How biased is your news source?

[_Some Schmo]

How biased is your news source? You probably won’t agree with this chart

I pretty much do, from what I've seen.



Let the gnashing of teeth begin.

[_cinepro]

Let the gnashing of teeth begin.

From what I know of those sources, that chart looks about right. Certainly there aren't any glaring errors.

[_Fence Sitter]

Biggest glaring error is Faux News should be completely off the chart to the Right.

[_EAllusion]

How biased is your news source? You probably won’t agree with this chart

I pretty much do, from what I've seen.



Let the gnashing of teeth begin.

It's a so-so chart. My snarky reaction is that it is "false-balance" illustrated. It doesn't really capture the asymmetry in quality of information because it's trying to aim for a perfect ideological symmetry even though that doesn't really exist in US media. Buzzfeed News and the Federalist aren't the opposite sides of the same coin in terms of fairness of interpretations of news and partisan bias. Not even close. It choices on partisan bias are also goofy at times. Jacobin is a hardcore socialist publication and its listed to the right of the Daily Beast. That is crazy-talk. Whomever put the chart together probably likes that Jacobin tends towards the sophisticated in its writing and squeezed it in the sweet spot window even though it should be "most extreme liberal." More so than most of the sources that are listed to the left of it, in fact. Likewise, Democracy Now! is further to or as far left as multiple publications listed to the left of it. On the flip side, the idea that the National Review tends towards the sophisticated and less biased compared to some publications below it is wack-a-doodle.

[_DoubtingThomas]

I am not sure why many stores like Walmart are selling the Enquirer. The Enquirer is so bad I am not even sure if it is suppose to be a satire.

[_Xenophon]

Has the The Daily Beast changed much in the last few years? I stopped visiting it long ago but I find the idea of it being both "analytical" and just to the left of "skews left" highly dubious. EA has already highlighted some of the other questionable choices. I think it fair to suggest that the author of the diagram has at least a touch of partisan lean in herself.

Going to the source of the chart I think her methodology explains why some things appear where I probably wouldn't normally rank them:

Just read this one more thing: It’s best to think of the position of a source as a weighted average position of the stories within each source. That is, I rank some sources in a particular spot because most of its stories fall in that spot. However, I weight the ranking downward is if it has a significant number of stories (even if they are a minority) that fall in the orange or red areas. For example, if Daily Kos has 75% of its stories fall under yellow (e.g., “analysis,” and “opinion, fair”), but 25% fall under orange (selective, unfair, hyper-partisan), it is rated overall in the orange. I rank them like this is because, in my view, the orange and red-type content is damaging to the overall media landscape, and if a significant enough number of stories fall in that category, readers should rely on it less. This is a subjective judgment on my part, but I think it is defensible.

Emphasis mine. I think this can kind of explain why she places sources like The Federalist so low. At first glance I don't think I agree with the strategy but in her defense, she admits that it is subjective. I also find it really odd that no source is allowed to be both extreme partisan and analytical, I'm not sure I agree with the notion that being extreme liberal/conservative prevents you from providing analysis on a topic. I wouldn't expect the Cato Institute to provide me with analysis from a progressive viewpoint just because that would be balanced so I'm uncertain why the empty space on her chart.

[_EAllusion]

Has the The Daily Beast changed much in the last few years? I stopped visiting it long ago but I find the idea of it being both "analytical" and just to the left of "skews left" highly dubious. EA has already highlighted some of the other questionable choices. I think it fair to suggest that the author of the diagram has at least a touch of partisan lean in herself.

Going to the source of the chart I think her methodology explains why some things appear where I probably wouldn't normally rank them:

Just read this one more thing: It’s best to think of the position of a source as a weighted average position of the stories within each source. That is, I rank some sources in a particular spot because most of its stories fall in that spot. However, I weight the ranking downward is if it has a significant number of stories (even if they are a minority) that fall in the orange or red areas. For example, if Daily Kos has 75% of its stories fall under yellow (e.g., “analysis,” and “opinion, fair”), but 25% fall under orange (selective, unfair, hyper-partisan), it is rated overall in the orange. I rank them like this is because, in my view, the orange and red-type content is damaging to the overall media landscape, and if a significant enough number of stories fall in that category, readers should rely on it less. This is a subjective judgment on my part, but I think it is defensible.

Emphasis mine. I think this can kind of explain why she places sources like The Federalist so low. At first glance I don't think I agree with the strategy but in her defense, she admits that it is subjective. I also find it really odd that no source is allowed to be both extreme partisan and analytical, I'm not sure I agree with the notion that being extreme liberal/conservative prevents you from providing analysis on a topic. I wouldn't expect the Cato Institute to provide me with analysis from a progressive viewpoint just because that would be balanced so I'm uncertain why the empty space on her chart.

The Federalist is a Brietbart-style rag. It's main contribution to society is providing fodder for Federalist Pitchbot. I'm not sure why it is so high. I suspect the author really, really wanted a pretty bell curve so the distribution of sources is skewed relative to what they are. This also explains why Jacobin - whose partisan slant ranges from socialist to communist - is listed substantially to right of New Republic - a neo-liberal/liberal political magazine with some moderate conservative contributers. The author just must like Jacobin's high-brow writing style and needed to shoehorn it closer to the ideal part of the forced curve.

[_Xenophon]

The Federalist is a Brietbart-style rag. It's main contribution to society is providing fodder for Federalist Pitchbot. I'm not sure why it is so high. I suspect the author really, really wanted a pretty bell curve so the distribution of sources is skewed relative to what they are. This also explains why Jacobin - whose partisan slant ranges from socialist to communist - is listed substantially to right of New Republic - a neo-liberal/liberal political magazine with some moderate conservative contributers. The author just must like Jacobin's high-brow writing style and needed to shoehorn it closer to the ideal part of the forced curve.

I suppose my lack of reading The Federalist is coming through (not unlike The Daily Beast). Although I remember them as a highly conservative organization I don't remember them being too factually inaccurate just that I disagreed with most of their arguments. It again raises the question for me: Is it impossible to be both partisan and offer serious analysis from said partisan perspective? I don't think it is, the point should be about making solid arguments for your side using facts and sound reasoning. Allowing for that combination would've course destroy her bell curve though, which I think you are right to call out.

[_EAllusion]

The Fedrealist is pretty much subgenius takes in article form.

Looking over the distribution again, I think the author heavily influenced by what she considers intellectual. If we're being honest, The National Review is closer to the conservative equivalent of Alternet, but it's placed no where near that because it is probably coasting on its reputation as what conservative intellectuals like.

Unless you go to a little more obscure sources like Wilson Quarterly (perhaps a bit more centrist), nothing should be in that space at all, but the author probably needs something to be.

Libertarian sources have the problem of not neatly aligning on a left/right dichotomy.

[_Doctor Steuss]

Time is right of center?

My bias detector is broken.