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Comment by ardy42 | Hacker News Reader

> Suppose the NYPost has an axe to grind and went looking for a lawsuit that makes twitter look bad... so what?

Because that would be more like propaganda than journalism.

> That wouldn't mean they're lying, it would only mean they have a different idea of what constitutes news worthiness than you. That wouldn't make it disinformation.

Lying is only one of the many ways you can mislead someone. My point was that lying is inferior way to deceive than assembling true facts in a deceptive way. So the fact that the NY Post themselves didn't outright lie in this story does little to refute the idea that they're a disreputable paper.

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There is no clear demarcation line between journalism and propaganda. Every journalist has biases, every last one, and every journalist aspires to report on matters they care about (e.g. "want to grind an axe on", which is just a way of saying the same thing but with a derogatory connotation.)

What matters is whether their reporting is factual or not. In this case, there seems to be little doubt that the reporting is factual; the reported lawsuit does exist and does make the reported claims.

> does little to refute the idea that they're a disreputable paper.

I have no interest in refuting obvious truths.

> What matters is whether their reporting is factual or not. In this case, there seems to be little doubt that the reporting is factual; the reported lawsuit does exist and does make the reported claims.

That matters, but it isn't the only thing that matters. Again: the fact that the NY Post themselves didn't outright lie in this story does little to refute the idea that they're a disreputable paper. The way they choose facts to report and how they arrange them can be the real source of disrepute.

I am not disputing that the NYPost is disreputable, do I need to say this more? I am saying the deservedly poor reputation of the NYPost is irrelevant in this case because the reported facts are easy to independently verify. The reputation of a newspaper counts when their reputation is what we must rely on, which is not the case here.

The NYPost's source is a public filing linked elsewhere in this discussion. If you think the NYPost has lied, point out the lie. If you think they left something important out, point it out. I'm guessing you cannot do either.

> I am saying the deservedly poor reputation of the NYPost is irrelevant in this case because the reported facts are easy to independently verify. The reputation of a newspaper counts when their reputation is what we must rely on, which is not the case here.

That's where we disagree. You're saying the the only job of a paper is to report true facts (or at least try its best). I'm saying its job is to report true facts and true impressions. True facts can be used to create false impressions, and the impression created often matters the most, especially when you know your readers aren't going to read your story like a careful lawyer.

Whether any impressions somebody walks away from this article with are 'true or false' is likely a matter of subjective opinion. Maybe they think twitter is doing enough to moderate their platform already, or maybe not enough. None of this has bearing on whether or not the article is misinformation of disinformation. The article is factual, reporting facts (correct me if I'm wrong about that) concerning a real lawsuit.

And you don't have to be a lawyer to understand the meaning of 'the lawsuit alleges' repeated a dozen times. Or is your position that reporting allegations against tech companies is always misinformation because you think only lawyers know what allegations are?

I agree with what you said but I feel like this is standard for most media outlets, including ones somewhat opposed to ny post (most notably the nyt)

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