Media outlets begging for mercy..
A better plan would have been to take responsibility for the fact that the media outlets are a big part of the problem in how people speak and adress each other online.
Lately I have noticed some media outlets are almost begging for mercy not only for themselves but also for other people. People active in the sport.
In all they cry about the social media climate being too rough and tough on both them as media outlets, and writing journalists as well in how they treat other individuals.
I can agree this is very much true. However I also have studied these things for years and made a couple of notes about the state of things.
Firs of all equestrian sport journalism has been on a down going spiral for years.
Technically I can only come up with a handful media outlets that actively have not only reported about the sport but also asked difficult questions and also been questioning the sport over the past ten years.
Interestingly enough out of these magazines two are actually dressage magazines, one is a mix but also stamped as one of the leaders when it comes down to write about sport horse breeding.
Of these three magazines only one is based in Europe. The other two sit in the US and Australia.
One of the media outlets that is now crying for mercy has nothing to do with the two above, and is based in Europe and here’s the funny thing.
Almost never during the past 10-15 did this particular outlet write anything negative about the sport in the sense of questioning either their own national federation nor the international one of the FEI.
Others yes, but never anything more close to home!
Never ever did they mention names of people with a proven wrong doing based on i.e. a suspension at the FEI, at least not if they belong to their own home nation.
I mean if a rider is suspended by the FEI it is common knowledge to anybody who goes to their website and scroll through the list of cases or check out the rider directly in the database.
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Along came Facebook!
However, years back on the day Facebook comments were introduced they were the first ones to replace their own native comment system and outsource it into the hands of Facebook.
And let’s face it - no joke intended. It is not like they were moderating or monitoring those comments in the first years of Facebook comments.
Eventually the Facebook commenting system has been replaced with nothing, at least on the magazines websites. Cause most media outlets have stopped with comments full stop and have instead chosen to put all eggs in one basket. A basket named Facebook.
This is done by dropping their news links on their respective Facebook pages and again let Facebook do the work for them while watching their social media grow.
These days a lot of media outlets, equestrian, sports, daily news, fashion magazines, are indeed monitoring and moderating what is happening on their social media flows.
Don’t feed the trolls..
If there is something that could be provocative or lead to some kind of riot they sometimes just kill the comments or won’t even post that particular article on their Facebook page in the first place. That could be a good plan.
A better plan would have been to take responsibility for the fact media are and have been a big part of the problem in how people speak and adress each other online.
In many ways they are like mother ship off all the net Trolls out there.
So instead of asking others to change, maybe they should.
Just imagine an equestrian outlet or any other magazine removing themselves from social media and run their own thing instead of keep feeding the monster!
Personally I would admire the crap out of such a media outlet, that instead of crying about it made the gutsy move and removed themselves from it and reclaimed their power.
