What Can We Deem Reliable?

I am sitting here writing this post thinking, "How am I to be considered a reliable source since everything I am writing is my personal opinion?" The answer is easy, it is up to the reader to verify my blog or not. The choice is yours.

There is so much fraud in the world today that it is hard to tell what truth is and what is a hoax. Then when there is truth, the internet allows us the ability of unrestricted web publishing, such as this blog. The difference is since this is a personal blog, people know that even though it may contain some truth, it remains that what is written is of my own volition and my opinion. With that said, I read an article in today's online issue of The New York Times entitled 'U.S. Suspects More Direct Threats Beyond ISIS written by Mark Mazzetti, Michael S. Schmidt, and Ben Hubbard. The article talks about the Islamic state and the new threats facing America and Europe because of this rebel group. Throughout the article, there are many sources to help back up the authors.

 The first source, is the director of national intelligence, James R. Clapper, Jr. Mr. Clapper has been the director since 2010 and “serves as the principal intelligence advisor to the president,” (DNI.gov). The next source is a Bipartisan Organization, which is a non-profit organization founded in 2007, by Bob Dole, Howard Baker, Tom Daschle, and George Mitchell. The third source, Institute for the Study of War, is an organization built on helping the nation’s military through research and war studies. Finally, the last few sources come from the authors own research and eyewitness accounts of what is going on in those countries right now.

So, what is my problem then? Well, the problem I see is that even though I am able to make sure these sources were credible, it does not mean that they were not tampered with or published unbiasedly. Because the web allows unrestricted we publishing articles like this can be taken out of context and rewritten to insight war, rioting, hate, etc. Anyone can take an article off the internet, rewrite it to fit their agenda, and then publish it through sites like Wikipedia and call it true. This article shows the worry that people are facing and the threats that face Europe, and us but it also tried to instill the thought of hope that the threat is under control right now. If people were to take to the internet and publish what they want about this topic, who is to say that it would not just make the matter worse. As Americans, we have the freedom of speech, but that does not give us the right to use it in a harmful way. We are given the right and freedom to write and publish what we want all over the internet without prejudice, but in my personal opinion, there are some people who should simply keep those opinions to themselves. Then again, that is just me using my ability to publish my opinion in an open forum. :)

Here are the links I used to verify my sources from the New York Times:

http://bipartisanpolicy.org/

http://www.understandingwar.org/who-we-are

http://www.dni.gov/index.php/about/leadership/director-of-national-intelligence

In addition, the article I read:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/21/world/middleeast/us-sees-other-more-direct-threats-beyond-isis-.html?ref=todayspaper

Social Media and the Perception of Truth

How do I know what I know? Well…how do any of us know what we know? Are we born with an innate ability to understand the world around us? Or do we simply have the ability to ‘soak’ up the knowledge around us? I personally believe that as we with everything in life we need to be taught what we know. This being said, I would say that I know what I know because I have learned how to put technology and social media to use. Through such sites as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. I learn different things on a daily basis.

Today for example, I learned about an altercation in San Antonio, TX. Two men (one of them an employee) started an altercation at a Sonic drive-thru, apparently over a woman (according to news 4). One man pulled out a box knife and cut the other man across the abdomen (according to KENS 5 news). When the police arrived the suspect left the scene only to be pursued by said police, while the other man was taken to the hospital (according to FOX 29). As you can see each site contained different information and yet the same information. So how do I know that this story is true? “Truth is a statement of what is most probable in proportion to the evidence at the time,” (Kovach and Rosenstiel, 2010, p. 32).

We cannot say for certain what the exact truth of something is unless we were there and involved in the entire scenario at hand. Do I believe this story to be true? Yes, not only because I see it on my Facebook page, but also because I took the time to look up more information on the situation and vet the sources that contained said information. I could say that social media, or media in general, is never reliable and state plenty of instance, such as the Sandy Hook coverage, or the Boston Marathon coverage, or plenty of false deaths of celebrities, but that would be wrong.

Social media may be concerned with being the first to get the news out and some may say they are trigger happy, but they also bring us news on a steadfast plane. We are constantly connected through some type of ICT (information and communication technology). Due to this, we have instant access at our fingertips and in a moment’s notice. This by no means makes social media more reliable, but it also does not mean that they are not. “For there are no media rules. There is no law that requires labeling. The First Amendment protects the right of all of us to write or broadcast freely,” (Kovach and Rosenstiel, 2010, p. 35). Therefore, all in all everyone has their right to say or print what they want. Does this make it true? No, but it also does not make it false. The truth is up to the consumer to find and with the vast majority of information overload available to us, how could we not.


FOXSSan Antonio. Man arrested for stabbing at Northwest Sonic. Retrieved September 14, 2014, from: http://www.foxsanantonio.com

KENS5. Worker stabbed during altercation at northwest-side Sonic. Retrieved September 14, 2014, from: http://www.kens5.com

Kovach, B. and Rosenstiel, T. (2010). Blur: How to Know What’s True in the Age of Information Overload. New York, NY: Bloomsbury USA.

News4 San Antonio. Stabbing at Sonic leaves man in jail. Retrieved September 14, 2014, from:http://news4sanantonio.com

Social Media and My Daily Routine

On a daily basis everyone uses some form of social media, myself included. Today alone, I have used Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, and Instagram. These are just a few of the sites I have been on today alone. I can honestly say that every morning after I wake up the kids the first thing I do is grab my phone and check all my tweets from the night before and then check my Facebook page. Social media is in every aspect a part of my life.
Not only do I use social media to keep in touch with friends and family all over the globe, but I use it to keep track of the news. I can honestly admit that I hate watching the news because very rarely is there ever anything happy on there and this just makes me even more scared. With the use of social media, such as Facebook, I can keep up with the news but at the same time I can bypass anything that I do not want to partake in. Not only can I bypass it but I can delete it from my view. With this I have to say that I am still undecided as to whether or not social media is good or not.
I say this because if we look at everything that has gone on in society we have both perspectives. On the one hand, we have the good which involves the ability to keep in touch at the push of a button with those on the other side of the world. We can share our lives with those we love the instant it happens. Those this may be the good do not forget that we have the bad as well.
Take for example the Cloud issue that happened just recently. Someone hacked into the cloud and was able to steal personal photos of celebrities. To me this is the bad part of not only social media, but also technology. We try to make our lives easier by building this technology into our lives, but at what cost? We allow others the ability to take what they want from us without our permission because we wanted to share.
So, is social media a good influence or a bad? I guess that just depends on the day and whether or not someone has stolen something else that does not belong to them. I guess my answer would be to ask me on a daily basis because as social media and technology changes, so does my view of it.