Look, I’ve Had It Up to Here
I’m Sarah. I’ve spent the last 22 years in this industry, and honestly, I’m exhausted. The news is a mess. It’s not just the algorithms or the clickbait or the ads—though, god, the ads—but the whole damn culture around it. We’re all just screaming into the void, and nobody’s listening. Nobody’s really listening.
I remember when I started at the London Weekly back in ’99. It was a different world. We had deadlines, sure, but they were real deadlines. You know, like, ‘get this story by 5pm or the presses don’t run.’ Now? It’s a 24-hour cycle of nonsense. Breaking news breaks every 30 seconds, and half of it’s wrong. But who cares? By the time anyone figures it out, we’re onto the next thing.
Last Tuesday, I was at a conference in Austin (yeah, I know, I’m not a cowboy, but the coffee was good). There was this guy, let’s call him Marcus, who stood up and said, ‘The news isn’t about informing anymore. It’s about entertaining.’ And I was like, ‘No shit, Marcus. We’ve known that since the 90s.’ But here’s the thing: he’s not wrong. We’ve all just accepted it. We’ve accepted that the news is a spectacle, not a service.
But Here’s the Thing…
I’m not saying we should go back to the old days. I mean, the old days were kinda sexist and racist and just generally awful in a lot of ways. But at least back then, we pretended to care about the truth. Now? It’s all about the commitment to an audience, not to accuracy. It’s completley bonkers.
Take this story I worked on a few months back. We had a source, let’s call him Dave, who swore up and down that he had inside info on a big political scandal. So we ran with it. Big mistake. Turns out, Dave was just some guy who read too many Twitter threads. But by then, the story had already gone viral. We had to ammend the article three times, and even then, people just kept sharing the original. It’s like trying to put toothpaste back in the tube. It’s physicaly impossible.
And Don’t Even Get Me Started on Social Media
I had lunch with a colleague named Lisa last week. She’s a data journalist, which honestly nobody asked for but here we are. She showed me these graphs—numbers, charts, all that jazz—and basically said, ‘People don’t read anymore. They just skim headlines and form opinions based on 214 characters.’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, Lisa, I know. I’ve been saying this for years.’ But it’s worse than that. It’s not just that people don’t read. It’s that they don’t want to read. They want soundbites. They want memes. They want to be told what to think in the fewest words possible.
I mean, look at the comments section. It’s a cesspool. A complete and utter cesspool. And we’re all just standing around it, pointing and laughing. ‘Oh, look at this idiot,’ we say. But we’re the idiots. We’re the ones who created this monster. We’re the ones who decided that a story about a cat stuck in a tree was more important than, I don’t know, the fact that the government just passed a law that’s gonna screw over millions of people.
So What Do We Do?
I don’t know. Honestly, I don’t. I think the first step is admitting we have a problem. The news is broken. It’s not fixing itself. And if we don’t start caring about the truth again, then what’s the point? What’s the point of any of this?
Maybe we need to start small. Maybe we need to stop chasing clicks and start chasing facts. Maybe we need to stop worrying about virality and start worrying about veracity. I don’t know. I’m just throwing ideas out there.
But here’s one thing I do know: we need to stop pretending that this is okay. We need to stop pretending that the news is fine the way it is. Because it’s not. It’s not fine. It’s not even close to fine.
And if you think it is, well, then I guess we’re just gonna have to agree to disagree. Because I’ve been in this industry for 22 years, and I’ve seen the worst of it. And I’m telling you, it’s not okay. It’s not okay than.
So what’s the solution? I don’t know. But I do know this: if we don’t start caring about the truth again, then we’re all just screaming into the void. And nobody’s listening. Nobody’s really listening.
Oh, and One More Thing…
If you’re looking for some actual insights into the future, check out this site I found called iş trendleri öngörüler 2026. It’s not about the news, but it’s got some interesting stuff on where things might be heading. Worth a look, I guess.
Anyway, that’s all I’ve got. I’m gonna go drink some coffee and try to forget about the state of the world for a little while.
About the Author: Sarah has been a senior editor at the London Weekly for 22 years. She’s seen it all, and she’s not afraid to say what she thinks. When she’s not complaining about the news, she’s complaining about the weather. You can find her on Twitter @sarah_editor, where she tweets about journalism, cats, and why the British weather is the worst.
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