MUMBAI: We have known it for a long time. And many have cautioned us about it as well.
Now here’s some data to support the fact that digital content influencers and creators are pretty inventive about the so-called information that they tout as facts.
A Unesco backed Behind the Scenes survey has revealed that 62 per cent of influencers do not carry out rigorous and systematic fact-checking of information prior to sharing it. However, 73 per cent expressed the desire to be trained to do so.
The survey is the first global analysis of digital content creators’ motivations and practices, and of the challenges they face. It involved 500 influencers in 45 countries, with the expertise of a dedicated research team at US-based Bowling Green State University.
The survey found that content creators have difficulty determining the best criteria for assessing the credibility of information they find online. 42 per cent of respondents said they used “the number of ‘likes’ and ‘shares’ a post had received” on social media as the main indicator. 21 per cent were happy to share content with their audiences if it had been shared with them “by friends they trusted,” and 19 per cent said they relied “on the reputation” of the original author or publisher of content.
Here’s more: mainstream news media is only the third most common source (36.9 per cent) for content creators, after their own experience and their own research and interviews.
Clearly, a lot needs to be done to train digital content creators as well as followers who swallow any drivel that’s dished out to them as a fact. Unesco has launched an online course to address this and educate them. More than 9,000 participants from 160 countries already registered to participate.
They will learn how to:
* source information using a diverse range of sources
* assess and verify the quality of information
* be transparent about the sources which inspire their content
* identify, debunk and report misinformation, disinformation and hate speech
* collaborate with journalists and traditional media to amplify fact-based information.
Can some more educational initiatives in India be instituted by educational institutes to educate the digital and social media crowd?
