Media transparency - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Media transparency is the concept of determining how and why information

Information

Information in its most restricted technical sense is a message or collection of messages that consists of an ordered sequence of symbols, or it is the meaning that can be interpreted from such a message or collection of messages. Information can be recorded or transmitted. It can be recorded as...

is conveyed through various means.

As used in the humanities

Humanities

The humanities are academic disciplines that study the human condition, using methods that are primarily analytical, critical, or speculative, as distinguished from the mainly empirical approaches of the natural sciences....

,the topic of media transparency implies openness and accountability. It is a metaphorical extension of the meaning used a “transparent” object is one that can be seen through.

In communication studies

Communication studies

Communication Studies is an academic field that deals with processes of communication, commonly defined as the sharing of symbols over distances in space and time. Hence, communication studies encompasses a wide range of topics and contexts ranging from face-to-face conversation to speeches to mass...

, Media

Mass media

Mass media refers collectively to all media technologies which are intended to reach a large audience via mass communication. Broadcast media transmit their information electronically and comprise of television, film and radio, movies, CDs, DVDs and some other gadgets like cameras or video consoles...

is transparent when:

there are many, often competing, sources of information
much is known about the method of information delivery
the funding
Funding
Funding is the act of providing resources, usually in form of money , or other values such as effort or time , for a project, a person, a business or any other private or public institutions...

of media production is publicly available

Aspects of transparent media include open source

Open source

The term open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Some consider open source a philosophy, others consider it a pragmatic methodology...

documentation, open meetings, financial disclosure statements, the freedom of information legislation

Freedom of information legislation

Freedom of information legislation comprises laws that guarantee access to data held by the state. They establish a "right-to-know" legal process by which requests may be made for government-held information, to be received freely or at minimal cost, barring standard exceptions...

, budgetary review, audit

Audit

The general definition of an audit is an evaluation of a person, organization, system, process, enterprise, project or product. The term most commonly refers to audits in accounting, but similar concepts also exist in project management, quality management, and energy conservation.- Accounting...

, peer review

Peer review

Peer review is a process of self-regulation by a profession or a process of evaluation involving qualified individuals within the relevant field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards, improve performance and provide credibility...

, etc.

Overview

Media transparency deals with the way the media

Mass media

is viewed to the public today and concerns why the media may portray something the way that it does. Media communication can be a very powerful tool in affecting change whether it is political or social. The various implications it has on the way issues are viewed within the government and to the public has a great affect on public policy change in the United States. Social media

Social media

The term Social Media refers to the use of web-based and mobile technologies to turn communication into an interactive dialogue. Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein define social media as "a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0,...

participation can be a key factor in whether or not something is accepted by the government. Transparency causes issues when there are many competing sources and they are possibly corrupt. The biased information can affect public policy if the government is tampering with the way the information is portrayed, in order to cast a positive or negative light on it. Depending on how transparent a news article is, one can determine its reliability and draw their own assumptions or draw their own conclusions from the findings.

The media’s pervasive influence can directly affect public opinion. It has been stated that “the only means of influencing what people think is precisely to control what they think about.” Agenda-setting relates to the process of policy change because “media content is pervasive and rife with explicit

Explicit

Explicit can mean:* Sexually explicit, content that might be deemed offensive or graphic* the final words of a text, which are immediately followed by a colophon...

and implicit political meaning.” Beyond the role that agenda-setting can play in influencing public opinion, agenda building has to do with the mechanisms by which “social problems

Social problems

Social problems are problems and difficulties that people often face in society. These include:*crime*corruption*poverty*homelessness*hunger*disease*drug addiction*alcoholism*schizophrenia*depression*pollution...

originate on the media agenda and how they are subsequently transformed into political issues.” The transparency with which information has been obtained alters our knowledge about the subject. The framing theory states that media influence issue agendas by portraying an issue as positive

Positive

Positive is a property of positivity and may refer to:- Mathematics and science :* Converging lens or positive lens, in optics* Plus sign, the sign "+" used to indicate a positive number* Positive , a polarity of electrical charge...

or negative

Negative

- Science and mathematics :* Negative number* Negative mass* Negative energy * Electrical polarity* Negative result * Negative lenses, uses to describe diverging optics, see lens - Photography :...

