// bit.ly/2MWNlgk Newell, A. (1978). Harpy, Production Systems and Human Cognition. Pennsylvania: Carnegie-Mellon University. https://bit.ly/3dA5mMi Newman, N. (2018). The Future of Voice and the Implications for News. Digital News Project. University of Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. November. https://bit.ly/2XbyeFE Pariser, E. (2012). The Filter Bubble. How the New Personalized Web Is Changing What We Read and How We Think. New York: Penguin Books. Pedrero Esteban, L.M. (2020). Hacia una verificación inteligente de la información en los interfaces de voz. El Periscopio. Blog del Master de Innovación Periodística. Universidad Miguel Hernández de Elche. https://bit.ly/2zUYomH (accessed May 18, 2020). Pedrero Esteban, L.M. and Herrera-Damas, S. (2017). La notificación push como estrategia informativa de la radio en el entorno digital. El Profesional de la Información, 26(6), 1100–1107. https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2017.nov.09 Rodríguez-Fernández, L. (2020). Junk News y “medios de desinformación” en la campaña electoral del 10-N. Revista Mediterránea de Comunicación, 11(2), 71–83. Salazar, I. (2018). Los robots y la Inteligencia Artificial. Nuevos retos del periodismo. Doxa Comunicación, 27, 295–315. https://doi.org/10.31921/doxacom.n27a15 Scolari, C.A. (2018). Las leyes de la interfaz. Diseño, ecología, evolución, tecnología. Barcelona: Gedisa. Thurman, N., Lewis, S.C., and Kunert, J. (2019). Algorithms, automation, and news. Digital Journalism, 7(8), 980–992. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2019.1685395 Voxly Digital. (2020). Time to shine, Alexa. Getting the UK through insolation. Investigating the impact of Coronavirus on UK voice usage. https://bit.ly/3fXDhjp (accessed April 23, 2020). Welt. (2012). Von IBM shoebox bis siri: 50 Jahre Spracherkennung. Welt News Check. Available at https://bit.ly/2Ywehde (accessed April 20, 2012). Zamith, R. (2019). Algorithms and journalism. In Örnebring, H., Chan, Y.Y., Carlson, S. et al. (Eds.). Oxford Encyclopedia of Journalism Studies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

187

12 Transparency, Innovation, and Journalism1 Rogério Christofoletti2

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Federal University of Santa Catarina

The voice of enthusiasts who say that transparency is the new objectivity has strengthened over the past ten years. Transparency is a growing value in journalistic ethics connected to a fundamental principle of journalism in order to bring two worlds together; one which is more open and dialogical, and another that, although widely respected, is currently showing strong signs of fatigue and has visible difficulty in breathing. In other words, transparency is a word which has instilled a new mindset into the language of journalism, but more than that, it is a survival item in these challenging times. Society is currently demanding more transparency in public acts and the corporate world. Citizens and institutions are demanding open data from governments while appropriating monitoring technologies for decision-making and public actions. Consumers and social institutions pay more attention to the development and launch of products, the creation and offer of services, and the positioning of companies and brands in the market. The idea that clarity and visibility give us more power and control is an attractive one, but the concept of transparency has been questioned by authors like Lord (2006), Chul-Han (2012), Alloa and Thomä (2018), Schudson and Pozen (2018), Berger and Owetschkin (2019), among others. These authors warn of the shortcomings of transparency if conceived as a cure-all, and the social risks attached to its automatic and sweeping adoption. Despite its widespread popularity, transparency is not an easy concept to explain and implement in practice. It gained momentum in the mid-1980s as a measure to stop the increasing loss of confidence in governments in the face of allegations of corruption. The loss of credibility in institutions forced administrators to open up their 1  This chapter is the result of research financed by the National Council for Technological Development (CNPq) and was supported by the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (Capes). 2  Professor at the Department of Journalism at the Federal University of Santa Catarina, Brazil. A researcher at the National Council for Technological and Social Development (CNPq), he has led research teams with Brazilian and foreign funding, including UNESCO. He is the author and editor of 13 books on journalistic ethics, education, and new technologies. He has published over 120 chapters and articles in journals. He was chairman of the Ethics Committee of the Journalists Union of Santa Catarina (2017–2020) and he is coordinator of the Observatory of Journalistic Ethics (objETHOS). News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

188

12  Transparency, Innovation, and Journalism1

organizations and make them more responsible (Schmidt, 2018; Craft, 2019). The “solution” was not only limited to governments, it also applied to the corporate world, whether that be a profitable business (Oliver, 2004), a key to progress and good governance (Florini, 2007), or just to comply with legal requirements and respond to social pressure (Christensen and Cheney, 2015). Societies have since been developing instruments to re-establish that trust by creating more open, accountable, and horizontal relationships. The idea of transparency is based on the need to satisfy the public and the legal right to demand more information about these actions. The word “transparency” is polysemic and perhaps is closest in meaning to the word “openness.” Used initially in the field of physics, transparency is rooted in the understanding that visible objects are also subject to more trust and credit. Anything that may be opaque is also suspect, since it cannot be monitored or held under surveillance. This enlightening concept will evolve to integrate the ideas that underpin today’s democracies, including electoral processes (Bowles, Hamilton, and Levy, 2014; Dimova, 2020). In social life, transparency is seen as a democratic persuader, an increasingly necessary and more versatile element for promoting social balance. Mathiesen (2016) states that informational transparency has great value in democracy since democratic regimes need an informed public to function effectively. When a government provides information about its public policies and economic figures, it is making its citizens aware of what is happening in society. Mathiesen argues, however, that it is not enough for governments to make open data available so that democratic decisions can be made. They must also prioritize and interpret data, fill in information gaps, support the intermediaries that make data more accessible, and invest in education so that citizens understand the complexity of open data. In other words, transparency is a means to an end, and not an end in itself. The phrase that makes transparency a renewed objectivity has its roots in the field of journalism, where being objective has value and meaning. In general, the media supports the use of transparency and accountability instruments in governments, but the media companies themselves are resistant to implementing internal policies that would allow the public to monitor and debate them. There are aspects of journalism’s professional culture that hinder the process of spreading a mindset of transparency. There are some situations where reporters may not be completely transparent in their methods or work, as doing so may mean jeopardizing the report or exposing their sources to unnecessary and undesirable risks.3 On the other hand, transparency in a very competitive market which is going through a crisis, could help support innovative journalistic initiatives, and can even contribute to increasing public confidence. This chapter looks at how the concept of transparency is absorbed by the media and lists measures to demonstrate how journalistic innovation and accountability policies are not necessarily opposite and excluding.

3  Angela Philips agrees that the duty not to reveal confidential sources is greater than the duty to be transparent, but she recalls that most journalistic situations do not require the protection of sources. “And there is absolutely no reason (beyond a distorted concern for commercial and brand protection) why journalists should not credit fellow professionals from other news organizations when the occasion demands that a real scoop should be recognized” (2010, p. 380).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Transparency and Professional Ethics

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Transparency and Professional Ethics It is important to understand that the demand for transparency has reached journalism but not because the public recognizes it as a political actor which must be accountable, such as governments or public officials. The demand has reached journalism because new technologies have allowed for mass circulation of information through external and alternative channels; they have shortened the distance between audiences and sources, and made it possible for everyone to view the content. It might have been enough for journalism in the past to just present its product and have the public trust it, but that is not enough anymore. Losing its exclusivity as an information provider has weakened journalism’s credibility, which has made media and professionals provide more detail and explain content and practices. It is not just about technological changes but about cultural transformations. Appropriating new information and communication technologies quickly and easily has made audiences more selective and demanding. Selective because they have access to a larger and more diverse number of information channels; demanding because the number of options means they can compare the quality of information products and services, which leads to increased expectations for said quality. Given the abundance of content and its expanded capacity for verification, the public is no longer satisfied with just the content, but wants to know more and more about what’s going on behind the news; how the information was obtained or produced. The relationship between audiences and journalism has changed and, consequently, has brought cultural changes to society. Transparency is increasingly linked to credibility because it allows the public to check and compare, and to recognize and be convinced of the reliability of the information being offered to them. Cultural changes often have an effect on the relationships between people and organizations, and end up redefining the values and meanings of these relationships. These effects, then, also relate to the ethics of these social groups. A number of authors have discussed and recorded developments in the ethical standards of journalism over the last few decades (Christians, 1998; Aznar, 1999; Harcup, 2001; Sanders, 2003; Bernier, 2004; Friend and Singer, 2007; Foreman, 2010; McBride and Rosenstiel, 2014; Ess, 2020; Wilkins and Christians, 2020). Paul (1994) states that, in general, journalists are resistant to the idea of publicly revealing their daily practices, and so they treat them like professional secrets. Three decades ago, this was even more common. Revealing how a report was put together seemed to compromise not just its results, but also the sources involved, and remove a certain magical aura that surrounded the world of journalism. At that time, media still had the primacy of informing, they had privileged access to authorities, and they had the specific technological know-how and dominance of the language to provide society with news. Keeping these practices within the newsrooms strengthened the core of the profession and maintained a necessary distance between journalists, sources, and the public. There were several areas in which journalists were not transparent: the public did not know how the facts became news; what the rationale was behind those news reports; or even what the points of view were of the individuals involved in the news events; conflicts of interest never seemed to exist; and all investigative actions and reporting seemed fair, correct, and ethical. Reporters did not even share their

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

189

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

190

12  Transparency, Innovation, and Journalism1

phone book contacts with other colleagues in the newsroom for fear that they might compromise their closeness to authorities and “reveal” their routine to the public. The idea that transparency was beneficial for governments and companies, because it helped restore part of the lost trust and allow for better anti-corruption systems, also reached journalism, which slightly increased debates between professionals and the media (Restrepo, 2004; Keeble, 2007; Meyers, 2010; Muller, 2014; Ward, 2015). The frictions, however, were more to do with the conflict between opening journalism up and the ideology of transparency (Allen, 2008; Ward, 2014). Being transparent is the best way to tell the truth, claim Kovach and Rosenstiel (2003). For journalism, which is all about telling truths, keeping its practices open is part of a professional rule. For Singer (2007), transparency in journalism is in the domain of his social responsibility, and for Karlsson, Clerwall, and Nord (2017), it is one of the daily professional rituals of reporters. There is a famous quote by Judge Louis Brandeis from the United States Supreme Court which says that sunlight is the best disinfectant. In the beginning of the twentieth century he pointed to the need for powers to be transparent so that citizens could follow their movements and abuses, and mistakes and irregularities could be identified. This idea gained momentum and took on new shapes in journalism at the beginning of the twenty-first century. Transparency seems now to be the new objectivity. By showing how they do their job, journalists can try to do away with intent, idiosyncrasies, and biases in coverage, achieving the desired effect of a rather worn-out value: objectivity. Central to the profession’s ethical pantheon (Ward, 2004), objectivity functioned as a scale and a compass, but also as a straitjacket and a ghost. It was a professional objective and ritual, a newspaper’s slogan, and a reporter’s mantra, but it was also the cradle of frustration for those who produced and consumed news. Total objectivity is impossible in journalism as it is a human activity that cannot escape subjectivities of journalists, the public, and sources. What is more, objectivity comes across as cold and detached, devoid of sensitivity and empathy, among other effects. Transparency can be seen as a driving force behind cultural, value, and capital changes in journalism (Craft and Heim, 2009). As Karlsson (2010) explains, there are two ways this occurs: through dissemination and through engagement and participation, thus educating people on how news is produced and involving the public in this process. Hellmueller et al. (2013) point out that journalistic transparency is related to open practices and open decision-making processes which can result in professionals having a greater responsibility and commitment to the truth (Vos and Craft, 2016). According to Craft (2019), the ability of journalists to be transparent can increase social expectations about the level and type of transparency available. In practice, this may refer to explaining work routines, as well as presenting original documents, videos, transcripts, and other materials that authenticate the news reports. Editors can also publish columns that justify the use of anonymous sources and that indicate any conflicts of interest, as well as ones that update and correct information. Asserting transparency as the new objectivity is attractive to many people, as it updates a professional rule and connects it to a new social demand. But the adoption of transparency as an ethical value in journalism is a long way from being completely understood, given the many practical difficulties involved with implementing it.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Professional Cultures

Ward (2014) considers that a normative concept such as transparency does not solve deeper-rooted problems in journalism, nor does it offer any magical solutions. Adopting transparent practices is not enough to make journalism more responsible. Transparency cannot be confused with responsibility, although it is a factor that leads to it. “Practitioners should honor a web of values. Transparency is only one of the gods in the pantheon of journalism ethics” (2014, p. 45). If incorporated as a norm, transparency must fit into a network of values, and in journalism those values are democracy, accountability, responsibility, honesty, and openness. “Transparent actions can be non-democratic, and non-transparent practices can be democratic” warns Ward (2014, p. 47), reminding us that privacy and confidentiality are necessary and consolidate certain procedures between professionals and their clients, in our case, journalists and their sources. Schudson (2015) points out that even the right to information is not absolute, and that some issues need to remain opaque in order for democracy to function, as is the case with secret ballots and protecting vulnerable populations, for example.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Professional Cultures Despite its inclusion in more recent debates, transparency does face resistance from newsrooms and journalistic business management. Chadha and Koliska (2015) observed how six influential vehicles in the United States dealt with the issue of transparency. The results indicate that The New York Times, The Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, CNN, and NPR are involved in a limited and strategic way with the issue, only having limited areas of news production open and visible to the public. It is a “managed transparency,” a low-risk offering for news organizations. Tensions between professional cultures make it difficult for transparency to be accepted as a broad value, applicable on a large scale and assimilated as a fundamental feature of journalistic conduct (Mick, Ribeiro, and Christofoletti, 2019). McBride and Rosenstiel (2014) point out that it is necessary to learn the pattern of transparency, meaning it is not natural and spontaneous in newsrooms. They believe that the “new mandate of transparency” is very close to the original concept of objectivity, as it allows the public to decide who they want to believe and remain confident in the mediums that provide them with their information. These authors claim that true transparency goes beyond informing how the news is produced. Transparency is the key to a method which guides journalists to produce news in a way that allows them to explain how it was done and to defend their methods. McBride and Rosenstiel (2014) recognize that several newsrooms are developing good practices in this direction, but transparency is far from routine in journalism. For these authors, the possibility of having transparent journalism depends on a greater demand from the public, more varied technological possibilities of information from different sources, and more efforts to develop good practices. According to McBride and Rosenstiel, the most persuasive way to convince someone to trust you is to show them how you do your job. Transparency, then, is a mechanism to eliminate suspicion and mistrust. “When citizens can see how the work was created, how the newsrooms are financed, and who is in position to influence editors and reporters, then they can judge the value of the news.”

