[siruncledrew]

Journalists today don't even need any instruction, credentials, or experience to be "journalists". It's a media arms-race over who can monopolize territory in the information-space, and companies will take whoever gets them results - not only who is best at their job.

Who cares about paying for a staff of $60-80k/year well-seasoned investigative reporters that take weeks-months to produce vivid, informative pieces only for them to be forgotten about for another thing in the 24hr news cycle? Why not just pay a bunch of young people $18/hr to "rehash" 8 articles/day with a bunch of fluff and opinion to pump out more stuff to get more dollars? Why even bother going out into the world to gather information when I could just copy-paste the first story to come out, add a few pictures and edits, then release it to catch the demand-wave for content monetization while it's riding high, and call it a day?

The proliferation of 'fake news' is basically just "full-throttle" digital journalism that said, "Fuck it, why even wait around for real-life happenings to report on when I could just create my own and make money?"

Journalism is not anymore some "sacred art" or "esteemed profession", like a doctor or lawyer or scientist, it's just another avenue to make dollars from society through supply-demand.