The Rise of Fake News and the Lack of Barriers to Entry.

Once upon a time, as all good fairy tales should begin, there was a barrier to entry. There was a barrier to entry if you wanted to publish a newspaper. Mimeographed sheets aren’t as credible as printed sheets. Tabloids aren’t as credible as broadsheets. There was a hierarchy in place that was used to judge to quality of the information. There was The National Enquirer and then there was the Washington Post.
In radio there was the local AM station with local staff and news and on the other hand there were the national networks with news bureaus and reports throughout the country and throughout the world. There was Edward R. Murrow reporting from London live in person.
You get the idea. Now there is no barrier to entry. Everyone has an internet connection and everything is judged by appearance. People can see and read what they want to see and that doesn’t have any bearing on reality. I wake up every morning to the local AM station playing America’s Morning News, a “news aggregator” that combs the internet for stories and repeats their findings on the air as fact. Once I’ve heard the local weather for the day I switch over to National Public Radio, Georgia Public Radio because I know that these people have new bureaus and reporters on the scene of whatever story is happening.
Aaron Sorkin wrote that when the FCC allocated frequencies for the national networks and required them to air 1 hour of news daily, the FCC made the mistake by not requiring the networks to provide this service free of charge.