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

191

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

192

12  Transparency, Innovation, and Journalism1

Global studies such as Journalistic Role Performance4 and Worlds of Journalism5 show there are multiple ways to practice journalism, which brings us to different local professional cultures. This is a more complex landscape because each journalistic market is composed of different organizations that all provide news. This kind of plurality represents a challenge in terms of new practices being adopted by journalists. There are contexts in which transparency is a rising value in journalistic ethics, and there are others that simply reject it. There are still others in which it promotes conduct in newsrooms. Transparency in journalism, public management, and in private business means justifying choices and actions, giving explanations, and being accountable. It means adopting a frank, open, and horizontal attitude toward the public, sources, service and product suppliers, competitors, governments, companies, and other interested groups. Being transparent here implies being responsible for the results of the work itself, and making any concerns public, allowing external requirements and demands. Transparency, then, is about adopting a mindset focusing on more public exposure and less arrogance in management, and more willingness to review procedures. It is a less narcissistic and more dialogic culture, and its assumption implies changes in ethical and technical conduct, otherwise we will only have the “promise of a culture of transparency,” as identified by Appelgren and Salaverría (2018) in the contexts of Sweden and Spain. Transparency takes on different forms in newsrooms: it reveals conflicts of interest in a story; explains how the news was investigated; names sources; informs about how the story was funded; admits mistakes, inconsistencies, failures, and doubts; makes it clear who was responsible for the report, who edited it, and who collaborated on it; it is about being frank, open, and honest with the public; informing the motivations of the sources or what encouraged their production; admitting negative results from its publication, and so on. Despite tensions in professional cultures, journalists can benefit from more transparency in their industry. Truong projected that 2020 would be a year of radical transparency in journalist salaries. This could benefit other portions of society in the United States, especially women and blacks, by exposing misrepresentations and white privileges in the labor market, for example.6 In addition to local difficulties, there are other obstacles that prevent the culture of information transparency from spreading. Over the last few decades, the platforms on which social networks are hosted (which work outside of journalism) represent a major part of this obstacle. In 2014, Gilmor was already wondering whether these private platforms could threaten public journalism. Its current financial power, global reach, and algorithmic opacity are fuel for a marginal debate about how to regulate these platforms (Yeung and Lodge, 2019). Turning our attention back to journalism, the most influential academic contribution to hold companies and professionals accountable and make them more transparent came well before the empires of Google and Facebook, and can be attributed to 4  See: https://www.journalisticperformance.org. 5  See: https://worldsofjournalism.org. 6  See: https://www.niemanlab.org/2019/12/the-year-of-radical-salary-transparency.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Professional Cultures

Bertrand (1999). This author believes news organizations, journalists, and society can create instruments for media accountability. Media Accountability Systems (MAS) are instruments independent from governments and help to improve information services, encourage the media to listen to different voices, educate audiences, and train professionals. MASs strengthen a culture of self-regulation within the sector and promote transparency and responsibility, which in turn allow for accountability. In short, MAS is an arsenal for democracies, still being studied in the United States and especially in Europe (Baldi and Hasebrink, 2007; Eberwein et al., 2011; Eberwein, Fengler, and Karmasin, 2017, 2019; Bastian, 2019). Studies in other geographic and social contexts—such as Lusophones (Paulino, 2009) or in Spain7—require the recognition of history and an understanding of multicultural realities. Domingo and Heikkilä (2012), in turn, go through media accountability for online practices. MASs can take on different forms: they can be in the form of editor columns, press observatories, reader and user associations, ombudsmen, media councils with societal members, and other efforts. A few decades ago, the emergence of press ombudsmen and the creation of letters from the editor sections were initially presented as instruments for transparency and improving quality. On the one hand, they control and monitor, and on the other, they are mechanisms that facilitate dialog with the public. We also cannot ignore the fact that there are initiatives used as marketing strategies and to find a competitive edge in a highly disputed market. Although they are healthy and suitable forms of openness, ombudsmen and editor notes play a more active role in accountability and are limited to justifying something which has already been done and accomplished. Basically, an ombudsman comments on published content and an editor explains the decisions made about the content that has already been made public. They most often explain what choices were made and how they shaped the information product, and less time explaining the modus operandi. Is there a way for transparency to deal with the production process and accompany the stages of doing journalism? How would one deal with these cases? How much truth do we bear? They may be outsiders to the world of journalism, but whistleblowers have been historically important for uncovering information over the past five decades (Greenberg, 2012; Moore, Huxford, and Hopper, 2014; Apaza and Chang, 2017). In 2010 and 2013, situations involving WikiLeaks and Edward Snowden shed a new light on the relationship between informants and journalists (Sifry, 2011; Goldfarb, 2015; Christofoletti, 2016; Lashmar, 2017; Bell and Owen, 2017), including new kinds of leaks (Arnold, 2020). However, whistleblowers have uncovered much more of what goes on behind the scenes in government and corporations than the media and journalists in society have (Stanger, 2019). Ironically, journalists consider themselves to be the champions of transparency, but of others’ transparency! A situation of a similar nature occurred in Latin America with the leaking of secret information by media vehicles and journalists (Becerra and Lacunza 2012). A WikiLeaks of journalism might not be possible, but a whistleblower from the media would be most welcome in the name of transparency.

7  See: http://mediaaccountability.upf.edu/index.html.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

193

194

12  Transparency, Innovation, and Journalism1

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Transparency and Innovation In addition to public demand, social imperative, and possible upward value in deontology, transparency can also be a catalyst for innovation in journalism. In newsrooms, transparency should not be an end in itself, but more a means to achieve higher levels of technical excellence, social responsibility, and professional ethics. Adopting transparency in journalism requires changes to conduct and adopting more efficient postures around the visibility of information production. These actions are not merely about adapting, they are about profoundly changing the understanding of journalism and its relations with society. These relationships are built on technology, language, politics, and social culture, and changing their bases means investing in people, finance, time, and energy. The popularization of gadgets and the massive increase in the number of channels have caused the market for the consumption of information and symbolic goods to grow dramatically in recent decades, creating an economy of attention. The makeup of this market has changed a lot, and the time spent on news is becoming less important. The crisis in journalism is a dynamic, multifaceted, complex, and unprecedented one as it affects not only the forms of business survival, but also affects journalism’s ethical integrity, its credibility, and its decision-making systems (Alexander, Breese, and Luengo, 2016; Christofoletti, 2019). In a market with many players, with consumption limits (time is an inflexible commodity!), and with a crisis of confidence, journalists and the media are looking for ways to distinguish themselves from the competition and get that competitive edge. Speed, agility, cost-benefits, and versatility are factors that can help one media company get an advantage over another in the search for public preference. But journalism also uses entertainment and leisure to compete for the public’s attention. The rate of consumption does not change—it is a 24-hour a day cycle all over the world—which means journalism needs to resort to other strategies to capture the public’s interest; sometimes these other strategies even involve imitating social networks. Are sense of community, responsibility, a commitment to ethics, and transparency factors that make journalism attractive enough to feed the appetite of current consumption? It is not only that these intangible assets should be considered as distinguishing factors—they must. According to Breese and Luengo (2016), we can imagine a journalistic industry without printed newspapers, but it is impossible to image journalism abandoning its professional values and standards. We can bring transparency into the values that guide journalism, or see it as a springboard toward reaching levels of greater excellence in the news industry. It is true that the lack of transparency in the sector is not an obstacle to doing business or expanding into consumer news markets. Although there are increasing demands for transparency in the management and ownership of journalistic companies in Spain and Portugal (Kranenburg, 2017), in less democratic countries, such as Iran and Iraq, the lack of clarity in investments is a major concern (Safari, 2018; Bali and Zarea, 2018). This gap causes economic uncertainty which can affect a company’s competitiveness or its ability to attract investors. Does the lack of protagonism weaken transparency? Not necessarily, but it puts it on another level, close to that of ethics and a commitment to responsibility. We make a point to say that transparency in journalism is not an end in itself, but a path.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Transparency and Innovation

Transparent actions can be a catalyst to innovation processes in the journalistic ecosystem, by bringing news producers closer to their audiences and by promoting technical quality. A culture of greater transparency in journalism can create a new relationship with the public, contribute to professional qualification, and assist in media education. It can also give greater coherence to journalism, which regularly monitors public and corporate actions, the latter almost always being opaque with its own procedures. If journalists monitor the transparency of governments and companies, why cannot they also open up their own practice and show society how the news is produced, who finances it, and what interests move it? There are some media who are more open to the public, and these new relationships could be innovators in the hazy landscape of global journalism. The Dutch cite that De Correspondent8 (also sold in the United States, Nigeria, India, and other countries) seeks to build its relationship with the audience, to be more transparent and open to collaboration, based on its principles: “We believe in transparency and continued selfimprovement.” The same is true with Mediapart9 in France. The Conversation10 is an independent medium in Australia and other countries such as Indonesia, Spain, Canada, and the United States, which is highly committed to ethics and accountability and relies on a wide network of academics and journalists to provide reliable information in the midst of this chaos of misinformation. The Conversation lists ten reasons11 that set it apart from its competitors and the transparency of methods, origins, and funding is one of its first principles. There are some specific examples of openness in Latin America. Red/Acción12 in Argentina proposes to “change the boundaries of newsrooms” by promoting a humane, responsible, and purposeful journalism. Supported by the membership model, Red/ Acción presents several forms of collaboration. “Redacción Abierta” is one that stands out, a space that functions as an open newsroom where users discuss ideas, suggest agendas, and talk about stories with journalists. Professionals, in turn, open their routines to the public. There is a similar initiative in Colombia with El Espectador, the country’s oldest circulation newspaper. The section “Redacción al Desnudo” comments on failed news coverage and behindthe-scenes events. Considering how it is only published sporadically, the section provides apprehensive and limited transparency, which is quite different from the self-criticism that ombudsman columns allow, as seen in Brazilian newspapers like Folha de S. Paulo, which instituted an ombudsman more than 30 years ago,13 and O Povo, the newspaper that created the position in 1994. Other more comprehensive initiatives encourage the spread of transparency to restore public confidence. Created in 2016 at the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute of the Missouri School of Journalism (USA), the Trusting News Project14 works with “newsrooms to learn how people decide what news to trust and help

8  See: https://decorrespondent.nl. 9  See: https://www.mediapart.fr. 10  See: https://theconversation.com/au. 11  See: https://theconversation.com/us/10-ways-we-are-different. 12  See: https://www.redaccion.com.ar. 13  See: https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/ombudsman. 14  See: https://trustingnews.org.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

195

196

12  Transparency, Innovation, and Journalism1

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

journalists implement trust-building strategies.” With the collaboration of more than 50 media vehicles, the project offers training for journalists and consultancies, edits materials, interviews consumers, and tries to connect newsrooms with their audiences. In 2018, Trusting News conducted a survey with the University of Texas Center for Media Engagement to see if including explanations of how journalists do their job is useful toward building trust with readers. According to the results, having a space for reporters to explain their processes can improve people’s perceptions of news organizations.15 A similar organization is the Trust Project,16 which develops “transparency standards that help you easily assess the quality and credibility of journalism.” The project is a consortium of news companies that implement credibility indicators by training teams, formulating editorial policies, and adopting new management and journalistic practices. Headed by journalist Sally Lehrman, the initiative is funded by technology giants and philanthropic funds. The Trust Project has chapters in several countries, including Canada, the United States, Spain, and Brazil. The credibility indicators include the publication of explanatory labels in the news, transparency on funding and property, greater visibility in error correction, plurality of voices in the news, encouraging public collaboration, and policies of ethics and editorial integrity. For example, the Brazilian chapter reported in 2020 that important vehicles from its local consortium, such as Folha de S. Paulo and Poder360, started to report on the revenue percentages of governments. This policy is different from the standard in the country, which is known for its lack of transparency in journalism. There is a technological initiative in Spain which is pushing for more transparency in journalistic production. Started by the daily newspaper Público, the TJ Tool17 uses eight transparency indicators for each news item. “We want all our news pieces to achieve 100% transparency.” TJ Tool explains how they do this: Making our editorial policy public: 15% Explaining why we choose a certain way to say things: 15% Stating the place where we write the information: 10% Byline: Does it give a full name, initials, or a general denomination for the newsroom: 10% Mentioned sources: Persons, Institutions, Other Media, and even a Nonidentified Source: 20% Attaching support documents: 10% With links to other context documents: 10% Giving the publication and updating dates as well as the dates of all documents: 10% This TJ Tool is an open source WordPress plugin that can be installed by any vehicle wishing to adhere to what the Público newspaper refers to in its policy statement18 as Transparency Movement in Journalism. 15  See: https://mediaengagement.org/research/building-trust. 16  See: https://thetrustproject.org. 17  See: https://www.transparentjournalism.org/reader. 18  See: https://www.transparentjournalism.org/manifesto.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Transparency and Innovation

The TJ Tool unites two essential sides of the information process: informing readers how journalism is done and encouraging professionals to be open about their technical procedures. Examples of this have been slow, contributing mainly to the qualification of journalists. In Peru, the Press Council and the Ojo Público website produced a guide in 2016 for sharing investigative data journalism tools. In “La Navaja Suiza del Reportero,” David Hidalgo and Fabiola Torres reveal some secrets of the profession to other journalists and help to strengthen the transparency of public data in that country. The guide provides technological solutions for gathering information and displaying it in an attractive way. Another example from Latin America is “Háblame de tus fuentes,” a book written by Luisa García Tellez in which she interviews 20 investigative journalists from Mexico, Chile, Colombia, Argentina, Peru, Venezuela, and Spain. The reporters are open and candid about their experiences, addressing aspects which are rarely made public, such as strategies used to gain the trust of interviewees, how sources are protected and treated, the types of approaches and techniques they use, and the kinds of dilemmas they face. With regard to journalistic transparency, the most sensitive issue still seems to be the funding of media organizations, as this can reveal the solidity and longevity of business, possible conflicts of interest in the news, and potentially unacceptable relationships. Portugal has an interesting story worth looking at. One of the many responsibilities of the Communication Regulatory Agency (ERC) is to promote transparency in the media, according to law 78/2015. The ERC created a specific portal19 to make the data public on ownership, management, and the funding of companies in the country’s communication sector. By law, information on funding and corporate management, such as the corporate structure of companies, must also be given to the ERC and released in its annual public reports. It is a model of transparency and accountability that limits the self-regulation that organizations in the sector defend so much, especially in the West. In Portugal’s case, the state regulatory body is a promoter of financial and administrative transparency in the media. The Media Ownership Monitor project,20 from the NGO Reporters Without Borders, maps out not only the groups that control the media in several countries (Pakistan, Turkey, India, Cambodia, and others), but also reveals local tendencies that may threaten media freedom and the right to information. As we have seen, there are many complex challenges in assimilating transparency into the agendas of journalists and news organizations. It stands in opposition to corporate, financial, and political interests. But if accepted as an active principle, it can contribute to increased technical excellence, to greater ethical responsibility, and to restoring new relationships of trust with the public. These are actions that innovate and revitalize good practices. In newsrooms, on the streets, and on screens, media accountability is comparable to other movements of greater public transparency, such as open science, which does not change the methodology of research or its results, but popularizes scientific advances

19  See: https://portaltransparencia.erc.pt. 20  See: https://www.mom-rsf.org.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

197

198

12  Transparency, Innovation, and Journalism1

and demystifies the work of scientists, bringing them closer to society. Whether it is science or journalism, this is an agenda for building a more fair, open, cooperative, and honest world.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Alexander, J.C., Breese, E.B. and Luengo, M. (Eds.). (2016). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered: Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. New York: Cambridge University Press. Allen, D.S. (2008). The trouble with transparency: the challenge of doing journalism ethics in a surveillance society. Journalism Practice, 4(3), 323–340. Alloa, E. and Thomä, D. (Eds.). (2018). Transparency, Society and Subjectivity: Critical Perspectives. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. Apaza, C. and Chang, Y. (Eds.). (2017). Whistleblowing in the World: Government Policy, Mass Media and the Law. London: Palgrave MacMillan. Appelgren, E. and Salaverría, R. (2018). The promise of the transparency culture. Journalism Practice. https://doi.org/10.1080/17512786.2018.1511823 Arnold, J.R. (2020). Whistleblowers, Leakers and Their Networks: From Snowden to Samizdat. Lanham/Boulder/New York/London: Rowman & Littlefield. Aznar, H. (1999). Ética y periodismo: códigos, estatutos y otros documentos de autorregulación. Barcelona: Paidós. Baldi, P. and Hasebrink, U. (Eds.) (2007). Broadcasters and Citizens in Europe: Trends in Media Accountability and Viewer Participation. Bristol/Chicago: Intellect. Bali, A.O. and Zarea, H. (2018). The challenges of firms in Iraqi Kurdistan Economy in the light of strategic acquisition theory. In Khajeheian, D., Friedrichsen, M. and Mödinger, W. (Eds.). Competitiveness in Emerging Markets: Market Dynamics in the Age of Disruptive Technologies. Cham: Springer. Bastian, M. (2019). Media and Accountability in Latin America: Framework, Conditions, Instruments. Cham: Springer. Becerra, M. and Lacunza, S. (2012). WikiMediaLeaks. Buenos Aires: Ediciones B. Bell, E. and Owen, T. (Eds.). (2017). Journalism after Snowden: The Future of the Free Press in the Surveillance State. New York: Columbia University Press. Berger, S. and Owetschkin, D. (Eds.). (2019). Contested Transparencies, Social Movements and the Public Sphere: Multi-disciplinary Perspectives. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Bernier, M.F. (2004). Éthique et Deontologie du journalisme. Saint-Nicolas, Québec: Les Presses de l’Université Laval. Bertrand, C.J. (1999). L’Arsenal de la démocracie: médias, déontologie et MARS. Paris: Économica. Bowles, N., Hamilton, J.T., and Levy, D.A.L. (Eds.). (2014). Transparency in Politics and the Media. Accountability and Open Government. London: I.B. Tauris. Breese, E.B. and Luengo, M. (2016). News innovations and enduring commitments. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E.B. and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered: Democratic Culture, Professional Codes, Digital Future. New York: Cambridge University Press. Chadha, K. and Koliska, M. (2015). Newsrooms and transparency in the digital age. Journalism Practice, 9(2), 215–229. https://doi.org/10.1080/17512786.2014.924737

