When a news article reports an event or something someone important said, then immediately segues to

People didn't hold back from sharing their thoughts on social media,

it's annoying, maybe even malpractice.

Why should anyone care about random cherry-picked pithy or funny opinions of people who nobody knows, aren't knowledgeable, likely inexperienced, certainly not expert in what happened, probably ignorant of the history of the matter, and are nothing verifiable other than a fast thumbtyper able to react quickly enough to be noticed by a lazy journalist?

Look up "trusted sources" and "fact checking." Do your social media sources fit the bill?

Seriously, folks, especially if you call yourself a journalist: don't care what the Internet thinks! You might even be quoting bots. The Internet is partly responsible for getting us in the mess we're in today, to boot. Stop it. Just stop it. Delete your X-Twitter. Turn off your phone. Quote Wikipedia; you'll at least sound intelligent.

#BoostingIsSharing so please boost.

#journalism #journalist #news #author #writer #writersOfMastodon #writingcommunity