[andyjdavis]

>The old news networks at least made an effort to present both sides of most issues

I am not sure whether they did that because they wanted to present both sides or if they just wanted to provide confirmation for what everyone wants to believe and they lacked the ability to segment their audience. If both sides of an argument watches the one news program that news program is incentivized to provide fodder for both sides to avoid losing part of their audience.

[qu4z-2]

Does it really matter what their motivations were if they did it, though? They now have the ability to target ads/content, and they use it. The fact that they would've before if they could doesn't really change that they didn't and now they do.

[andyjdavis]

I suspect it does matter what their motivations were, at least a little. It is about not distorting the truth Vs distorting the truth in two opposite ways that hopefully cancel out. It is still distortion.