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

Christensen, L.T. and Cheney, G. (2015). Looking at transparency: challenging ideals, proxies and organizational practices. Communication Theory, 25, 70–90. Christians, C. (1998). Media Ethics: Cases and Moral Reasoning. New York: Longman. Christofoletti, R. (2016). Ethical risks, informers, whistleblowers, leaks and clamor for transparency. Brazilian Journalism Research, 12, 2. Christofoletti, R. (2019). ¿A crise do jornalismo tem solução? Barueri: Estação das Letras e Core. Chul-Han, B. (2012). Transparenzgesellschaft. Berlin: Matheus & Seitz Verlag. Craft, S. (2019). Transparency. In Vos, T.P. and Hanusch, F. et al., (Eds.). The International Encyclopedia of Journalism Studies. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118841570.iejs0097 Craft, S. and Heim, K. (2009). Transparency in journalism: meanings, merits and risks. In Wilkins, L. and Christians, C. (Eds.). The Routledge Handbook of Mass Media Ethics, Second edition. New York: Routledge, pp. 217–228. Dimova, G. (2020). Democracy beyond Elections. Government Accountability in the Media Age. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. Domingo, D. and Heikkilä, H. (2012). Media accountability practices in online news media. In Siapera, E. and Veglis, A. (Eds.). The Handbook of Global Online Journalism. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Eberwein, T., Fengler, S., and Karmasin, M. (Eds.). (2017). The European Handbook of Media Accountability. London: Sage. Eberwein, T., Fengler, S., and Karmasin, M. (Eds.). (2019). Media Accountability in the Era of Post-truth Politics. London/New York: Routledge. Eberwein, T., Fengler, S., Lauk, E., and Leppik-Bork, T. (Eds.). (2011). Mapping Media Accountability—In Europe and Beyond. Cologne: Herbert Von Halem. Ess, C. (2020). Digital Media Ethics. 3rd ed. Cambridge: Polity Press. Florini, A. (Ed.) (2007). The Right to Know: Transparency for an Open World. New York: Columbia University Press. Foreman, G. (2010). The Ethical Journalist. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Friend, C. and Singer, J.B. (2007). Online Journalism Ethics. London/New York: M.E. Sharpe. Goldfarb, R. (Ed.) (2015). After Snowden: Privacy, Secrecy and Security in the Information Age. New York: St. Martins’ Press. Greenberg, A. (2012). This Machine Kills Secrets. How WikiLeaks, Cypherpunks and Hactivists Aim to Free the World’s Information. London: Virgin Books. Harcup, T. (2001). The Ethical Journalist. London: Routledge. Hellmueller, L., Vos, T.P., and Poepsel, M.A. (2013). Shifting journalistic capital? Journalism Studies, 14(3), 287–304. https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2012.697686 Karlsson, M. (2010). Rituals of transparency. Journalism Studies, 11(4), 535–545. Karlsson, M., Clerwall, C., and Nord, L. (2017). Do not remain corrected: transparency and attitudes towards inaccurate news and corrections in online journalism. Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, 94(1), 148–167 Keeble, R. (2007). Ethics for Journalists. London: Sage. Kovach, B. and Rosenstiel, T. (2003). Os elementos do jornalismo: o que os jornalistas devem saber e o público exigir. 2ª ed. São Paulo: Geração Editorial. Kranenburg, H.V. (Ed.) (2017). Innovation Policies in the European News Media Industry: A Comparative Study. Cham: Springer. Lashmar, P. (2017). No more sources? The impact of Snowden’s revelations on journalists and their confidential sources. Journalism Practice, 11(6), 665–688.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

199

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

200

12  Transparency, Innovation, and Journalism1

Lord, K. (2006). The Perils and Promise of Global Transparency: Why the Information Revolution May not Lead to Security, Democracy, or Peace. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press. Mathiesen, K. (2016). transparency for democracy. In Moore, A. (Ed.). Privacy, Security and Accountability: Ethics, Law and Policy. London/New York: Rowman & Littelfield. McBride, K. and Rosenstiel, T. (2014). The New Ethics of Journalism: Principles for the 21st Century. Thousand Oaks/London: Sage. Meyers, C. (Ed.) (2010). Journalism Ethics: A Philosophical Approach. Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press. Mick, J., Ribeiro, A., and Christofoletti, R. (2019). Mídia jornalística e accountability: quando quem exige transparência não a pratica. In Faustino, P., Martins, C., Puentes, I., and Belda, F. (Eds.). Comunicação, Media E Indústrias Criativas Na Era Digital. Porto: Media XXI. Moore, M.A., Huxford, J., and Hopper, K.M. (2014). Whistleblower as news source: a complex relationship examined through a survey of journalists’ attitudes. Journal of Applied Journalism & Media Studies, 3(3), 355–374. Muller, D. (2014). Journalism Ethics for the Digital Age. Victoria: Scribe. Oliver, R.W. (2004). What Is Transparency? New York: McGraw-Hill. Paul, N. (1994). Some paradoxes of privacy. Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 9(4), 228–230. Paulino, F.O. (org.) (2009). Lusocomum: transparência, governança, accountability e comunicação pública. Brasília: Casa das Musas. Philips, A. (2010). Transparency and the new ethics of journalism. Journalism Practice, 4 (3), 373–382. Restrepo, J.D. (2004). El zumbido y el moscardón: taller y consultorio de ética periodística. México: FCE/FNPI. Safari, F. (2018). Restrictions and legal challenges for foreign investment in the media market in Iran. In Khajeheian, D., Friedrichsen, M., and Mödinger, W. (Eds.). Competitiveness in Emerging Markets: Market Dynamics in the Age of Disruptive Technologies. Cham: Springer. Sanders, K. (2003). Ethics & Journalism. London: Sage. Schmidt, P. (2018). Transparency. In Arrigo, B.A. (Ed.). The Sage Encyclopedia of Surveillance, Security and Privacy. Los Angeles: Sage. Schudson, M. (2015). The Rise of the Right to Know: Politics and the Culture of Transparency, 1945–1975. Cambridge/London: The Belknapp Press of Harvard University Press. Schudson, M. and Pozen, D.E. (Eds.) (2018). Troubling Transparency. The History and Future of Freedom of Information. New York: Columbia University Press. Sifry, M. (2011). Wikileaks and the Age of Transparency. New York: OR Books. Singer, J. (2007). Contested autonomy: professional and popular claims on journalistic norms, Journalism Studies, 8(1), 79–95. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616700601056866 Stanger, A. (2019). Whistleblowers: Honesty in America from Washington to Trump. New Haven/London: Yale University Press. Truong, D. (2020). The year of radical salary transparency. NiemanLab. https:// www.niemanlab.org/2019/12/the-year-of-radical-salary-transparency Vos, T.P. and Craft, S. (2016). The discursive construction of journalistic transparency. Journalism Studies. https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2015.1135754 Ward, S.J.A. (2004). The Invention of Journalism Ethics. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

References

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ward, S.J.A. (2014). The magical concept of transparency. In Zion, L. and Craig, D. (Eds.). Ethics for Digital Journalists: Emerging Best Practices. New York: Routledge, 45–58. Ward, S.J.A. (2015). Radical Media Ethics. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Wilkins, L. and Christians, C. (Eds.). (2020). The Routledge Handbook of Mass Media Ethics. 2nd ed. New York/ London: Routledge. Yeung, K. and Lodge, M. (Eds.). (2019). Algorithmic Regulation. London: Oxford University Press.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

201

202

13 Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation Óscar Espiritusanto and Inès Dinant Fundación Cibervoluntarios

Introduction

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Numerous studies have already warned of the increase in misinformation and the danger that it may have for the stability of our democratic societies (Pariser, 2017; Schudson and Zelizer, 2017; Nielsen and Graves, 2017; Allcott and Gentzkow, 2017; Keane, 2018; Roozenbeek and van der Linden, 2019). Citizens in several EU member states have exhibited concern about the rise of populism and Euroskepticism and expressed worries about the use of misinformation. The topics that have received the most attention in different EU Parliament committees are: the countermeasures that Europe can adopt; the destabilization that countries outside Europe can cause within electoral processes; freedom of expression; and the way to distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources of information (The EU in 2019 – General Report, 2019). With this in mind, on December 10, 2019, the European Council reached a series of conclusions on complementary actions for increasing resilience and fighting hybrid threats, including misinformation. Point 32 states: The Council recognises that a comprehensive approach at all levels is needed to address the challenges of disinformation, including interference seeking to undermine free and fair European elections, making best use of all available tools online and offline. (European Council, 2019, p. 9) We have recently witnessed an increase in fake news relating to a subject that is affecting people across Europe: COVID-19. When respondents to a Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (RISJ) survey conducted between March and April 2020 were asked if they had encountered false information, a third of those surveyed claimed to have come across a large or very large amount of false information in the preceding week, especially on social networks and messaging applications (Nielsen et al., 2020). With good reason, the director-general of the World Health Organization Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned of an “infodemic” accompanying the Covid-19 pandemic and affirmed that the evolution of the coronavirus outbreak would largely News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Introduction

depend on correct information being sent to the people who need it (Adhanom Ghebreyesus and Ng, 2020). Fact checkers have been and continue to be present in this fight against misinformation. Currently, according to Duke Reporters, there are 237 organizations in 78 countries that actively verify the statements of public figures, follow up on the promises made by politicians, or focus on verifying information (Duke Reporters, April 2020). The Poynter Institute’s International Fact-Checking Network, which brings together fact checkers from around the world, revealed in a survey of 15 of its partners that the increase in traffic and queries to their services regarding COVID-19 has increased in an unprecedented way, the most striking case being Colombia Check, which experienced the highest growth in page views, with an increase of 1,090% (Mantas, 2020) So much information has been generated in relation to COVID-19 that many factchecking outlets around the world are dedicating a large proportion of their time and resources to verifying information on this topic (Brennen et al., 2020). The aforementioned RISJ study in 2020 analyzed different English-language stories. Fact checkers rated 225 items as false or misleading. The response from the main social networks has been to remove or flag news that the checkers considered fake. That said, in this area, there are differences between social networks. Here we can see that fact checkers responded quickly to the huge amount of misinformation that was generated. There was a 900% increase in English-language checks during the pandemic (Brennen et al., 2020). An important aspect of this work is that it once again confirms the limited access that checkers have to private channels such as email, private groups, and messaging apps, in which numerous hoaxes and great quantities of misinformation are shared (Brennen et al., 2020, p. 2). In this situation, educating and sharing with the fact-checking community is important. Spanish fact checkers such as Maldita have created a community that will be an important fulcrum as its rebuttals become more far reaching and relevant. This relationship between the different members of the community and the organization may make it possible to refute and expand on information, to improve the digital literacy of some of its members, warn about certain rumors, and so on (Magallón-Rosa, 2018). In addition, just as Maldita does,1 another of the Spanish fact checkers, Newtral,2 offers a fact-checking service via WhatsApp. Users can send memos, hoaxes, statements, published articles, and so on to a phone number so that the fact-checking team can help them to ascertain whether or not the information that they have received is true. Fact checkers reach out to their user communities to have the latter send them queries, but at the same time they help users to better understand the mechanisms of misinformation via courses and tools posted on their websites. A basic ingredient in fighting misinformation is user education. These organizations entrusted with checking facts allow users to see a simple method for verifying information, and they contribute to citizens’ media literacy (Lotero-Echeverri, Romero-Rodríguez, and Pérez-Rodríguez, 2018, p. 313).

1  Maldita: https://maldita.es. 2  Newtral: https://www.newtral.es/metodologia-transparencia.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

203

204

13  Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation

Fact-checking journalism makes a contribution to users’ and journalists’ media literacy by allowing them to witness a simple and repeatable method for verifying information published in the media and on social networks before they share it. In Europe, the authorities have a clear view of things: to deal with misinformation, providing a media education to journalists and audiences is important. Citizens’ media literacy has been important to the European Union (EU) since 2007. The ability to access, have a critical understanding of, and interact with media is considered to be important, especially in an era such as today, when we have an excess of information and, above all, of misinformation. The EU is aware that if we are able to shape citizens who can assess information critically, this will allow individuals of all ages to safely navigate the news environment and to make informed decisions (European Commission, 2007). One of the population groups on which this current panorama comprising the media, misinformation, and fake news is having the strongest undesirable impact is primary- and secondary-school students. At these ages, misinformation has both a cognitive and emotional influence. The consequences of misinformation campaigns can be significant, particularly among this group of individuals. According to McDougall et al. (2018, p. 7):

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Media literacy initiatives have been shown to lessen the vulnerability of children to disinformation. The development of critical thinking and analytical competences are key components of a successful educational intervention. It is important to start fostering literacy concerning misinformation at the earliest ages, but we must bear in mind that fake news reaches all strata of society. Within the EU Citizens’ Dialogues undertaken since 2017, there have been issues that concern Europeans and that continued to dominate in 2019—for example, populism, Euroskepticism, fake news, and misinformation (The EU in 2019 – General Report, 2019, p. 135). These subjects are interrelated and influence one other. In its reports, the EU takes the view that media literacy must be fostered in relation to the different media formats (broadcasting, radio, and the press) and distribution channels (traditional forms, the Internet, and social networks), and that it must address the needs of all ages. Media literacy empowers citizens, raises awareness, and helps counteract the effects of misinformation campaigns and the spread of fake news through the media and social networks.3 Media education is a basic element in dealing with fake news and misinformation in public discourse (McDougall et al., 2018). Therefore, at the moment, it is desirable to have fact checkers and to develop the literacy of and educate citizens so that they are able to think critically about information. But in the long term, there will be a need for tools such as Provenance, a European project that will allow users to assess online content. This project aims to educate people and, using intelligent algorithms, detect misinformation and irregularities in content. Such a tool may be a good solution for combating misinformation in a simpler and faster way.

