Ask Skewz.com Founder About Detecting Media Bias

Skewz.com is not the Microsoft-funded Blews experiment that is supposed to help detect rightness and leftness in stories based on blogs that link to them. Instead of detecting blog links, Skewz relies on readers to submit and rate stories, and even tries to pair stories that have "liberal" and "conservative" biases so that you can get multiple takes on the same event or pronouncement. The Skewz About page explains how it works. The site has drawn a fair amount of "media insider" attention, including a writeup on the Poynter Institute website. But what does all this mean? Where is it going? Can Skewz.com help us sort our news better and make more informed decisions? We don't know. But if you post a question here for founder Vipul Vyas, maybe he'll have an answer for you. (Please try to follow the usual Slashdot interview rules.)

Comments

Self Selection = Inaccurate Data

[plasmacutter]

This will merely attract the obsessive ultra-right crusaders to dump "left wing bias" en masse on everything.

You want to test for political bias?

Examine the feeds themselves.
A - How often are left/right political figures treated negatively/positively, if so how harsh on a scale of 1 to 5, with 3 being neutral.
B - Whenever government programs/economic issues are covered, does the presentation favor talking points used more by right-wing or left-wing groups (supply side and dereg vs regulation, heavy corporate scrutiny/investigation,and pro labor)
C - Whenever news involves corporations, is the presentation more pro or anti corporate. Are corporate releases repeated verbatim without qualifiers or criticism. How soft or harsh are they on a scale of 1 to 5

now plot the individual data in bar graphs. A1-A5, B, etc.

There will be a real bias meter.

Singin' the Blews

[pbrooks100]

"The Newz is all bad, and I'm feelin' so sad, ain't got no x-Skewz, I got da biased blog Blews." Really. Whats up with these Web 2.0 type names? Ugh.

Re:Are all americans one dimensional

[Ethanol-fueled]

Then you've never seen FoxNews. Hmm, wait: They do tend to show a lot of fine babes and sex-related stories. O, the dichotomy is ripping me apart!

Re:Are all americans one dimensional

[Naughty Bob]

So the government exists "to look after society?"

Yes.

Not to protect us and our liberty?

That you think the two are separate objectives speaks volumes.

Re:Are all americans one dimensional

[chunk08]

Yes, individual responsibility must be regulated, but only to the point where liberty could harm others. Thus we have laws against underage sex, laws against nudity in public, laws against drinking while driving. Thus, we should have laws prohibiting abortion, which is, however you try to spin it, murder of an unborn child. "Rights of a mother" pooh, do I have the right to come kill you? The libertarians have it almost right. However, in the course of protecting liberty, some liberty must be curtailed. The problem comes when too much liberty is curtailed and the government becomes a legal form of robbery.