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No one wants nuance.
The Washington Post, after it was purchased by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, began refining a new digital content assessment tool called “Bandito.” Editors place two versions of an article online under different headlines. Then, in real time, the system determines which version is more popular with which readers, and eliminates the less attractive version where it is less effective.
Readers are prone to click on more sensational headlines, and that means headlines are going to tilt in a more sensational direction—not only because of the technology, but as headline writers anticipate how to respond to consumer demands.
almost every major news site in recent years has adopted, in some form, what has become known as “the Buzzfeed headline”—for example, “Canada’s Response to Russia’s Anti-LGBT Propaganda Law Is Totally Awesome.” Buzzfeed understood the way people consume news online better, and earlier, than its competitors.
Online readers, who move more quickly from one article to the next than readers of a traditional, in-the-hand newspaper, want headlines that not only tell them what’s happening, but also what to think about w...
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Have you noticed that, on most news sites, the sharing buttons are at the top of articles, well above the content text? That’s because web designers know that the overwhelming majority of people will not make it even to the third paragraph, let alone the bottom of the page.
Look at me! I am the kind of person who agrees with this statement!”), not because anything in the article is useful or insightful.
senior producer at one of America’s largest cable news networks once let me in on “rule one” of their segment selection: “We only do two kinds of stories,” he told me—“those that make people who love us love us more, and those that make people who hate us hate us more.”
“There are no possible 70-percent-of-America audiences anymore,” one executive explained. “All we can do is try to create ‘stickiness’ among the 1 percent of the readers we have a shot at. So that means getting attacked is almost as valuable as being loved.”
Getting people angry enough at you to share an article or clip is almost as valuable as getting them to endorse it.
Sunday Night Football, for a short run in 2014, claimed a 14 percent share of American households. By contrast, Lucy and Desi regularly captured almost 70 percent of America.†
But had my friend discerned his “powers” in 2018, he might not have told his real-world friends. Instead, he likely would’ve done an online search, found a digital support group, and spent years posting evidence of telekinesis on message boards devoted to paranormal activity under the screen name “Mind-Over-Matter Man.” As “community” moves from family and friends—people who’ve seen you with bed head—to people who exist only as usernames, it becomes a lot easier to lose your hold on reality. Your older brother will put you in a headlock and noogie you until you stop acting like a goofball.
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Political media outlets have figured out how to exploit this trend. People more and more insulated from real people and the day-to-day concerns of real life are easier marks. They are the fanatics who tune in, click, and share, all day, every day. As their grip on reality gets weaker, the media’s grip on them gets stronger.
machine. In exchange for wild accusations and exaggerations, they get rich and famous—and we, their viewers and listeners, get a shallower, angrier, less workable America.
contrary to so much hand-wringing and finger-pointing, the president did not create our polititainment problem. The incentives to gin up short-term outrage were already there. He’s just exploited them better than anyone else has.
His goal is to provoke. He finds it entertaining. And the media plays into his hand, every single time.
He misspells words on purpose (“covfefe”) and makes grammatical errors on Twitter because he can count on the media to blow it out of proportion—to his benefit.
Media outlets need to keep the clicks coming, and Trump is always looking for attention.
President Trump uses race to rally people against the media.
I’ve heard multiple serious journalists wonder aloud whether facts will ever make a comeback.
Most media business models—network or print—are broken. Some of this is a consequence of technology. But it’s also the direct result of a decision to lean into certain consumer attitudes and preferences, and to prioritize certain values (e.g., entertainment) over others (e.g., genuine relevance).
“It may not be good for America, but it’s damn good for CBS.”
Because no one saw anything they didn’t want to see, they simply became more convinced of their own views—including the most dubious, idiosyncratic, or downright nutty of them.
Moral dilemmas can’t be resolved by a computer.
50 percent of America now believes that reporters simply make up stories about Donald Trump, it isn’t surprising that only 17 percent of Republicans think journalists as a whole consistently tell the truth. It
it’s also that it actually becomes harder to believe credible charges against one’s own tribe. It wasn’t just that Republicans wouldn’t criticize former Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore’s exploitation of underage girls; it was that many Republicans wouldn’t believe the charges against Moore in the first place,
quantity does not magically become quality. Our opinions aren’t more thoughtful, or our characters more noble, simply because we have more data. We might know a lot, but we aren’t necessarily becoming wiser.
we need real, local, in-person communities. But our communities are in collapse.
There is no silver-bullet way to restore a republic characterized by empathy and self-restraint except by the cultivation of healthy habits among its citizens.
What is wrong with us is exacerbated by technology, but it did not originate with technology. What is wrong is that we have let our habits corrode, and our affections warp.
We have been willing to accept cheap, distant anti-tribes when, in reality, only hard-built tribes of blood, ...
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The American idea is a commitment to the universal dignity of persons everywhere.
The Founders set down what America meant, but because of their own brokenness, and because of the economic power of slaveholders, they did not achieve the idea of America. Lincoln and King appear not to reject but to carry forward the Founders’ dream: to more perfectly realize the marvelous American idea of liberty and justice for all. This, and nothing less, is what America means.
each and every individual is created with dignity—and therefore government, because it is not the source of our rights, is just a tool.
The U.S. Constitution is one of the most important documents in human history, but it was not handed down by God on Mount Sinai. It is the product of fifty-five very flawed men who wrestled long and hard about human nature and the proper uses of government.
Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and Snapchat didn’t create our darker impulses; they simply revealed them.
“zeal for different opinions concerning religion, concerning government, and many other points” has always “divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to cooperate for their common good.”
Since “causes of faction cannot be removed,” he wrote, “relief is only to be sought in the means of controlling its effects.”
the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”
Assume that if you believe anything important or hold anything dear, it will not always align with majority opinion.
Government isn’t in the business of setting down ultimate truths. It doesn’t decide who’s saved and who’s damned. Government is merely a tool to preserve order, to preserve space for free minds to wrestle with the big questions. Government is not the center of life but the framework that enables rich lives to be lived in the true centers of freedom and love: homes and communities.
That work requires keeping the majority humble—not allowing them to impose compulsory, one-size-fits-all solutions on the big riddles of life. It also requires constantly renewing our commitment, in every sphere of life, to the dignity of every person.
we strive “not only to guard the society against the oppression of its rulers, but to guard one part of the society against the injustice of the other part.”
That culture depends on habits of charity and empathy and respect. We’ll never understand why our opponents act the way they do if we refuse to listen—really listen—to their arguments.
but it’s getting harder the more we organize our fellow Americans into Good Guys and Bad Guys even before the “conversations” begin.
absolutely certain that we’re on the “right side of history” on every issue, no matter how small.
“that’s not the way we learn.” When you encounter someone with whom you disagree, “you should have an argument with them,” he encouraged. “But you shouldn’t silence them by saying, you can’t come because I’m too sensitive to hear what you have to say.”
but more and more colleges are inculcating their students with the idea that they are entitled to live without offense, without encountering ideas that they don’t already embrace. But if that’s the case, what’s the point of the university? Education requires encountering ideas you didn’t already know or hold.
Actual debate that touches on deep, closely held beliefs is hard—partly because we know we might be wrong, even about some of our strongest convictions. But it’s also difficult because we’re typically not very good at seeing perceived opponents as real people. Doing so requires struggling against our instinct to impose our will on others.
It’s easy to argue that position in an essay or on social media; it’s harder when your opponent is standing in front of you.
