The current news landscape is an exciting one which is rapidly shifting and evolving to adapt to the new realities it is facing. On Regret the Error, Craig Silverman is performing a very important task which is improving journalism in the world today.
There's been much debate on the legitimacy of bloggers vs. traditional journalists. I find that Craig Silverman is a perfect example of how both mediums can work together to improve each other's "performances". Craig Silverman is right to point out that mistakes and errors are unavoidable; humans aren't perfect, and the world of journalism isn't either.
As is pointed out in the Poynter interview with Silverman, errors erode credibility and in a democratic society, public belief in big media is an absolute necessity. Through blogs, and independant citizen journalists such as Craig Silverman, traditional media has a mirror to view itself with and a mirror which criticizes and participates in the creative process. This is incredibly useful for traditional media. Errors made and not corrected are reproduced, copied and reiterated and rooted into eternity.
The role of traditional journalists, who have financial support and a generaly more professional education on journalism, needs to reflect this by producing better texts, with more nuanced opinions, more facts, and less mistakes.
Society needs to feel that they can turn to media sources with integrity for information whether it subscribes to their perspective or not. I want to read relevant pieces from the left, the right bu more importantly from people and sources which have analysed the subject from a variety of perspectives and made sure to properly fact-check.
Traditional media and bloggers for that matter need to invest more time into looking into their information sources.
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