; citizens will then be influenced by media to hold similar opinions. By discussing local issues in a positive manner, local media can garner support for issues. By blocking certain users, they defy transparency in media.

Media transparency and power

The media

News media

The news media are those elements of the mass media that focus on delivering news to the general public or a target public.These include print media , broadcast news , and more recently the Internet .-Etymology:A medium is a carrier of something...

can play the role of a watchdog in some situations while in others it can be manipulated to reflect views of a particular group in power. Police forces are becoming increasingly proactive, strategic, and professionalized in their use of the news media. Willingly or not, it has long been recognized that the police

Police

The police is a personification of the state designated to put in practice the enforced law, protect property and reduce civil disorder in civilian matters. Their powers include the legitimized use of force...

and the media can be seen to be locked into a relationship that is, to some degree at least, premised on what has described as a ‘complex loop of interdependence.' The media depends on the police for the constant release of ‘crime and crash’ information as the lifeblood of their news stories; the police depend on media coverage for help in crime prevention and detection and also in the promotion of a positive image of policing work. Nevertheless, the effective management and use of information has an important role to play in crime prevention, reduction and investigation strategies, and the amount of information that police officers encounter in the course of their work is considerable.

Biased information can affect public policy if the government tampers with the way information is portrayed in order to cast a positive or negative light on it. Depending on how transparent a news article is, one can determine its reliability and make assumptions or draw one’s own conclusions from the findings. Media transparency brings up issues concerning freedom of speech since the governments may censor what information is conveyed in order to sway public opinion. Corruption has been a major issue in the growth and progress of certain areas of the world, because there is a lack of media transparency.

Transparency, publicity, and accountability are all needed in order to produce change. Just making information available may not be enough to prevent corruption if such conditions for publicity and accountability, as education, media circulation and free and fair elections are weak.[1] Information should be reached by much of the common public if it is to catalyze change in the areas being exposed. It may be helpful to strengthen people’s capacity to act upon the information they receive through transparency, in order to increase its effectiveness.

In terms of governments, media transparency can be particularly important in allowing members of a particular country to see what is actually happening in a certain situation, without the story being manipulated. Abuse of power is very common in some countries and this can be directly related to a lack of media transparency. It is this absence of relevant knowledge of political and public affairs, of participation and accountability; an absence disguised by an overload of information on politically irrelevant or unenlightening matters.

In particular, mass media

Mass media

produce and use information to divert attention from important matters, to change or confuse the meanings of events, to turn public concerns into matters of entertainment. Far from focusing on matters of public interest in a way that respects that public interest, they increasingly blur the public-private line. They intrude into the private lives of public figures, pleading the public’s ‘right to know’. The result is 'a simulated transparency between governments and the governed.'

The government

Government

Government refers to the legislators, administrators, and arbitrators in the administrative bureaucracy who control a state at a given time, and to the system of government by which they are organized...

takes great care to be presented in a certain light by the media. For millennia leaders have known the importance of the visual image to their public relations persona. All manner of dress, ritual, and ceremony have been designed to shore up the perception of the powerful. From the very beginning of photojournalism

Photojournalism

Photojournalism is a particular form of journalism that creates images in order to tell a news story. It is now usually understood to refer only to still images, but in some cases the term also refers to video used in broadcast journalism...

, leaders saw an opportunity to groom their political image through their visual representations.

The degree to which state agents work to influence video production

Video production

Video production is videography, the process of capturing moving images on electronic media even streaming media. The term includes methods of production and post-production...

contradicts the use of those images by news organizations as indexical, objective representations. Because we so strongly equate seeing with knowing, video cultivates an inaccurate impression that we are getting the “full picture.” It has been said that “what is on the news depends on what can be shown.” The case studies for this project demonstrate that what can be shown is often decided in concern with political agents. Essentially, the way the media presents its information creates an illusion of transparency.

Examples

Some organizations and networks insist that not only the ordinary information of interest to the community is made freely available, but that all (or nearly all) meta-levels of organizing and decision-making are themselves also published. This is known as radical transparency

Radical transparency

Radical transparency is a management approach in which all decision making is carried out publicly. The term was used by Daniel Goleman in his book...

