In the face of media anarchy and the harm due to false news, attempts have been made to gather reliable publications around quality standards and certification, as in other industries. One of these is suggested by the American Scott Yates, a former journalist. The problem is: who sets the standard?
Scott Yates, 55, an American and a journalist in the early part of his career (at Spy Magazine, New York Newsday, Durango Herald, Rocky Mountain News and Denver Westword), lives in Colorado where he founded three companies: MyTrafficNews (bought out by Microsoft), LegislativeDatabase (now called BillTrack50) and BlogMutt renamed Verblio.
Through his activities in the industry, Scott Yates has integrated the concepts of quality certification and standards that he now offers to the media industry. He has published a book entitled: “The Future of Water“. His official website is: sco.tt/time
We met Scott Yates in New York in the framework of an expert meeting at the end of 2018 at the initiative of the World Economic Forum. The topic of the discussion was “Rebuilding trust in information ecosystems“. In short, what is the vaccine against misinformation? The idea of a certification of the media in the same way as for other industries (food, construction, pharmaceuticals, etc.) seems more necessary than ever. It is also gaining momentum. But the idea is not new and past attempts have resulted in failures.
Because the major problem of quality is always the same: who defines the standard? Who certifies? Who says what is or is not qualitative? Who will have authority over the others? And then, how can we bring together the fragmented players in this very complex field? How not to conceive a project at the global level and, hence, how to prevent a hegemony of the big American media? Conversely, would the latter accept compromises with foreign media? How to avoid blacklists? And finally, will the future body in charge of the label, if it sees the light of day, have the means to carry out its policy?