Unprofessional attitude of some Online news platforms poses danger to industry survival
The plethora of fake information on many Online news platforms, unprofessional attitude of the players to hurriedly disseminate information without cross-checking and disobedience to copyright practices are coming to the fore as observers predict that many of these Online news platforms would fade away over lack of genuineness.
Over time, consumers of information have expressed worry over misleading information from some Online news platforms. In 2015, this generated a debate among Nigerians as the National Assembly planned to censor the use of social media in Nigeria. Other concerned stakeholders have called for the ranking of the platforms.
According to an observer, some of these Online news platforms engage in lifting stories from other sources unto their sites, sometimes without attributing it to those sources or they deliberately feed consumers with rumours as facts.
Assessing this trend, Jerry Oche, Founder/CEO of Zowasel, a deal aggregation firm based in Ikeja underlined laziness as major reason many of the Online platforms flout copyright rules and publish materials without cross-checking them.
“They lack ideas of generating something fresh and unfortunately, some of the online publishers that flout these rules don’t know that what they are doing is wrong”. He said that in the long run, many readers would not take them seriously.
He believed that the fake Websites’ challenges would be compounded as the popular search engines such as Google and Facebook intensify efforts to grade them. When this is done, the fake Websites which thrive on unfounded rumours would not attract adverts and without adverts, they would fade away.
Another observer, Bassry Okon, an engineer based in Lagos said most of these citizen ‘journalists’ operating online news platforms want to be heard, recognized and be relevant but they do this at the risk of causing chaos, doing more harm to the socio-political environment.
While advising most of the online news platforms to be serious and cross check what they publish, Okon who acknowledges that gossips sell, noted that continuous publication of gossips and rumours and embrace of other unprofessional acts are capable of eroding the credibility of online news industry.
Malachy Udejinta, a lecturer at Ajayi Crowther University, Oyo said “unlike reporters who rely on multiple sources and fact-checkers to get the story straight and protect their professional reputations, some bloggers feel they have little to lose if they post inaccurate information or spread outright lies”
He regretted that some of the bloggers are not journalists and they don’t follow the ethical codes.
Another observer, Jumoke Okeowo, a banker believed that some bloggers have become instruments in the hands of some business operators to attack competitors. “50 to 60 pecent of blog attacks are sponsored by competitiors who use blogs to criticize other businesses” she said.
Daniel Obi and Bunmi Banjo