journalism

I was wondering whether the Joann Fabrics liquidation sale was over. I was going to be out that way and wanted to know whether it was worth stopping by. So, I fired up the Google machine and found many clickbaity linkfarm sources that didn’t answer the question. Then I found a link to a trusted local newspaper a few pages down in the search results.

 

This was the moment I realized the internet is functionally dead.

I feel myself slipping between planes.

I’m sitting at my desk reviewing legal documents, stitching together information, assimilating, digesting, recognizing patterns, summarizing findings. Writing. I feel alive.

I’m sitting at my desk uploading documents, asking AI to stitch together facts, to assimilate, to digest, to recognize patterns, to summarize findings so I can review them for accuracy. I feel dead inside. It’s all wrong and I spend just as much time correcting it as I would have done by doing the work in the first place. I’m at a disadvantage because I didn’t review the documents beforehand, so now I have to review them to make sure AI got everything right. The work takes twice as long.

My inbox fills with all of the amazing things AI can do to solve problems I have literally never had in my 30 years of being a paralegal.

My inbox fills with sales pitches and free trials and product reviews, and I am just trying to do my job, which is thinking and writing and helping others do those things.

I don’t want to have to think about what my life will look like when I’m now supervising AI agents instead of human beings. That is a lonely, depressing existence I do not want.

And yet, each morning I wake up and slog through 1.5 hours of commuting, marching forward in service of my own demise. Facilitating it, even. If I push back, I’m at loggerheads with progress in the same way the stenographers fought against typewriters; in the same way my coworkers fought against eradicating typewriters and sneakernet when I pushed to network our computers; in the same way I’ve dug into every new thing because I believed staying on top of the tech in my field is important.

I read an article the other day that suggested that the humans most at risk in my field were early career, the ones who don’t have the network and impressive resume.

The article failed to consider the humans who have the network and impressive resume being forced to experience best parts of their career hacked into bits by AI and the ways this will slowly kill them.

This is all happening much faster than I thought it would.

I thought we had more time.

The article I read about the demise of my beloved Joann Fabrics got many basic, fundamental facts wrong:

· All of Joanne’s stores are closing for good, not just 600 out of 800.

· This store was not next to A.C. Moore, which went out of business in 2020.

· Antoinette Stafford of “Summerdale” (the town is spelled Somerdale), the “woman” who was “interviewed” for this article had not been shopping at this store for over a decade. This Joann location opened in 2022.

 

· Literally no one would say this. Anyone who makes things knows that A.C. Moore went out of business in 2020. Further, no sewist would suggest A.C. Moore or Michaels as alternative sources for fabrics. They would say Hobby Lobby or Walmart, because that’s what we’re left with for bargain fabrics.

I don’t know what to do. I know it’s wrong, but I don’t know how to approach it. Do I ignore it? Do I send a letter to the editor? Do I tell a journalist who cares? Do they exist? This article was published on a news site that claims to have editorial standards.

Everything we report on is guided by strong moral principles, which guarantees that our readers have access to accurate, deeply researched, and meaningful reporting…

…guided by strict journalistic standards. All our members of the team are trained to prioritize fact-checking, impartiality, and ethical reporting to ensure credibility. We’ll always present balanced perspectives and maintain transparency of our news sources and editorial processes.

Do people care what is real and what is not anymore? Do they even notice? If someone from outside of South Jersey read that article, they wouldn’t have known that many of the facts in that article were incorrect. I’m not even sure people read critically enough to spot these discrepancies and in this case, why would they? It’s a fluff piece about Joann closing FFS.

It’s all fun and games except for the fact that this news site also covers government.

I feel like I’m the crazy one even though I understand I’m not.

I feel like whatever I do is pointless because this is just the direction we’re going and I’m powerless to stop it.

I think about this a lot because in all the work I do I’m required to double- and triple-check facts. There are (or were) consequences for getting them wrong. Even here, I was more worried about making sure the facts in my criticism were accurate than the journalist was concerned with the accuracy of the article, which appears to have been barfed out by AI.

I think about this a lot because we’re existing on separate planes of truth and wading through disinformation and falsehoods being spread by our own government. What we are told is not the same as what’s happening on the ground. What we see on the news depends on the whims of journalists and editors who decide which story to tell and how to tell it.

This is what happens when local newspapers go away. We have only the behemoths to turn to: CNN, MSNBC, FOX, New York Times, Washington Post, etc., most of whom are primarily motivated by revenue, not public good.

Now, little local “newspapers” are carving out a space in the void that was left behind when our actual newspapers with actual editors went away. Unfortunately, many of these smaller publications are more motivated by dreams of being the next Scrooge McDuck than they are by providing high-quality, trustworthy information.

So I wrote a quick note to the editor sharing what I discovered along with links to sources. They didn’t respond. They quietly edited the article behind the scenes. No note at the top of the article. And they left that fake “interview” in.

So much for journalistic integrity.

When one fact is wrong, they’re all wrong. You can no longer trust the writer, the editor, or the source.

That is as true for a newspaper as it is for the internet at large.

PS: And this is what happens when Clippy is forced into retirement:

 

He would never have made such a silly suggestion.

Header image: “Eureka Silk. Law sakes alive! This ‘ere silk is just beautiful! I’ll never use any other! [front]” by Boston Public Library is licensed under CC BY 2.0.