3  Cfr. https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/media-literacy.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Methodology

In this chapter, we set out the results of a study carried out as part of the Provenance project.4 This study seeks to respond to the question of how citizens handle information, how their relationship to it affects them, and what conclusions they reach as they go about deciding if they will subsequently share it with their contacts and on social networks. Within the context of fact checking and media literacy, this study aims to ascertain how citizens build “their truth” from the content that they receive. Identifying the relevant informational mechanisms will allow us to explain the role played by the Internet and social networks in the decisions that individuals make as they go about becoming informed and selecting and sharing content. Specifically, we will look at these choices as they relate to voting intention and support for particular political trends. As Tapias Hernández (2019) points out, political organizations’ use of negative, anger-filled, emotional discourses can create common collective goals. This argument can be linked to that of authors such as Fernández Such (2017), who affirms that the Far Right’s new populist movements are finding a place to prosper among rural populations simply by claiming to listen to a part of the population that has been forgotten in political discourse. Consequently, feelings of anger against the political establishment in rural settings could lead to a reinforcement of right-wing populist discourse.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Methodology In order to examine the mechanisms that activate (dis)information and propagate it in the new digital ecosystem and to assess the fundamental role played by social networks in the public’s construction of informational truth, we conducted four group interviews between March 2019 and June 2019 in Madrid. We made the methodological decision to use group interviews since they would allow us to obtain an in-depth understanding of the existing narrative behind the information journey from the perspective of users themselves. We sought stories that allowed us to understand, from people drawn from our own societal context, how to devise the Provenance fact-checking tool on which the research team is working so that it responds as closely as possible to people’s realities, concerns, and needs related to information and misinformation. This exploratory phase of the Provenance project corresponds to two of the four uses of group interviews defined by the IOÈ Collective (2010, p. 83), namely: “Identifying the most common topics among different segments of the population (conscious and explicit judgments) and detecting the frequency or ‘dominance’ of certain topics.” In line with the IOÈ Collective’s view that focus groups (FG) are similar to group interviews, we worked based on the premise that one of the biggest potential differences 4  This study is part of Provenance (Providing Verification Assistance for New Content; H2020ICT28-2018); the project has received funding from the EU’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No. 825227. Along with the Cibervoluntarios Foundation, the following organizations are involved in this project: DCU Institute for Future Media and Journalism, Trinity College Dublin, newswhip, Everis, the Czech Academy of Sciences, and Graz University. Each of these organizations contributed to the project according to its own experience. Based on different points of view, realities, and specialisms, consortiums of this type are creating various tools to help fight disinformation.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

205

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

206

13  Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation

between the two is that defined by David Varona and Gema Sánchez (2016). These authors, based on the study by Gaitán-Moya and Piñuel-Raigada (1998, p. 127; quoted in Varona-Aramburu and Sánchez-Muñoz, 2016, p. 798), describe argumentation and counter-argumentation as one of the characteristics of FGs. This is something that we can ultimately understand in terms of the logic of debate. In our case, we do not take the view that, owing to the objectives of the research and the exploratory phase in which we find ourselves, we need to foster debate. Rather, the idea is to understand in depth how different profiles that are representative of the informational context in which we find ourselves relate to the content that people corresponding to those profiles come across in the online ecosystem. The following section presents the results of a study carried out over two phases. The first phase, in which two group interviews were conducted, aimed to investigate the informational “journey” from the public’s perspective. In the second phase, we delved into the role played by emotions in relation to that journey and decision-making vis-àvis sharing. Before going into detail in terms of defining profiles and specifying the methodology used, it is important to highlight that both these aspects were based on prior analysis of the literature pertaining to the concepts deployed within the problems addressed in the two stages of the research presented here, as well as on the sociodemographic context of the information society in its current state. Likewise, this prior study of the literature allowed us to define the concepts, variables, and indicators that made it possible to specify the interview script and undertake a deeper level of analysis once the information was collected, since it allowed these elements to be analyzed in a way that took the macrocontext in which they are produced into account (Ioé, 2010, p. 91). The interviews of the first phase involved two sets of people: those who have incorporated digital technologies into their lives and those who have not. Participants from these groups corresponded to a combination of the following variables: age, education, residence, and political engagement. Detailed breakdowns of the profiles can be found in Appendix 1. These first two group interviews allowed us to ascertain the ways in which individuals become informed and the paths taken by information as it passes through citizens’ hands. After the role of emotions in this journey became apparent, we delved deeper into this matter in the second phase through two additional group interviews. The variables of the profiles established to undertake these were initially based on the following distinction: rural and urban. This choice was based on the need to understand the influence of political orientation in the construction of truth. In examining the literature, we observed that people could be inclined to believe information and news oriented toward their values as a community (Parratt, 2011; Pellegrini, 2019; Kappes et al., 2020). In order to be able to observe this issue in the Spanish context, we took the view that politics could be a key element here. In order to give effect to this distinction, we consider, based on what Fernández Such (2017) proposes and on the results of Spain’s general elections of April 28, 2019,5 in which the right-wing bloc won more votes at the municipal level than did the left-wing blocs, that the way to obtain a 5  Villalonga and Aragó (2019). “Dónde gana la derecha y la izquierda en España.” https://www. lavanguardia.com/politica/20190430/461945318418/elecciones-enerales-espana-2019-municipiosderecha-izquierda.html.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Results

certain dichotomy is to group people from rural areas and those from urban ones. The people who made up the set of participants were profiled according to the following variables: age, the main source to which they turn to inform themselves, the frequency with which they share or comment on content, their employment status, and their degree of political engagement. A detailed breakdown appears in Appendix 2.

Results We will now present the results obtained from the four group interviews and the impact they had in defining the Provenance tool. We will therefore first detail the informational journey as it was defined by people seeking to stay informed. We will then attempt to make sense of the role played by emotions in the informational decisions that people make. Finally, we will produce a definition of the tool developed, based, among other elements, on the results obtained from this methodology.

The Information Journey Figure 13.1 shows the different results from the four phases that we will explain in this section. Phase 1: Initial Information Capsules

An initial information capsule is all the information that a person comes into contact with at first. People construct these capsules consciously or unconsciously, since they

Provenance

INFORMATION JOURNEY

1 INITIAL INFORMATION CAPSULE PASSIVE

4 CREATION OF THE CAPSULE: SHARING ACTIVE

BREAKING

Twitter Flipboard Google (Alerts) Newsletters TV News Facebook Whatsapp

LET’S SHARE EXTERNAL SOURCES

• Cutting the chain • Avoiding Politics

INTERNAL SOURCES

FIRST IMPRESSION • Something is wrong with the info • Particular interest - Work - Personal Political / Gossip / (Pseudo)Science

Intention to share and/or use the info

2 LET’S GO CLOSER ACTIVE

3 CHECKING THE NEWS ACTIVE

DEEPER APPROACH

LET’S VERIFY

Specialized websites (Snopes...)

COMMENTS

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

NEWS

Google

Online News (Sometimes in the Initial Capsule)

Information Checking

Image Persons in situ

Step out of the bubble step out from the Political correction

Figure 13.1  Source: author.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

207

208

13  Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

emerge from both personalized sources such as social networks and nonpersonalized ones such as television or radio. The way in which a given capsule is generated is of essential importance to the object of this research, since the sources that it comprises provide truthfulness to the information consulted at the same time as they provide a basis for filter bubbles, to use Eli Pariser’s term (2017). First, the data from the group interviews confirm the existence of an initial information capsule that comprises content published on the different social networks (principally Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram) that the participants consult, in the form of the corresponding apps, pages, and personal profiles, in order to be informed about the topics that are of the greatest interest to them. This finding confirms the most recent data from the Digital News Report (RISJ 2019), according to which people usually access these information capsules through their mobile phones. In Spain, 67% of people use smartphones to stay informed. Facebook represents the most widely used social network for this purpose (47%), followed by WhatsApp (36%). Among young people, between the ages of 18 and 24, Instagram also plays a significant role (27%), according to the Digital News Report. In the case of this age group specifically, the same report indicates that Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter are used to approximately the same degree as Instagram. In other words, although there are many social networks, they all contribute to generating information bubbles (Pariser, 2017). The displacement of the old news models arising from radio and/or television, media that are considered more static due to their rigidity in terms of time and space, has been accompanied by the rise of a mobile-based way of accessing the news that offers a greater level of immediacy and access to the most up-to-date information. However, television remains an important information medium for older users. Having watched TV, these people decide whether or not to look deeper into particular issues that have caught their attention. It should be noted that, as the study carried out by Tapias Hernández (2019) found, misinformation also appears in more traditional media. In addition to television, this group also comes into contact with certain information through their most immediate networks such as those on WhatsApp, in which the contacts who supply information are known to the user. In the interview the comment was made that: It’s in our genes. It used to be almost compulsory to have the radio on at 2:30 or 3:00 in the afternoon, and then, when there was only one television channel, you had to watch it. (ND6-P7) A bit of everything … What I do is watch the news bulletin on TV, which for me is like the starting point. I latch on to what I find interesting and then research it. I find things out, and some things I see as valid by themselves, and for things that seem to be a little more important, what I do is go online and look in other media, compare things, look, listen, talk to other people, discuss, … to see whether or not what we think matches what has been published. (D-P7)

6  L 302, 19/10/92, P.1. Not Digital; D: Digital.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Results

Phase 2: Going into Greater Depth

Having established the first contact with the information, people decided to study topics in greater depth, adopting the following criteria: the information was of interest to them; the information did not sound at all good to them; or they thought the information could be wrong. People applied an emotional filter when deciding what may be most important when it comes to being informed or misinformed. One of the interviewees stated: Checking, yes, that’s usually what I do. Especially in the case of missing people. First I look carefully at the publication date and then confirm it matches before sharing. (D-P5) When I see that something is sensationalized, because it normally is, I usually look somewhere else, on Google’s search engine to see in which other newspapers and sites are talking about it, … where it has come out. For me to investigate further, really it has to be something that’s very important, that worries me. Otherwise I let it go for a bit, see what happens, see if it continues to grow or loses steam … If they say it comes from the Efe agency or Europa Press, normally it’s something serious. (D-P8) In addition to these reasons why they delve deeper, certain topics particularly call for investigation—generally politics, pseudosciences, and events. To delve deeper into the information, most of the participants used Google. A small proportion used other search engines. We can thus confirm that Google was not a primary source of information/news but a resource for verification.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

I look at the news a little, what has happened in the world. The truth is that I usually look at newspapers from all sides, because depending on the story, sometimes things change … And then I look on Google, when I see a news story that I find a little bit … Or that jumps out at me. I see something on Twitter and I can’t stop watching where it’s going … I usually search on Google. (ND-P1) Regarding interest, what we observed corresponded to García Jiménez et al.’s (2018) assertion that, while information finds the person through newsletters, as soon as a person begins to delve into a topic that is of interest to them, they begin to find information. As we will see later, this is the first point when the Provenance tool can support and guide the person on the path to becoming informed. Based on blockchain technology and machine-learning algorithms, the tool highlights elements in relation to which certain irregularities have been observed by the technology: these are the tool’s fact-checking categories. Phase 3: Verification

This stage usually and mainly takes place when there is an intention to share certain content. In addition to delving into topics, some participants stated that they verify the veracity of the information. In the Spanish case, in which the editorial lines taken in the media generally reflect political polarization (Hallin and Mancini, 2004), the way in which citizens ascertain the truthfulness of information is to check other media

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

209

210

13  Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation

corresponding to different tendencies to those that the individual usually consults. This is demonstrated by several interviewees’ opinions: I also think that things on the Internet move much faster, and so do people … There are journalists, very objective ones, who decide to open a news site and concentrate on investigating on their own and do their own research, and there comes a point when it’s no longer a blog. (D-P5) In rare cases, people used websites such as Snopes to verify information. At this stage of the journey, the Provenance tool directly offers the elements that have to be verified so that the citizen can ensure that the information consulted is true. Phase 4: Sharing Information

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Above all, on topics that interest me, technology, economics. I don’t usually talk about politics in public … besides, now everyone is tense about these issues … so I prefer to keep my opinion to myself and my people. (D-P1) The fourth part of the journey, sharing information, nurtures the news capsule for the next day. According to the participants’ statements, deciding whether or not to share information is one of the reasons why people fact-check news items; they do not want to share dubious content and thus extend the chain of misinformation. The act of verification may vary according to the channel through which the information reaches the user. According to Amoedo et al. (2018, p. 30), “People are more likely to verify information that reaches them through WhatsApp, a medium that in itself is considered more intrusive, than they will any other information that might reach them through another channel.” It should be noted that this journey is not always linear. Moreover, the only stage that always takes place is the first. Many people continue the journey, and the further they advance, the less the subsequent stages are undertaken in the order outlined above. One path taken for the journey is to jump straight from the first phase to the fourth; this is the riskiest approach when it comes to misinformation. In short, the discourse analysis of the group interviews carried out shows us that the information shared by people is considered true by the individual who shares it, which does not mean that it is. The individual builds the truth based on their world view (shaped by family, political, social, and historical considerations) and on the importance that they attribute to each piece of information (Pellegrini, 2019). When the news item received coincides with the person’s world view, emotions are elicited; this is the key element that influences whether or not they decide to share the information. Based on these interviews, we were able to conclude that the information journey consists of four main stages. In the first stage, younger and/or digitally literate people typically receive the information capsule digitally; we might liken this to their receiving compiled news bulletins once a day. These information capsules are mainly consulted through social networks. This fact is particularly relevant to what we are studying here, since, according to Roozenbeek and van der Linden (2019), this environment is particularly fertile ground for misinformation.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Results

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Emotions, a Transversal Element Across the Different Phases Based on these results related to the informational journey and the behavior of people within each of its stages, we decided to delve into the issue of emotions, as we realized that it was a key element in whether or not people see a news item as credible, even if they are suspicious about its truthfulness. Analysis of these group interviews indicates that five emotional reactions are in play when people share information: anger, the impulse to act, fear, concern (raising awareness), and fun. After all, post-truth is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as: “Relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief” (Fernández-García, 2017, p. 67). Anger is mainly generated by the fact that certain information may or may not be shared according to the way in which content is described. A certain level of frustration arises when people realize how a given news item has been covered by the media. This emotion arises when a person notices that the way in which the information is recounted or presented induces the person to have a manipulated opinion about a certain group such as immigrants, or about a particular socio-political issue such as male violence against women. These kinds of feelings tend to provoke a greater number of complaints about manipulation and/or cutting of information chains. In addition to the anger that may be unleashed by disagreement with the way in which the information is transmitted, there exist narrative mechanisms that seek to provoke anger and annoyance, promoting the spread of fake content and thus guiding political decisions or advertising revenue (Tapias Hernández, 2019). For instance, in a study carried out in Colombia and focused on the stimulation of audiences’ emotions, César Augusto Tapias Hernández (2019) states that emotions are especially used vis-à-vis emotionally vulnerable groups. Provoking those emotions makes it possible to create something that this author draws on from Appel and Richter 2010 (Tapias Hernández, 2019, p. 244): “the mental world of narration.” “In this context, the greater an individual’s need for affection, the greater the persuasive impact of a story” (Appel and Maleck, 2012; quoted in Tapias Hernández, 2019, p. 244). If we take into account the application of these mechanisms in contexts in which parts of the population may feel politically or historically marginalized, as Fernández Such (2017) has described, we may obtain a better understanding of certain electoral results from recent years. This fact is exacerbated by the use of online information. And owing to this context of information dissemination, the conditions are such that “although anger is, in the first instance, an individual emotion, it matters politically when it is articulated by collectives, generally with a shared objective of addressing an injustice” (Wahl-Jorgensen 2018, p. 3; quoted in Tapias Hernández, 2019, p. 254). The impetus to act is triggered by a need to find a missing person/animal, or to let people know that everything is okay after a disaster, for example. In general, in these scenarios, information is usually shared openly, after it has been verified by official sources. Concern about debunking a lie is an emotion that arises when people observe that some hoax is going viral. Fear, on the other hand, is provoked when the news is about something directly related to oneself or someone from one’s immediate social circle. When this feeling arises, the news is usually verified before it is shared in a more-orless personal way, either through Facebook with groups or individuals, or through

