Stay safe and get back to the newspaper this pandemic

It is arguably better to deal with the coronavirus than it really is to manage misinformation about any of it. The key difference is that when working with the former, you have your projects cut out for you personally. Maintain social distancing, close borders, flatten the curve, and build capacity in the national healthcare system. In terms of working with misinformation there is no person set of steps you can take to definitively win the battle.

We did not need a global pandemic to realise what size a challenge misinformation is, nonetheless it helps. In India and abroad, we've seen some spectacular consequences of spreading misinformation. In the UK and Netherlands, conspiracy theorists spread misinformation claiming that 5G cell towers were spreading coronavirus. Because of which, some 50 towers were burnt in the united kingdom and 16 in holland.

Nearer to home, when PM Modi asked citizens to light candles and make noise for ten minutes, WhatsApp was rife with networks of misinformation. People claimed that the rise in temperatures or the opportunity in decibel levels would kill the virus. Even when you have not been subject to these messages, you have likely heard that Indore locals or Muslim mobs attacked health staff and attacked doctors who visited treat them.  To put it mildly, it generally does not make any sense to attack doctors throughout a pandemic. Until you read Indian Express’ report that fake WhatsApp videos were circulated in localities claiming that healthy Muslims are being recinded and injected with the virus were doing the rounds of Tatpatti Bakhal and adjoining localities.

Misinformation is so potent because social media is an excellent tool to spread narratives and reinforce beliefs, as opposed to television. Imagine a scenario when you are viewing protests survive news on a television set screen. In all probability, all you can easily see is a hoard of people fighting with the police or marching down an aisle with slogans printed on charts.  The info you take in is largely what is obvious on the charts or what the anchor at that time is saying.

Compare that to how you observe a protest on social media. On Twitter, when you follow a trending hashtag, it'll demonstrate the video of the protestors or the slogans they carry. In addition, you will also manage to look at what many people say or thinking about during the protests. This can help absorb a narrative far more quickly when compared to a news anchor would.

In times of panic, like protests or a pandemic, the narratives thrive and get yourself a larger audience. This leads to more engagement and more content. This is a vicious cycle that reinforces itself. That’s how it becomes easy to assume that 5G towers are spreading the virus or that doctors attended to inject you with the virus rather than to treat you.

It’s hard to state whether most misinformation is because malice or stupidity. However when it comes to tackling the infodemic, there aren't a whole lot of generally accepted truths in the area.  The broad goal is clear. We have to re-evaluate the importance we afford to social media inside our news diet. To anyone who hasn’t been living under a rock, it really is evident that WhatsApp isn't a credible source of information.

In that spirit, it is easy to head to news sources that are free and convenient to gain access to, such as Twitter and Facebook. It really is even better when the news involves you through push notifications on WhatsApp. However, when we count on these sources for the news, there is no assurance that we actually get the news.

Quality journalism and information that comes because of this of it really is a commodity. Like the majority of commodities, it might seem sensible to pay for it with money (not with privacy). Paying for the news headlines is inherently not really a foreign concept. We've payed for newspapers before, and a substantial number folks still do so. It might not seem sensible to physically hold a newspaper everyday at this time, but paid digital access is a far more convenient and ironically, a far more natural alternative.

The trade-off will probably be worth it. There is no result in sight to the lockdown and the pandemic. In times such as these, the worthiness we attribute to information increase on average. You might have a gripe with the editor about the stories s/he curates for you personally, but in a good news agency, there is genuine effort involved in fact checking and making certain consumers get both sides of a tale. Any person who supplies you with a forward on WhatsApp won't go through these pains.

Which means this lockdown, consider spending money on the news headlines or be critical of what you consume for free.

As 5G towers in the united kingdom and injured doctors in Indore will let you know, it is worth it.