. These organizations include: Wikipedia

Wikipedia

Wikipedia is a free, web-based, collaborative, multilingual encyclopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Its 20 million articles have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world. Almost all of its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the site,...

, the GNU

GNU

GNU is a Unix-like computer operating system developed by the GNU project, ultimately aiming to be a "complete Unix-compatible software system"...

/Linux

Linux

Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...

community, and Indymedia.

When an organization (corporate, government, non-profit, or other) holds a meeting and the proceedings are open to the public

Public

In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individuals, and the public is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the Öffentlichkeit or public sphere. The concept of a public has also been defined in political science,...

and the press

Journalist

A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...

, and the meeting is publicized via one or more of the following methods, there is less opportunity for the organization to abuse the system of information delivery in their own interest:

broadcast over radio
Radio
Radio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
reviewed on television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
reported in newsprint
Newsprint
Newsprint is a low-cost, non-archival paper most commonly used to print newspapers, and other publications and advertising material. It usually has an off-white cast and distinctive feel. It is designed for use in printing presses that employ a long web of paper rather than individual sheets of...
journalized on weblogs
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...

This assumes, of course, that the organization does not own or otherwise affect the media conveying the information.

Related terms

Distortion
Distortion
A distortion is the alteration of the original shape of an object, image, sound, waveform or other form of information or representation. Distortion is usually unwanted, and often many methods are employed to minimize it in practice...

: involves some level of undue or inappropriate interference in the media through funding sources, personal or organizational bias, or some other influence.
Privacy
Privacy
Privacy is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves and thereby reveal themselves selectively...

: obscuring a matter from media attention by anonymity
Anonymity
Anonymity is derived from the Greek word ἀνωνυμία, anonymia, meaning "without a name" or "namelessness". In colloquial use, anonymity typically refers to the state of an individual's personal identity, or personally identifiable information, being publicly unknown.There are many reasons why a...

, confidentiality
Confidentiality
Confidentiality is an ethical principle associated with several professions . In ethics, and in law and alternative forms of legal resolution such as mediation, some types of communication between a person and one of these professionals are "privileged" and may not be discussed or divulged to...

, court order
Court order
A court order is an official proclamation by a judge that defines the legal relationships between the parties to a hearing, a trial, an appeal or other court proceedings. Such ruling requires or authorizes the carrying out of certain steps by one or more parties to a case...

, military classification
Classified information
Classified information is sensitive information to which access is restricted by law or regulation to particular groups of persons. A formal security clearance is required to handle classified documents or access classified data. The clearance process requires a satisfactory background investigation...

, or other means. There is value in both privacy and transparency. Privacy can protect a news source from retaliation, increase the number of whistleblowers, improve national security
National security
National security is the requirement to maintain the survival of the state through the use of economic, diplomacy, power projection and political power. The concept developed mostly in the United States of America after World War II...

, and the like, but excessive privacy allows for increased corruption
Political corruption
Political corruption is the use of legislated powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain. Misuse of government power for other purposes, such as repression of political opponents and general police brutality, is not considered political corruption. Neither are illegal acts by...

, statism
Statism
Statism is a term usually describing a political philosophy, whether of the right or the left, that emphasises the role of the state in politics or supports the use of the state to achieve economic, military or social goals...

, and military dictatorship
Military dictatorship
A military dictatorship is a form of government where in the political power resides with the military. It is similar but not identical to a stratocracy, a state ruled directly by the military....

.
Freedom of speech
Freedom of speech
Freedom of speech is the freedom to speak freely without censorship. The term freedom of expression is sometimes used synonymously, but includes any act of seeking, receiving and imparting information or ideas, regardless of the medium used...

if a censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...

order is blocking the media from publishing.
Suppression of dissent
Suppression of dissent
Suppression of dissent occurs when an individual or group which is more powerful than another tries to directly or indirectly censor, persecute or otherwise oppress the other party, rather than engage with and constructively respond to or accommodate the other party's arguments or viewpoint...

when a more powerful opponent tries to silence the other.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Overview

Media transparency and power

Examples

Related terms

Further reading

External links