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

211

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

212

13  Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation

WhatsApp with people whom the user knows are directly affected by the information at hand. Last of all, news is considered humorous, not especially because it is intended to be so, but because it may be seen as funny within the circle in which it is shared. Depending on the case, and without there being a specific pattern, such stories may or may not be shared. Based on these results, and once again incorporating the assessment of the expert partners of the Provenance project,7 we introduced within the verification categories of the tool an alert that is activated in the event that the tool identifies a tone in the article that seeks to appeal to the negative feelings of the reader. But in reality, how can we better understand how individuals share information? We know, as we have seen previously, that the information shared is considered true by the person who shares it (even if it is not; the individual will moreover sometimes share it without verifying it) because it responds to the way of thinking of the individual who shares it. Several authors (Parratt, 2011; Pariser, 2017; Allcott and Gentzkow, 2017; FernándezGarcía, 2017; Aparici and García-Marín, 2019; Kappes et al., 2020) have commented that, psychologically, humans tend to give more credit to information that they are already familiar with or consider to be true than they do to information that contradicts what they think is true. This cognitive bias allows people to maintain harmony between beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors. According to this same set of authors, individuals develop a mechanism that allows them to some degree to manipulate information so that it fits their beliefs. Given how individuals share and the cognitive biases that occur, understanding how citizens construct the truth is a worthwhile endeavor. Antonio Izquierdo (2016), in his analysis of the handling of immigration in the news during the economic crisis in Spain (2008–2014), indicates that when we try to understand reality, we have to take into account two elements. On the one hand, there is what we see and what we do not see; on the other hand, there is emotion that mediates the way in which we see different realities. The truth, ultimately, will be a shared truth that we have to believe in and show ourselves to be aligned with. Individuals need to be part of a community. They cannot be excluded from their local community. To understand what lies behind a person’s attitude regarding sharing, it is also necessary to enhance our understanding of the bubble that takes shape around the construction of truth. Eli Pariser (2017) states that our attitude as consumers of information has changed. On the one hand, lighter content is easier to consume: it is easier to give a like to a friend’s soup recipe than it is to an article about a given war taking place at the time. And so, according to Pariser, there is a dissonance between the person as they exercise their right to citizenship and that person in their capacity as “mere” customer. On the other hand, personalization of the news should be handled with caution to avoid these information bubbles. Depending on the group of actors, therefore, the elements of trust and the construction of the truth, as well as the interest in reaching the truth, may change. This last element is important; there is a difference between how we construct the truth and how, whenever we know that something is false, we do not care because we have lost 7  https://www.provenanceh2020.eu.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Application of Results: The Provenance Fact-Checking Tool

faith in finding out the truth and in the fact that what someone is telling us is true (Allcott and Gentzkow, 2017). The EU is now aware that it has a problem with fake news and misinformation. Eurobarometer 464 of March 2018 (European Commission, 2018) revealed that of the more than 26,000 European citizens surveyed, 83% considered fake news and misinformation to be a danger to democracies in Europe. That is why the EU has launched research initiatives and projects such as Provenance that seek to devise specific solutions to solve the problem of misinformation and, above all, the problem of its dissemination, in an attempt to have empowered users equipped with the appropriate tools break fake news chains. This same Eurobarometer indicates Europeans’ perception of fake news in different media and formats. When respondents were asked how often they came across fake news or content that manipulated reality, 37% said that this occurred daily. It should be noted that respondents in every European country say that they encounter fake news and misinformation at least once a week. Spain takes first place in its ranking of suspicions about information received. According to this same survey, 78% of Spaniards believe that they receive misinformation weekly (European Commission, 2018). Taking these aspects into account, there is an urgent need to create tools that allow citizens to receive verified and honest information. Different European projects are trying to create tools that serve this purpose.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Application of Results: The Provenance FactChecking Tool The results obtained in the group interviews gave us a basis for understanding how users relate to information, what motivates them to share or not share it, and, above all, how they construct their reality. At the Provenance consortium, we are making progress in developing a tool that empowers European citizens and serves to mitigate fake news and misinformation. We will not be the ones to say whether or not information is true, in the style of traditional fact checkers. Users receive alerts about the content that they access, and they themselves give it the level of credibility that they deem appropriate. According to some authors (Bergareche, 2016; Fernández-García, 2017), this way of acting through awareness raising and, in some sense, education, is the best way to tackle misinformation. Moreover, the tool offers improved information-checking times, since most other fact checkers perform this task manually. The task of fact checking is unquestionably very important today—even necessary. The problem is that it is tedious and time-consuming, and so there is a greater chance that misinformation will be widely shared and reach more places and people. There are times when, by the time a piece of content is classified as fake by the person who has verified it, damage that is difficult to repair later through a refutation will already have been done. This tool is intended to be useful for two types of user. First, it is intended for people who are searching for content online, as it empowers them with information that will allow them to decide whether or not what they are seeing or reading is sharable.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

213

214

13  Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation

On the other hand, this tool is also aimed at content creators, as it allows them to fact-check what they publish and at the same time to track what is published. In this case, we would be talking about prosumers, citizen journalists, activists, human rights defenders, and, in general, content generators. These people need tools to strengthen the truthfulness of their content should it be widely shared on social networks or in the media. According to Rheingold (Espiritusanto and Gonzalo, 2011, p. viii):

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Traditional journalists have to learn to build and refine networks of informants and manage communities of citizens, reporters, and commentators, using social and technological means to fact-check stories. For professionals and amateurs, the challenge is to understand the importance of searching for the truth when reporting on a news story and the fundamental role of journalism in democracy. This tool will bring greater credibility to and a closer relationship with this new media ecosystem. For all these reasons, Provenance is integrated into the information flow of prosumers. It uses blockchain technology to verify content, thus assuring the originality of the photographs or videos and protecting against possible future manipulations. A further implementation will involve allowing citizen journalists, activists, or prosumers to choose the type of license that they want to set for their content, in order to facilitate access to it by professional journalists, the media, or any other user or organization who wants to use it. In addition to the blockchain layer, the information verification delivered by the Provenance project uses an algorithm based on artificial intelligence (AI). It therefore checks the variables that it processes almost in real time. The results of AI-based algorithms of this type are encouraging, as has been shown by a study by the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab and the Qatar Computing Research Institute, in which researchers experimented with an AI algorithm to detect reliable and unreliable sources. The system needed about 150 articles to detect, with a degree of accuracy, whether a news source can be trusted. This can help in detecting sites that do not provide trustworthy information to users. This study coincides with our research in finding that fake news media and misinformation outlets often use more hyperbolic, subjective language that is heavily charged with emotion (Conner-Simons, 2018). However, we must not forget that this type of technology can be used in reverse, and for the moment human intervention is still needed to ensure greater reliability. Another investigation, carried out by the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan and the Department of Psychology of the University of Amsterdam, combined different variables of the text—lexicon, syntax, and semantics—to show that, in the best cases, the performance of the models they deployed are comparable to verification performed by human beings (Pérez-Rosas, et al. 2017). The need for algorithms of this kind is becoming greater because most of the information that users receive comes from social networks, blogs, or online media, in which a source that the reader can rely on is not specified. Therefore, we must develop automatic tools that allow us to safely assess such content. The research that we have conducted to date suggests that we are on the right track.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Conclusions

The algorithm, which is continuing to learn, will be able to assess the credibility of content. It will assess the basic information first: the source, the date, and the location. In addition, it will check the text’s tone and quality. If the story has similarities with others, it will have been confirmed or otherwise by the main fact checkers. Moreover, it will analyze images to ascertain if they are originals or may have been manipulated. The user is notified of all this information in a visual and customizable way. In its first phase, the tool takes the form of a plugin that is installed in the browser. The results obtained by the algorithm indicate the parts of the content that fail checking and the severity of these failures (low, medium, or high). Depending on the results, users could be looking at verified content, inaccurate or biased news, or, simply, intentional misinformation. The good news is that, despite the rapid spread of an increase in misinformation and fake news, Europe’s peoples share concerns about how to identify real, unmanipulated news. Specifically, in Spain, 68% of survey respondents indicated that they were not sure whether they have sufficient capacity to identify legitimate news. According to the previously mentioned RISJ study, Spain is one of the countries where concerns about sharing hoaxes over the Internet are highest. The Digital News Report (2019) report states, So it is not surprising that the majority of Spanish Internet users (68%) are concerned with discerning what is true or false on the Internet, although this concern especially affects those over 45 years of age (70%), compared to those under 25 (57%).

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Technology can help citizens to decide for themselves what information may be “truthful” and “sharable” and what may not be. The Provenance project will help to identify possible irregularities in the information people receive so that, while they will construct “their truth,” they will question the content received and thus decide whether it is really true within their value system and, as a consequence, if they want to share it with their fellow citizens on social networks or, on the contrary, to break that chain of misinformation, if there is one. The point is that users tend to ignore dissenting information. This scenario fosters the emergence of an echo chamber around shared narratives and beliefs. By that point, fact-checking may be perceived as another of their rivals’ ideas and therefore ignored. (El País, 2018)

Conclusions Why don’t we change our minds even if we are proven wrong? This is a question Walter Quattrociocchi asks himself in an article published in the Spanish newspaper El País.8 In this study, we have found that checked or verified information is much less convincing than feelings.

8  ¿Por qué no cambiamos de opinión aunque nos demuestren que estamos equivocados? https:// elpais.com/elpais/2018/01/26/ciencia/1516965692_948158.html.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

215

216

13  Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation

In these situations, algorithms and AI will be able to identify misinformation in real time; technologies such as blockchain will allow decentralization, transparency, and traceability of the content’s value chain to easily certify what the original and immutable material that has been included in that chain is. Besides, the place where information flows and will continue to grow in the future is the smartphone. Therefore, these types of verification tools must be geared toward devices that people use the most, along with automatic checking within social networks, blogs, and online media that make it difficult to access sources and ascertain if they are reliable. According to a report by the consulting firm Gartner (2017), in 2022 citizens in developed economies will consume more false information than true information. Tools such as Provenance will help individuals decide what they consider or do not consider “compatible” and “truthful” for themselves. The aim here is to try to break chains of misinformation and at the same time involve users in the decisions to be made about fake news and misinformation. This approach educates users and raises awareness among them that, in today’s world, being well informed depends on us and requires us all to make an effort.

Appendix 13.1 Digital profiles: Gender: Equal mix. Platforms: Twitter, Instagram, Facebook. Activities: making original content, comments, blogs, sharing

Age

Education

Residence

Political engagement

18–25 25–35 35–50 Univ No univ Rural Urban Engaged Not engaged

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Nondigital profiles: Gender Equal mix.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Appendix 13.2

Platform: Twitter, Instagram, Facebook: participants had created accounts but do not really use them. Activities: Consult different kind of content on the Internet, post comments, and share, though not on a regular basis.

Age

Education

Residence

Political engagement

18–25 25–35 35–50 Univ No univ Rural Urban Engaged Not engaged 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The methodology followed for both groups was the same. First, each person shared their general news-consumption habits (not just online ones) with the group. We placed emphasis on the media and sources that they consider most relevant, as well as on the reasons why people considered them to be so. After delving into their habits, we presented them with the Provenance project’s first initiatives regarding verification categories and the corresponding visual representations in order to obtain their first impressions.

Appendix 13.2 Rural profiles: (1) This had a direct effect on the degree of trust the participant placed in certain news. (2) Need to share on WhatsApp (3) Including WhatsApp (4) For them, the important thing is to go directly to the source.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

217

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

X

P5

P6

X

X

P3

P4

X

X

P2

P1

16–30 31–45 45–60

Age

X

60+

X

X

X

X

X

X

TV

Where informed principally(1) Social net(3) Online/offline Newspaper(4)

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

X(2)

X

X

X

x

X

less 1x/w 1–2 x/w +2x/w

Share content/comment

X

X

X

X

No

X

X

Yes

Work situation

X

X

X

No

X

X

X

Yes

Politization

References

Urban profiles (1) This had a direct effect on the degree of trust the participant placed in certain news. (2) Need to share on WhatsApp. (3) Including WhatsApp. (4) For them, the important thing is to go directly to the source. We first conducted a group interview to delve into the way in which people relate to their truth, how they construct knowledge, and what drives them to share certain news (emotions, ideology, group pressure). We then undertook a more practical exercise to collect information with a more emotional component. To this end, we presented seven different types of news story: 1. two on immigration, reporting on the same story, but with different sources and different titles; 2. one related to food quality at McDonald’s; 3. one on mayor of London’s opinion on olive oil; 4. one about a video about a cure for Alzheimer’s; 5. one about numbers related to gender-based violence; and 6. a satirical piece. At first, participants had to indicate the feeling caused by each of news item. We then asked them to indicate the reception channels, if they receive them, what they usually do with them (read, verify, comment, broadcast, for example), to whom, by what channel, and for what purpose. After participants did this activity individually, the results were shared and a short debate was held. These parts followed the same methodology as the first two interviews. All of the interviews were held in Madrid, Spain, in urban and rural settings.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Adhanom Ghebreyesus, T.Y. and Ng, A. (2020) Desinformación frente a medicina: hagamos frente a la “infodemia”. El País. https://elpais.com/sociedad/2020/02/18/ actualidad/1582053544_191857.html Allcott, H. and Gentzkow, M. (2017). Social media and fake news in the 2016 election. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 31(2), 211–236. Amoedo, A., Vara-Miguel, A., and Negredo, S. (2018). Digital news report.es 2018. Universidad de Navarra, Reuters. Aparici, R. and García-Marín, D. (coords.). (2019). La posverdad: una cartografía de los medios, las redes y la política. Barcelona: Gedisa. Bergareche, B. (2016). Mundo Facebook: implicaciones del arbitraje emocional de la verdad en la era de las plataformas. Cuadernos de periodistas, 33, 35–48. Brennen, J.S., Simon, F.M., Howard, P.N., and Nielsen, R.K. (2020). Types, sources, and claims of Covid-19 misinformation. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism Factsheet. https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/types-sources-and-claims-covid-19misinformation (accessed April 7, 2020).

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

219

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

220

13  Innovative Tools for Citizen Empowerment in the Fight Against Misinformation

Conner-Simons, A. (2018). Detecting fake news at its source. Machine learning system aims to determine if an information outlet is accurate or biased. https://news.mit. edu/2018/mit-csail-machine-learning-system-detects-fake-news-from-source1004?_ga=2.227629790.2133846231.1589887875–308741558.1589887875 Consejo de la Unión Europea. (2019). Acciones complementarias para aumentar la resiliencia y luchar contra las amenazas híbridas. https://data.consilium.europa.eu/ doc/document/ST-14972-2019-INIT/es/pdf Digital News Report. (2019). Resumen ejecutivo. http://www.digitalnewsreport.es/ los-usuarios-espanoles-se-previenen-de-la-desinformacion-y-demandan-a-los-mediosmayor-profundidad-y-vigilancia Espiritusanto, O. and Gonzalo, P. (2011). Periodismo Ciudadano: evolución positiva de la comunicación. Barcelona: Ariel. Available at https://www.fundaciontelefonica.com/ cultura-digital/publicaciones/125 The EU in 2019 – General Report. (2019). https://op.europa.eu/webpub/com/generalreport-2019/en European Commission. (2018). Flash Eurobarometer 464. Fake news and disinformation online. Available at https://ec.europa.eu/commfrontoffice/publicopinion/index.cfm/ survey/getsurveydetail/instruments/flash/surveyky/2183 Fernández Such, F. (2017). ¿Está aumentando la extrema derecha en el medio rural? Soberanía alimentaria, biodiversidad y culturas, 30, 26–28. Fernández-García, N. (2017). Fake news: una oportunidad para la alfabetización mediática. Nueva sociedad, 269. García Jiménez, A., Tur-Viñes, V., and Pastor Ruiz, Y. (2018). Consumo mediático de adolescentes y jóvenes. Noticias, contenidos audiovisuales y medición de audiencias. Icono, 14, 16(1), 22–46 doi:10.7195/ri14.v16i1.1101 Gartner. (2017). Top Strategic Predictions for 2018 and Beyond. https://www.gartner.com/ smarterwithgartner/gartner-top-strategic-predictions-for-2018-and-beyond Hallin, D.C. and Mancini, P. (2004). Comparing Media Systems: Three Models of Media and Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ioé, C. (2010). ¿Para qué sirve el grupo de discusión?: una revisión crítica del uso de técnicas grupales en los estudios sobre migraciones. Revista de Metodología de Ciencias Sociales, 19, 73–99. Izquierdo, A. (2016). Crítica de la inmigración imaginada. Barcelona: Edición Bellatera. Kappes, A., Harvey, A.H., Lohrenz, T., Montague, P.R., and Sharot, T. (2020). Confirmation bias in the utilization of others’ opinion strength. Nature Neuroscience, 23(1), 130–137. Keane, J. (2018). Post-truth politics and why the antidote isn’t simply “fact-checking” and truth. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/ post-truth-politics-and-why-the-antidote-isnt-simply-fact-checking-and-truth-87364 Lotero-Echeverri, G., Romero-Rodríguez, L.Y., and Pérez-Rodríguez, M.A. (2018). “Factchecking” vs “Fake News”: periodismo de confirmación como recurso de la competencia mediática contra la desinformación. Index.comunicación, 8, 2, 295–316. http://journals.sfu.ca/indexcomunicacion/index.php/indexcomunicacion/article/ view/370/400 Magallón-Rosa, R. (2018). Nuevos formatos de verificación. El caso de Maldito Bulo en Twitter, Sphera Publica, 1(18), 41–65. http://sphera.ucam.edu/index.php/sphera-01/ article/view/341 Mantas, H. (2020). Fact-checkers fighting the COVID-19 infodemic drew a surge in readers. Poynter Institute. https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2020/ fact-checkers-fighting-the-covid-19-infodemic-drew-a-surge-in-readers

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References

McDougall, J., Zezulkova, M., van Driel, B., and Sternadel, D. (2018). Teaching Media Literacy in Europe: Evidence of Effective School Practices in Primary and Secondary Education. NESET II report. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union. https://doi.org/10.2766/613204. Nielsen, R.-K., Fletcher, R., Newman, N., Scott, B.J., and Howard, P. (2020). Navigating the “Info-demic:” How People in Six Countries Access and Rate News and Information About Coronavirus. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. Nielsen, R.K. and Graves, L. (2017). “News You Don’t Believe:” Audience Perspectives on Fake News. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac. uk/ourresearch/news-you-dont-believe-audience-perspectives-fake-news Pariser, E. (2017). El filtro burbuja: cómo la web decide lo que leemos y lo que pensamos. Barcelona: Taurus. Parratt, S. (2011). Consumo de medios de comunicación y actitudes hacia la prensa por parte de los universitarios. Zer, 15(28), 133–149. Pellegrini, P.A. (2019). La verdad fragmentada. Conflictos y certezas en el conocimiento. Buenos Aires: Argonauta. Pérez-Rosas, V., Kleinberg, B., Lefevre, A., and Mihalcea, R. (2017). Automatic Detection of Fake News Computer Science and Engineering, University of Michigan and the Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam. https://arxiv.org/pdf/1708.07104.pdf Roozenbeek, J. and van der Linden, S. (2019). Fake news game confers psychological resistance against online misinformation. Palgrave Communications, 5(1), 1–10. Salas, J. (2018). ¿Por qué no cambiamos de opinión aunque nos demuestren que estamos equivocados? El País. https://elpais.com/elpais/2018/01/26/ciencia/1516965692_948158.html Schudson, M. and Zelizer, B. (2017). Fake news in context. Understanding and Addressing the Disinformation Ecosystem. Annenberg School for Communication Pennsylvania (accessed January 9, 2018). https://firstdraftnews.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/ The-Disinformation-Ecosystem-20180207-v4.pdf?x12651 Stencel, M. and Luther, J. (2020). 237 fact-checkers in nearly 80 countries … and counting. Duke Reporters Lab. https://reporterslab.org/ update-237-fact-checkers-in-nearly-80-countries-and-counting Tapias Hernández, C.A. (2019). ¿Qué estimula la emoción en las audiencias? Un estudio de caso sobre persuasión, distorsión y emoción en las noticias. Revista Anagramas, 18(35). Varona-Aramburu, D. and Sánchez-Muñoz, G. (2016). Las redes sociales como fuentes de información periodística: motivos para la desconfianza entre los periodistas españoles. El profesional de la información, 25(5), 795–802. https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2016.sep.10. Villalonga, C. and Aragó, L. (2019). Dónde gana la derecha y la izquierda en España. La Vanguardia. https://www.lavanguardia.com/politica/20190430/461945318418/ elecciones-enerales-espana-2019-municipios-derecha-izquierda.html

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

221

222

Conclusion Susana Herrera-Damas Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

From Creative Destruction to Creative Reconstruction Understanding the extraordinarily dynamic times that journalism as a profession is going through requires us to embrace complexity and go beyond explanations that reduce innovation to purely technological issues or to the logic of the market. As García-Avilés states, innovation formulated as

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The capacity to react to changes in products, processes and services using creative skills that allow a problem or need to be identified, and to be solved through a solution that results in the introduction of something new that adds value to customers and to the media organization. (García-Avilés et al., 2018, p. 29) goes far beyond the novelty of new technologies or a new product on the market. It refers to deeper issues such as creativity, the arrival at a solution, and the contribution of value for consumers, and also for the organization itself. It is undeniable that digital technology and market conditions play a notable role in media innovation. However, these two logics, while necessary, are not enough to explain creative innovations that go beyond the ephemeral spectacularity of “shiny new things” (Küng, 2015) that are sustainable over time, and, incidentally, that take the need for professional journalism into account. As García-Avilés also comments: Non-technological aspects such as storytelling, creativity, commercialization, or interaction with audiences are important areas of journalism innovation. If innovations emerge only through the reaction to the threats from the instability of the news market, technological disruption, and the competitive commercial environment, the change could be slow and erratic. (García-Avilés, Chapter 1) In this regard, in Chapter 3, Hermida and Young argue that “journalism innovation practice is littered with different examples of pivots, which are not rooted in research and development aligned with long-term strategic priorities of a news organization or clarity about the definition of innovation underpinning.”

News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

From Creative Destruction to Creative Reconstruction

As María Luengo explains in the Introduction to this volume, when the term “creative destruction” has been used to explain the changes currently being experienced by the profession, the focus has been, above all, on economic issues, with ethical and cultural components being overlooked. However, the various journalism initiatives that we have seen in this volume also allow us to legitimately speak of a genuine “creative reconstruction.” For this reconstruction to be truly creative, it must be driven by the ethical values that have always made journalism great, as well as by the civic values that our pluralistic, global, dynamic, and diverse societies currently demand. What values are we referring to? To modern civic values such as social engagement, solidarity, social justice, dialog, and inclusion, which an intermix with journalism’s classic ethical values. These include the search for truth, impartiality, independence, the requirement to verify information and question sources—as well as visuals, algorithms, and even the large platforms on which media often depend (Cancela-Kieffer, Chapter 10)—and the need to adopt a humane, responsible, and respectful approach, vis-à-vis both the protagonists of the reality represented and the audience. In this context, ethics and values provide a safe, bright, and solid path that allows us to advance with firm steps in the achievement of an authentic creative reconstruction of journalism that not only inspires new initiatives but also makes them durable over time. As García-Avilés states (Chapter 1):

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Any kind of innovative journalism should also be an ethical one. Without the essential component of ethics, no journalism is capable of innovating because the very professional activity of reporting itself is based on the commitment to the truth. From a more specific perspective, the ethics of innovation could contribute to overcoming the media crisis, which has been aggravated by the COVID-19 pandemic. This crisis is reflected “in advertising downfall, uncertainty about business models, the growth of misinformation, and, ultimately, the loss of relevance of journalism in society” (García-Avilés, Chapter 1). In other words, this transition from creative destruction to creative reconstruction is only possible if there is engagement with ethical and civic values capable of revitalizing the profession and continuing to make it essential. In the absence of this logic, neither an economic logic nor a technological one seems sufficient to embrace innovation in a way that is meaningful or even sustainable over time. Nothing seems to have a greater performative power than journalistic ethics when it comes to the profession’s innovative repair. In an intense and hectic time of chaos, noise, and uncertainty, the solution seems to be to go back to basics. In turn, this engagement with ethical and civic values will be what allows the “democratically engaged journalism” that Ward describes in Chapter 2, a journalism that is presented as “a third way between absolute neutrality and partisanship,” which has dialogic democracy as its ultimate goal, supports its claims with solid evidence, and thus moves away from the toxic sphere of ideologically biased media that have arisen owing to digital technologies.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

223

224

Conclusion

Technology as an Ambivalent Reality

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

As we have seen throughout the different chapters of this book, technology is an ambivalent reality that favors the logic of creative destruction while also being capable of creatively reconstructing journalism. By its instrumental nature, technology offers both promising opportunities and dysfunctional threats. At its best, technology makes it possible to: 1) Simplify information search, retrieval, classification, and processing tasks, which, according to Rojas Torrijos (Chapter 8), make it possible to streamline and expand coverage by increasing the production of pieces and enriching them with data and statistics, or to cover topics that were previously not addressed owing to a lack of time or insufficient personnel. This is the case with the various technologies related to artificial intelligence (AI) (Newman, 2017), which make journalism speedier, more efficient, and more cost-effective (Diakopoulos and Koliska, 2017). 2) Allow reporters to have more time to investigate and do their work better by being able to prioritize focusing on covering stories that were not previously reported (Van Dalen, 2012). 3) Give them a head start in knowing about news events through AI-based early warning systems (Barceló-Ugarte et al., Chapter 9). 4) Promote proximity and investigative journalism. 5) Bring citizens closer to the story, the people in it, and those people’s feelings and emotions in a credible, humane, and empathetic way, as happens in 360-degree immersive journalism. In fact, as we have seen in Benítez et al.'s Chapter 4 devoted to this innovation, initially this type of immersive journalism was focused on portraying humanitarian crises or denouncing unjust situations of human rights violations (Benítez, Herrera, and Benítez, 2019) doing so from a first-person perspective that viewers explore as they see fit (Benítez and Herrera, 2020). 6) Stimulate a type of critical thinking (Frasca, 2003) that leads to change and prosocial behavior (De-Aguilera and Casero-Ripollés, 2018). The interactive possibilities offered by newsgames allow this. Sometimes these are promoted by humanitarian groups and organizations that have explored this formula to deliver their messages to new types of audience. This approach has been used to denounce precarious working conditions as well as to give greater visibility to the living experiences of groups such as migrants, victims of gender violence, and sufferers of physical and mental illnesses. 7) Offer a deeper and more meaningful understanding of complex realities through statistical processing of huge quantities of data, which may be delivered through new formulas for visualizing information in which the significant remains attractive (Kovach and Rosenstiel, 2003). As we have seen, this is the case with the stamp format, which generates fast loading, eminently visual, full-screen, and vertical content (Navío-Navarro and González-Díez, Chapter 6). However, at its worst, the application of technology to journalism can also: 1) Encourage cognitive and ideological ghettos, partial and biased configurations of reality, and diverse forms of manipulation, such as excessive personalization of information through voice interfaces, bubble filters (Pariser, 2012), or the different algorithms that favor echo chambers.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Technology as an Ambivalent Reality

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

2) Promote anti-values, as happens when the strongly persuasive nature of immersive technologies is exploited in a perverse way to create powerful instruments for falsification, manipulation, and propaganda. This can also occur when these technologies are used to desensitize certain groups so that they have no qualms, for example, about resorting to the use of violence, or when, instead of promoting values such as solidarity or compassion, innovations are used to make the viewer respond with denial or to encourage a form of “poverty tourism” (Gregory, 2016). 3) Simplify complex situations without explaining the causes of a particular phenomenon, thus encouraging the acquisition of superficial knowledge—with a consequent impact on the configuration of reality. This may happen with the AMP Stories format when only a fragmented, superficial, and entertainment-skewed type of news is promoted. 4) Make serious problems trivial and frivolous (Apperley, 2008, p. 225) by turning the human suffering of millions into “childish games.” As we have seen, certain newsgames have been accused of doing this. Further, as Lewis and Westlund (2014) rightly state, technology often depends on the information that sources provide, which may also contain flaws or biases. At other times, it is impossible to cover certain topics because there are no structured data available. Likewise, the fact that bots do not interrogate, explain, or establish causalities prevents the orientation or formation of public opinion, one of journalism’s essential missions. For this reason, since technology is one of the most decisive catalysts in this digital acceleration and transformation that the profession is experiencing, it makes perfect sense for ethical demands and requirements to be extended to the innovations that are most closely related to it. This is the case with automated coverage based on the use of bots and algorithms, as is described in Chapter 8 by José Luis Rojas Torrijos, which also explains some of the dangers encountered when news coverage is left to the “free will” of algorithms. Rojas contribution highlights the need to regulate these possible excesses through semi-automated coverage in which human criteria, guided by classic journalistic values such as independence, precision, accuracy, rigor, integrity, depth, and the need for verification, question software’s biases. Similarly, Chapter 9 by Barceló-Ugarte et al. points out the advisability of continuing to use human judgment—with the ethical aspects that it contributes—to avoid the risk that a rigid application of AI might pose to the different phases of news production. In any case, the challenges raised by this new scenario are undoubtedly enormous. This is shown, for example, in Chapter 6 by Navío-Navarro and González-Díaz, who address how to efficiently use the “stamp story” format to connect with a young audience—one that prefers to be informed through visually attractive media—but doing so in a way that avoids excessive simplification, since many of the current explanations about what is happening in the world are complex and multi-causal. The magnitude of the challenges also forces us to rethink some of journalism’s new norms. This is the case with transparency, which has been referred to on numerous occasions as the new objectivity. However, according to Christofoletti (Chapter 12), transparency is to be understood not so much as an end—for treating it in this way would also raise unsolvable technical difficulties—but as a path to attaining higher levels of technical excellence, social responsibility, and professional ethics, while reestablishing new relationships of trust with the public.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

225

226

Conclusion

In the same vein, Cortés and Luengo’s Chapter 7 also demonstrates that it would be advisable to face these challenges in a collaborative rather than competitive manner. The use of data obtained from the Panama Papers leaks as an example of collaboratively produced journalism confirms the enormous potential of taking this approach and the different synergies that it brings about. However, these possibilities have hardly been explored to date owing to market logic and the fact that they are yet to become customary. At the crossroads between transparency and the need to fight against lies, Espiritusanto and Dinant (Chapter 13) point out the advisability of including the public in verification tasks with the idea of extending the network and the resources that professional journalists can call upon in the increasingly Titanic battle against misinformation. They do so by setting out the foundations of an innovative project oriented precisely toward this purpose. Cancela-Kieffer (Chapter 10), meanwhile, reminds us that all this media innovation must be driven by the central mission that journalism has always had, which consists in safeguarding the fundamental right of citizens to know the truth. This endeavor requires creativity and a type of radical collaboration that embraces disciplines other than those traditionally associated with journalism—for example, mathematics or programming.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Ethics and Values Should Illuminate Innovation’s Path All the chapters in this book share the same common denominator: the need to turn current thinking on its head when embracing a given innovation so that ethics stimulate and guide the entire process. As Rojas Torrijos states (Chapter 8), citing Breese and Luengo (2016), in a context in which new formats, narratives, business models, and technological innovations are changing the way in which news is produced, civic values and professional standards of journalism are being called on to play a decisive role in shaping the scenario in which they will have to operate in the coming years. The reactivating power of codes thus appears as a viable ethical solution to better accommodate the different innovations. And that ethical solution must be articulated in two ways. On the one hand, codes should be reviewed and updated in order to incorporate these new tools and innovations, but, above all, and in order to avoid normative apriorism, a much more proactive attitude should be adopted, in which ethics is the common thread that “anchors” and stimulates innovation (Alexander, 2016, p. 22), so that this one is sustainable over time and is not simply buried by subsequent innovation that may come about. As several of the chapters indicate, it is therefore not helpful to try out, colonize, and exploit innovations first and then look for solutions to the challenges, conflicts, and ethical controversies that doing so creates. Rather, in the public-service activity that all journalism practice amounts to, ethics should be what guides but also stimulates the innovation process. Building on this, the right approach would be to continue delving into the nature of the ethical dilemmas posed by the different innovations that we have described and to systemize best practices for specific applications, with these practices being illuminated by the ethical values and professional standards that have traditionally ennobled journalism.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

References

In any case, we trust that this book has served to inject optimism and hope at a juncture, the COVID-19 pandemic, that in general seems discouraging and whose impact is not a priori positive for a sector that has been going through a crisis of meaning, mission, and purpose for years, caused in part by the abrupt transition that digital technology has entailed. However, as we have seen, technology can also give rise to numerous initiatives that will continue to enhance journalism’s raison d’être as long as they are based on the ethical and civic values and principles that have defined the profession’s identity.

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

References Alexander, J.C. (2016). Journalism, democratic culture, and creative reconstruction. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1–28. Apperley, T. (2008). Videogames in Australia. In Wolf, M.J.P. (Ed.). The Videogame Explosion: A History from Pong to Playstation and Beyond. Westport: Greenwood Press. Benítez, M.J. and Herrera, S. (2020). Cómo producir reportajes inmersivos con vídeo en 360º. UOC: Barcelona. Benítez, M.J., Herrera, S., and Benítez, E. (2019). Analysis of the immersive social content feature in the Spanish news media. Revista Latina de Comunicación Social, 74, 1655–1679. Breese, E. and Luengo, M. (2016). News innovations and enduring commitments. In Alexander, J.C., Breese, E., and Luengo, M. (Eds.). The Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 282–290. De-Aguilera, M. and Casero-Ripollés, A. (2018). ¿Tecnologías para la transformación? Los medios sociales ante el cambio político y social. Icono, 14, 16(1), 1–21. Diakopoulos, N. and Koliska, M. (2017). Algorithmic transparency in the news media. Digital Journalism, 5(7), 809–828. Frasca, G. (2003). Newsgaming. F.A.Q. Available at http://newsgaming.com/faq.htm. García-Avilés, J.A., Carvajal-Prieto, M., De-Lara-González, A. and Arias-Robles, F. (2018). Developing an index of media innovation in a national market: the case of Spain. Journalism Studies, 19(1), 25–42. Gregory, S. (2016). Immersive witnessing: from empathy and outrage to action, Witness. https://blog.witness.org/2016/08/immersive-witnessing-from-empathy-and-outrage-to-action Kovach, B. and Rosenstiel, T. (2003). Los elementos del periodismo. Madrid: Ediciones El País. Küng, L. (2015). Innovators in Digital News. London: I.B. Tauris. Lewis, S. and Westlund, O. (2014). Big data and journalism. Epistemology, expertise, economics, and ethics. Digital Journalism, 3(3), 447–466. Newman, N. (2017). Journalism, Media and Technology Trends and Predictions 2018. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. https://reutersinstitute.politics. ox.ac.uk/our-research/journalism-media-and-technology-trends-and-predictions–2018 Pariser, E. (2012). The Filter Bubble. How the New Personalized Web Is Changing What We Read and How We Think. New York: Penguin Books. Van Dalen, A. (2012). The algorithms behind the headlines. Journalism Practice, 6, 648–658.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

227

228

Index

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

2001: A Space Odyssey, 177 Abt, Clark, 73 Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) 92–102 accountability, vii, xix, 22, 75, 84–85, 128, 142, 143, 166, 171, 188, 191, 193, 197 accuracy, vii, x–xi, 5, 9, 10–12, 26, 30–32, 57–58, 65, 66, 75, 77–79, 141, 214, 225 Adam, 131 Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Tedros, 202–203 Agence France-Presse, 165, 170 Aitamurto, Tanja, 59, 64 Alexa, 176–182 Alexander, Jeffrey C., vii–ix, 96, 99–100, 101–102 algorithms, xiii–xiv, 3, 13, 124–133, 138–152, 157–172, 175, 180–184, 204, 209, 214–216, 224–225 AlgorithmWatch, 168, 171 Alibaba, 171, 179 Aljazeera, 74 AllGenie Voz, 179 Alloa, Emmanuel, 187 Almodóvar, Pedro, 120 Alphabet, 174 Amazon, 3, 171, 176, 179, 181–182, 184 Amazon Prime, 3 Amazon Race, The, 81 Amnesty International, 171 Amnesty Tech, 170, 171 Anchorage Daily News, 162 Anderson, Christopher William, 109

Andreas, Peter, 162 Android, 170 Angwin, Julia, 171 Apple, 3, 177–178, 181, 184 artificial intelligence (AI), xiii–xiv, 13, 40, 124–133, 138–152, 157, 167, 171, 175, 179–184, 214–216, 224–225 and ethical challenges, 141–152 and ethical requirements, 143–144 and workflows, 151–152 Applegren, Ester., 192 Archant, 130 Associated Press, 13, 56, 58, 61, 64, 125–126, 131, 139–140, 166–167 Athenian political culture, 158 attachments, 34–36 audience engagement, xii–xii, 20–38 Audrey, 176–177 Automated Insights, 125–126 Automating the News, 164, 165, 171 autonomy, 8, 93, 99–100, 141, 143 Azure, 182 Bad News, 83 Baidu, 179 Ballon, P., 6–7 Baranetsky, Victoria, 169 Barnhurst, Kevin, 96 Barot, Trushar, 180 Belair-Gagnon, Valerie, 42, 44, 47 Bell, Emily, 158 Bell Labs, 176–177 Berger, Stefan, 187

News Media Innovation Reconsidered: Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, First Edition. Edited by María Luengo and Susana Herrera-Damas. © 2021 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2021 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Index

Berry, David, 159 Bertrand, Claude-Jean, 192–193 big data, xiii–xiv, 12, 108–112, 115, 138, 164 Big Local News COVID-19 Global Case Mapper, 46 Birkenfeld, Bradley, 110 Bixby, 179 Black Lives Matter, xiii–xiv Bleyen, V. A., 6–7 blockchain technology, 3, 209, 214, 216 bloggers, 9, 116 blogs, x–xi, 9, 23, 43, 210, 214, 216 Bloomberg, 167–168 Bly, Nellie See Elizabeth Cochrane Boczkowski, Pablo J., 42 Bogost, Ian, 85 Bolt, Usain, 82 Borden, Sandra L., 77 Borges, Eddy, 108–109 Borning, A., 82 bots, xiii–xiv, 13, 15, 124–133, 145, 175, 225 boundary work, xi Boyd, Danah, 110 Bradshaw, Paul, 161, 167 Brandeis, Louis, 190 Breese, Elizabeth Butler, vii, x–xi, 128, 194, 226 BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation), 10, 47, 62, 80, 85, 131–132, 140, 180–182 British Press Association, xiv, 130–131, 166–167 Brooks, Richard, 118 Bruno, N., viii Burke, Edmund, 159 Buzzfeed News, 131–132, 170 Cacheiro, Santiago, 126 Cairo, Alberto, 161, 166 CALO (Cognitive Assistant that Learns and Organizes), 178 Cambridge Analytica, 170, 175 Cameron, David, 115, 120 Canavilhas, João, 96 Can You Beat Usain Bolt?82 Can You Navigate a Day with Depression?81 Can You Spot the Threats?73, 76

Carlos III University, xv, 145, 150 Carlson, Matt, 111 Carlyle, Thomas, 159 Carr, Nicholas, 98 Casasús, Josep María, 96 Casas Vacias, 79 Caswell, David, 133 Carey, James, 142, 159 CBS, 33 Cebrián, Juan Luis, 121 CGTN (China Global Television Network), 59–60 Chadha, Kalyani, 191 Chaparro, María Ángeles, 128 Chartbeart, 99 Chouliaraki, Lilie, 62 Chul-Han, Byung, 187 civic/il values, ix, xiv, 128, 133, 223, 226 citizen empowerment, 202–216 Clerwall, Christer, 190 Climate Challenge, 76 CNN (Cable News Network), 94, 191 Cochrane, Elizabeth, 31 codes, cultural x, xii, 101–102, 126 colonialism, 42 Colonialism, Settler, 40 Colombia Check, 203 Columbia Journalism Review, 44 Columna Capital, 115 computer-assisted reporting (CAR), 108–109, 161, 165 convergence, 8–9, 11, 42, 73, 101 Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, 75 Conversation, The, 195 Cordero, Nacho, 117 coronavirus See COVID–19 Cortana, 179 Cortina, Adela, 96–97, 101 COVID-19, viii, 3–4, 13, 16, 46, 59–60, 157, 161, 170, 180, 202–203, 227 Craft, Stephanie, 190 Craig, David, 129 Crawford, Kate, 110 creative destruction, vii–x, 223 as creative reconstruction, vii, ix–x, 223

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

229

230

Index

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

credibility, 5, 10, 28, 56, 98, 115, 142, 152, 184, 189, 194, 196, 213–215 Crisis of Journalism Reconsidered, The, vii ¿Crees que eres un buen conductor?85 crowdsourcing, 12, 21, 109, 171 cultural change, 189 cultural objectivity, 158 cultural performance, xi, xiii cultural sociology, vii, x–xii cultural structures, 99–100 culture(s), professional 191–193 Cushion, Stephen, 162 Cutthroat Capitalism: The Game, 77 Daily, The, 45 Daily Mail, 85 Damasio, Antonio, 35 Darfur is Dying, 80, 84–85, 86 DARPA (The Department of Defense of the United States), 178 Datadista, 164 Data Journalism Awards, 163 data manipulation, 5, 12, 111 See also image manipulation Datawrapper, 162 debunking See fact checkers De Correspondent, 195 De la Peña, Nonny, 60 Deliveroo, 168 Deltour, Antione, 110 democracy, 26, 27–28, 102, 109, 112, 115, 118, 122, 142, 191 dialogic, 27–28, 223 egalitarian, 20, 27, 30, 33–35, 37, 38 elitist, 27 parliamentary, 27 participatory, 27–28 plural/istic, 27, 37 populist, 27 representational, 27 republican, 27 Detroit Free Press, 160–161 Dewey, John, 27, 32 Diakopoulos, Nicholas, 164, 167, 171 DiarioGol, 183 Diaz-Campo, Jesús, 128 Dickens, Charles, 35

digital culture, xi, xiii digital divide, 168–169 digitalization, x–xi, 7, 20, 41, 42–43, 46–47 digital media ethics (DME), 15 DigitalMinds, 168, 171 Digital News Report, 208, 215 Disney +, 3 docugames, 74 Documentos, TV, 79 Domingo, David, 6 Doyle, Gillian, viii “Driven to Distraction,”76 DuerOS, 179 Duportail, Judith, 169, 171 Dwight, Logan, 58 economic reductionism, viii, ix El Confidencial, 6, 108, 112–121, 164 Eldiario, 121 Eldiario.es, 164 El Espectador, 195 Elias, Carlos, 111 El Mundo, 80, 164 El País, 164, 215 emotional persuasion, emotions, xii–xiii, 12, 34–36, 61–67, 86–87, 206, 207, 211–213, 224 empathy, 12, 36, 55, 61–62, 82–83, 109 equity of communication, 143, 147–150 ERC (Communication Regulatory Agency), 197 Escape from Woomera, 80 ESPN, 182 ethical boundaries, 73–87 ethical codes, x, 57, 86, 95–100, 128, 132 Ethical Journalism Network, 75, 84 ethics, 55–68 See also professional ethics of journalism of ends, 5 individual, 4 of newsgames 73–87 prescriptive, 4 of procedures, 5 social, 4 of values, 5 Eurobarometer, 213 European Council, 202

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Index

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Euroskepticism, 202, 204 event-monitoring systems, 144–147 extremism, 38 Facebook, 3, 10–1, 41, 44, 92–93, 152, 170–171, 180, 192, 208, 211–212 Facebook Instant Articles (IA)93, 95 fact checkers, 202–216 Factfulness, 161 facts, 20–38, 57, 77, 79, 83, 87, 96, 141, 159–160, 165, 189, 203, 211 Factitious, 83 fairness, xi, 12, 22, 26, 75, 79–82, 142 Fake It to Make It, 83 fake news, 10, 20, 22, 30, 41, 83–84, 93, 148, 183, 202, 204, 213, 215–216 See also misinformation Fernández Such, Fernando, 205, 206–207, 211 Fifth Estate, 116,118 “Fight for Falluja, The,”63, 65–66 Financial Times, The, 86 Finkel, Michael, 78–79 Fisheye VR, 63–64 Flourish, 162 Fojba 2000, 73 Folha de S. Paolo, 195–196 Food Import Folly, 76 Forbes, 139 Foreword of News, 160 Forsythe, Michael, 117 Fourth Estate, 116, 118, 158, 159, 171, 172 Franssen, Jens, 63–64 Frasca, Gonzalo, 73–74, 79 French Revolution, The, 159 Freidman, Batya, 82 Friend, Cecilia, 5 Funes, 132 Games 4 Change, 75 García Tellez, Luisa, 197 gatekeepers, 8, 116, 167 GCPR (General Data Protection Regulation), 169 gender, 112, 168–169 Getty Images, 141 Gilbert, Feremy, 84

globalization, 20, 117 Gmail, 170 Google, 3, 41, 92–102, 161, 170–171, 174, 177–178, 179, 181–182, 184, 193, 209 Google Allo, 178 Google Assistant, 178–179, 183 Google Home, 176, 182 Google Instant, 174 Google Maps, 170 Google News Initiative, 46, 163, 170 Google New Lab, 170 Google Now, 178 Gradgrind, Thomas, 36 Graefe, Andreas, 126, 127 Greenhill, Kelly M., 162 Gregory, Sam, 61 Guardian, The, 74, 86, 108, 112–121, 161, 170 Guillmor, Dan, 96 Gunlaugsson, Sigmundr David, 119 Habermas, Jürgen, 143 “Háblame de tus fuentes,”197 Hal 9000, 177 Half-Life, 80 Hallin, Daniel C., 112 Harcup, Tony, 4 Hard Times, 36 Harpy system, 177 HBO (Home Box Office), 3 Heliograf, 130 Hellmeulier, Lea, 190 Heravi, Bhaerah, 163–165 Hernández, Robert, 59 Hidalgo, David, 197 History of the Peloponnesian War, The, 158 Hothead Zidane, 76, 81–82, 86 Howard, Alexander Benjamin, 109 How to Survive a Nuclear Bomb, 82 How Y’all, 75 humanity, 75, 82–84, 142 human machine communication, 175–176 IBM (International Business Machines Corporation), 177 ICFJ (International Center for Journalists), 162

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

231

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

232

Index

ICIJ (International Consortium of Investigative Journalists), 107, 109–110, 112–121, 140 IDL Reporteros, 108 Iliffe Media, 130 image manipulation, 5, 56, 58, 64, 215 See also data manipulation iMessage, 178 impartiality, xix, 9, 10, 29, 36, 75, 79–82, 142, 143, 223 independence, x–xi, 5, 9, 20, 24–25, 56, 75, 84–85, 142, 143, 171, 223, 225 Independent News and Media, 130 “infodemic,”202–203 innovation, 3–16, 40–47, 124–125, 222 See also innovation in journalism ambivalence of, 5 defining, 6–7 ethics in, 132–133 as existential, 133 Inspection Chamber, 181–182 Instagram, 10–11, 93, 94, 97, 170, 175, 208 integrity, 15, 58–59, 56, 64, 99–100, 194, 196, 225 Intercept, The, 170 Internet, the, x, 8, 11–12, 20, 22, 26, 41, 96, 98–99, 118, 121, 147, 159, 174–176, 178, 183, 204–205, 210 Internet of Things, the, 15, 138 interpretation, 5, 11, 13, 25, 28–29, 31–32, 96, 111, 145 IOE Collective, 205–206 iReporter, 83 irrational publics, xii, 35–36 ISIS, 63, 65–66 Is Youssof Malé a Slave?78–79 Izquierdo, Antonio, 212 Jenkins, Simon, 118–119 Jiménez, Roger, 14 Johnston Press, 130 Joomla, 95 journalism 360–degree immersive, xii–xiii, 12, 55–68, 224 active engaged, 36–30 algorithmic, xiv, 124–125, 131, 138–139

artificial, 138–139 automated, 124–125, 138–139 civic engagement, 20, 25–26 community, 30 computational 160, 161 continuum of, 24–26 crisis of, vii, 44–46 as cultural performance, x–xii data, vii, xv, 87, 107–121, 160–167, 171–172, 197 defining, 27–30, 41–42 and democracy, 27–28, 30, 37–38, 41, 42, 102, 159, 214 democratically engaged, xii, 20–38, 223 deontology of, 75, 85–87, 141–143,147, 194 dialogic, 37 digital, 3–16, 40 disengaged, 24–26, 38 engaged, 21, 22, 24–26 See also democratically engaged journalism entrepreneurial, 20 gonzo, 160 ideology of, 33 increased, 141 as innovation, 40–47, 100–102, 187–198 interpretive, 25–26, 30 investigative, xi, xiii, 25–26, 30, 115, 117–118, 122, 131–132, 162, 166, 224 next, 96, 100–102 new, 79 opinion, 23, 30 participatory, 20, 25–26, 43 partisan, 21, 23, 25, 32–34 perspectival, engaged, 25–26, 30 professional culture of, xiv, 191–193 professional ethics of, vii, ix, xiii, 3–16, 22–23, 128, 189–191, 194, 225 as propaganda, 12, 33 public funding of, 45–46 re-signification of, x–xii robotic, 124–125, 138–139 slow, 100 storytelling in, xii–xiii, 92–102, 129–130, 132, 160, 222 semi-automated, xiv, 124–133, 225 Journalism, Ethics and Society, 159 journalistic culture, 112–121

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Index

Mediterranean model of, 112 North Atlantic model of, 112 radical sharing model of, 116–117 Journalistic Innovation Index of Spanish Media, 6 Journalistic Role Performance, 192

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Kammer, Aske, 42 Karlsson, Michael, 190 Kayser-Bril, Nicolas, 171 Keller, Bill, 116 Kent, Thomas, 56, 61 KITT (acronym for Knight Industries Two Thousand), 177 Knight Rider, 177 Koliska, Michael, 191 Kool, Hollis, 63 Kovach, Bill, 5, 96, 101, 190 Krach, Wolfgang, 112 Krahmer, Emiel, 127 Küng, Lucy, 44, 47 Kwong, Robin, 86 La Nación, 112–121 “La Navaja Suiza del Reportero,”197 La Presse +, 44 La Sexta, 121 Latorre, José Ignacio, 151 La Vanguardia, 14, 97 leaktivism, 117–119, 122 Lecompte, Celeste, 125 Lehrman, Sally, 196 Lester, Paul Martin, 62 Lewis, Seth C., 12, 109, 111, 122, 225 L’Expresso, 108 Liberty and the News, 160 Lindmark, S., 6–7 Linfield, Susie, 66 LinkedIn, 95, 101 Lippman, Walter, 160 Little mix, xiii–xiv Lleida, Eduardo, 176 Lord, Kristin, 187 Los Angeles Times, The, 126, 129–130, 140, 145, 191 Luca de Tena Foundation, 140 L’une d’elles, 81

Luxembourg Leaks, 110 Lyons, Kate, 120 Mabrook, Radwa, 56 “Machine Bias,”169 Macintyre, Alasdair, 14 Macri, Mauricio, 115, 120–121 Madary, Michael, 61 Madrid, 76 Maldita, 203 Mancini, Paolo, 112 Marconi, Francesco, 133 Markup, The, 169, 171 Martínez-Costa, María Pilar, 7 Masip, Pere, 96 Materazzi, Marco, 81 Mathiesen, Kay, 188 McBride, Kelly, 128, 191 McDougall, Julian, 204 McLuhan, Marshall, 75, 84 media literacy, 38, 202–216 Media Ownership Project, 197 Mediapart, 195 mediatization of consumption, 174–176 Mediterraneo Digital, 183 Messenger, 170177–178, 179, 182, 184 Messi, Lionel, 120–121 Metzinger, Thomas K., 61 Meyer, Philip, 108, 160–161 Micó, Josep Lluís, 96 Microsoft, xiii–xiv Midland News Association, 130 Migrant Trail, The, 81 Milk, Chris., 61 Mindich, David, 31 misinformation, xiv, 5, 10–11, 15–16, 20, 171, 195, 202–216, 226 See also fake news Missouri School of Journalism, 161 MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab, 214 MIT Media Lab, 148 MittMedia, 13 Montelab, 79 Morton, Adam, 35 Mossack Fonseca, 107, 110, 113, 114–116 MSN.com, xiii–xiv

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

233

234

Index

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Mühlauer, Alexander, 107–108 Mulgan, Geoff, 5 multimedia content, 8–9, 11, 42, 73, 79, 85–86, 94, 98, 101, 121 Muñoz, Alejandro, 95 Muntz, Diana, 96 Murdoch, Rupert, 45 narrative, xii–xiii, 61, 65, 67, 74–75, 77–78, 94, 96, 99–101, 128, 211, 215 analysis, 112 VR (virtual reality), 12, 56 Nash, Kate, 62 National Health Service (NHS), 131 natural language generation (NLG), 124–125 natural language processing (NLP), 150, 179 natural language understanding (NLU), 176, 179 NBC, 94, 130 Negroponte, Nicholas, 148 Neiman Lab of Harvard University, 125 Netflix, 3 New Guiding Principles for a New Era of Journalism, 128 neutrality, 9, 21–22, 25, 28–29, 30–34, 36–37, 77, 109, 174, 183, 223 Newman, Nic, 124 newsgames, xiii, 73–87 serious, 73, 76–77 social impact, 74 Newsgames Directory, 75 News Lab, 131–132 newspapers, 8–9, 21, 25, 41–43, 93, 95, 99, 108, 112–113, 119, 165, 166, 209 Newsquest, 130 newsrooms, 3–16, 42–44, 47, 108–112, 125–126, 138–152, 162–163, 191–197 as communities of practice, 13–15, 16 Newtral, 203 New York Times, The, 9, 10, 31, 33, 47, 63, 65–66, 74, 75, 76, 86, 94, 112–121, 139–140, 161, 163, 170, 182–183, 191 New York World, 31

Nguyen, An, 160 NICAR (National Institute for ComputerAssisted Journalism), 161 Nichols, Bill, 59 Nielsen, Rasmus K., viii, 42, 47 Nixon, Richard, 31 “Nobel’s Nightmare,”63, 66 Nord, Lars, 190 normative apriorism, 4, 226 Nougayrede, Natalie, 120 NPR (National Public Radio), 179–183, 191 NPR News, 166 Nuance, 177–178 Ober, Josiah, 158–159 Obermaler, Frederik, 107–108 objectivity, xv, 9, 21–22, 24, 28–29, 30, 34–36, 79, 112, 142, 187, 188, 190, 191, 225 pragmatic, 29, 31–32, 35–36 Occupy, 118 Ojo Público, 132, 197 O Povo, 195 Oregon Public Broadcasting, 126 Ortega, Alfonso.176 Owetschkin, Dimitrij, 187 Padioleau, Jean-Gustave, viii–ix Panama Papers, xiii, 107–123, 171, 226 Panels, 141 Pariser, Eli, 208, 212 Parkinson, que tiemble el camino, 81 Paul, Nora, 189 Paulessen, Steve, 46 Pavlik, John V., 7. 41 personalization of news, vii, xiv, 148–149, 174–184 PEW Research Center, 158 Pidoux, Jessica, 169 Pinterest, 95 Pitch Interactive, 46 Play Our Game … Wheelchair User, 81 Poder 360, 196 Poepsel, Mark A., 190 Poynter Institute International FactChecking Network, 203

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Index

Pozen, David E., 187 Points of Entry: An Immigrant Challenge, 81–82 populism, 202, 205 Posetti, Julie, 41–42, 46, 133 post-truth, xiv, 211 Poverty News, 82–83 Prestashop, 95 privacy, 5, 8, 12, 15–16, 107–108, 118, 122, 143, 168, 191 professional values, x, 129,132, 194. See also individual values, e.g., accountability, accuracy, credibility, fairness, humanity, impartiality, independence, integrity, neutrality, objectivity, responsibility, transparency, truthfulness, veracity ProPublica, 126, 132, 166, 169, 170 Provenance project, 204–216 Public and Its Problems, The, 32 Público, 196 Pulitzer, Joseph, 31 Pulitzer Center, 65 Pulitzer Prize, 162 Purdy, Matt, 113–114

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Qatar Company Research Institute, 214 Quattrociocchi, Walter, 215 Quine, Willard V. O., 32 race, xiii–xiv, 169 racism, xiii–xiv, 22, 28, 33–34, 40 RADAR (Reporters and Data Robots), xiv, 130, 140, 166–167 Ranaivoson, Heritiana, 6–7 Rawls, John, 27 Reelect Bush, 76 Refugee, The, 81 relativism, 5 Reporters Without Borders, 197 responsibility, xiii, 10, 60–67, 84, 128, 142–143, 146–150, 176, 190–191, 194, 197, 215 Reuters Institute, 126 Reuters Institute Digital Report, 92, 172 Revers, Matthias, xi

Richtel, Matt, 76 robots, xiv, 13, 15, 108, 127, 151, 175–176 Rogers, Simon, 161 Roozenbeek, Jon, 210 Rosas, Omar, 87 Rosenstiel, Tom, 5, 96, 101, 128, 189, 191 RTVE, 6 RTVE Documentary Funds Directorate, 147 RTVE Lab, 74 Ruiz, Carles, 96 Ryle, Gerard, 114 Sádaba, Charo, 7 Salaverría, Ramón, 192 Salco, 131 Samsung, 179 Sánchez, Gema, 210 Sarkis, Chamsey, 66 Schlesinger, Philip, viii Schmidt, Eric, 174 Schudson, Michael, 187, 191 Schumpeter, Joseph Alois, vii–viii, 42, 47 Sehl, Annika, 42 Semantic Web, The, 147 Sen, Arijit, 47 September 12, 73–74, 76 Serious Games Classification, 75 Shoebox, 177 Silverstone, Roger, 62 Singer, Jane B., 5, 10, 43, 128, 190 Siri, 178–179 small data, xv, 164,165 Smart Audio Report, 179–182 Smart Media Group, 66 SMART News, 63, 66 SMART platform (Monitoring and Alert System in the Network of Spanish Radio and Television), 150 Snapchat, 94–85, 97 Snow, John, 160 Snowden, Edward, 110 Soccerbot, 140 social media, 10–11,15, 23, 26, 40, 43, 92–93, 99, 101, 152, 158, 160, 166, 168 “Social Media Radar”145–146

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

235

236

Index

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Solomon, Ben C., 65 Solop, Frederic, 111 Soria, José Manuel, 115, 120 “So You Think You Can Drive, Mel?”76 Sports Illustrated, 140 Spotify, 3 SRI International, 178 “Stairway to Tax Heaven,”121 stamp story formats, xiii, 92–102, 224, 225 ethics of, 100–102 Stanford University Journalism and Democracy Initiative, 46 Star Trek, 177 Steinke, Allison J.42, 44, 47 Sternadel, Dalibor, 204 “Structural Stories,”130 Süddeutsche Zeitung, 107–108, 110–111, 113 Suite Life, The, 64 Sun, The, 85 Swiss Leaks, 110 Syrian Journey, 78, 81 “Syria’s Silence,”63–64 Tableau, 162 Tapias Hernández, César Augusto, 205, 208, 211 technological determinism, 4 Telegram, 145 television, 8–9, 97, 99, 179, 208 public, viii, 37, 139, 144–152 Tew, Chad, 77 Thirwall, Jade, xiii–xiv Thomä, Dieter, 187 Thucydides, 158–159 Time Magazine, 80 Times, The, 94 Tinder, 168–169, 171 TJ Tool, 196–197 Tmall Genie, 179 Toronto Star, 44 Torres, Fabiola, 197 Toural, Carlos, 126 Toutiao, 183 Tow Center for Digital Journalism, 126 transparency, vii–viii, xiv, 5, 9, 11–13, 65, 67, 84, 107–109, 115–116, 128, 143, 146–150, 180, 187–198, 216, 225, 226

Trinity Mirror, 130 Trump, Donald, 28, 33 Truong, Doris, 192 Trusting News Project, 195–196 Trust Project, 196 truthfulness, xiii–xiv, 57–58, 65–67, 75, 77–79, 141–143, 148–149, 208–210, 211–213 Túñez, José Miguel, 126 Twitter, xi, 10, 92, 95, 130, 152, 208 Uber, 168 Uber Game, The, 78, 82–83, 86 UNESCO’s International Principles of Professional Ethics in Journalism, 57 Unidad Editorial, 164 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 5 University of Amsterdam, Department of Psychology, 214 University of Michigan, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, 214 Urbs Media, 130, 166 user-generated content (UGC), 9 Usher, Nikki, 42, 75–76 US Immigration and Naturalization Service 81–82 values, 34–36 Varona, David, 206 Van Dalen, Arjen, 126–127 Van Damme, Kristin, 61–62 Van der Kaa, Hille, 127 van der Linden, Sander, 210 van Driel, Barry, 204 veracity, 78, 142, 146, 147, 174, 183 virtual reality (VR), 3, 12, 40, 44, 55–68, 74 Vlaamse Radio-en Televisieomroep, 63–64 Vocento Media Lab, 140 voice user interface (VUI), 174–184 von der Pfordten, Dietmar, 5 Vos, Tim P., 190 VRT Virtual Reality, 63–64 Walker, Marina, 114 Wall Street Journal, The, 182, 191

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

Index

Worlds of Journalism, 192 World Wide Web, 40, 65, 76, 108, 145, 147, 176 open, 93, 95, 102 Wormer, Vanessa, 107–108 Xiao Ai, 179 Xiaomi, 179 YLE, 140 Yonhap, 140 You Guys Talk, 75 Youse, 75 YouTube, 10–11, 170, 208 Zezulkova, Marketa, 204 Zidane, Zinedine, 81 Zion, Lawrie, 129

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Warner, Amanda, 83, 108 Washington Post, The, 9, 10, 13, 31, 80, 84, 94, 97–98, 108, 130, 140, 162, 183, 191 Wasserman, Herman, 5, 11 Webb, Andy, 182 Weiss, Amy Schmitz, 6 Westlund, Oscar, 109, 111, 125, 225 WhatsApp, 152, 170, 178, 203, 208, 211–212 White, Micah, 118–119 Wikileaks, 110, 116, 117–119, 120, 122, 193 Windschutte, Keith, 159 Wolfe, Tom, 79 Wonders, Nancy A., 111 Wordpress, 95, 196 Wordsmith, 125–126 World Health Organization, 202

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana

237

WILEY END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT

Copyright © 2021. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Go to www.wiley.com/go/eula to access Wiley’s ebook EULA.

News Media Innovation Reconsidered : Ethics and Values in a Creative Reconstruction of Journalism, edited by María Luengo, and Susana