Anything self-advertising as in-depth, integrity, reliable, "you can trust", and comprehensive coverage is not. Those are going to fall in the "junk food" category of your news intake, a nice luxury of a bourgeois society that you can do without. There are news sources that are in-depth, comprehensive, etc. You need these staples, and you need to tune-in to them. The really nice thing about them is they're typically weekly or bi-weekly, and more likely monthly, quarterly, yearly. Some exceptions are going to be commentary news sources like blogs that might be published more frequently. What these do is give context for the news. I'm not referring to a perversion of context either, e.g. "Scientist have discovered Tues. x which throws all previous models out the window." That's just bad journalism.
What commonly drives most mainstream sources are economic considerations; mainstream is synonymous with corporate. Note: there's also the sense of it being an outlet for hegemonic dissemination. Not talking about that. Mainstream can also be interchangeable with popular, or has mass appeal. I'd caution against this understanding when taking about public media. These considerations affect what news is covered and how as it's customized for the target audience's consumption. It's what improves ratings minus various filters. It precludes though specialized news, which while a general population might not consider newsworthy, we do and expert news which is not set to the common denominator of the target audience. The target audience is not the primary clients of a news source, the advertiser are. IOWs, we are the product, and not the actual publication. My 2¢: the propaganda model is very helpful for thinking about public media; however, when it becomes a reductionistic, totalizing critique it ventures into the domain of bs. What a few corporation do is own all the news outlets, so that say the folks owning CNN also have Time and Adult Swim and Sports Illustrated.
One of the filters mentioned are for news pieces alienating PR (public relations) sources, at least toning down the language. All PR is propaganda. The term was coined precisely cause its Father (Edward Bernays) realized that people held a negative aversion to the word propaganda. What this means is that they're masters of manipulative techniques. Not a problem, just be suspicious. Many folks have fallen into a form of inconsistent cynicism. This is not advisable. Obviously, there's a difference even in the level of professionalism between the White House Press Secretary (Gibbs) and a spokesperson for Wheaton. Front groups are different than the ACLU or Focus on the Family. Just be conscious of the dynamic and look to honest sources for undisclosed information, how it's being spun, etc. Fox News and Rush Limbaugh don't count. Instead of a naive trust and a reactionary cynicism, its probably best to go for a critical trust (assuming they've earned it).
Now there's a cluster of ideals that need to be tossed out when thinking of news. Bias is not bad. Bias is just the formation of opinions and tendencies. If one isn't biased, that's cause they've not engaged whatever the subject matter is. That also generally means their opinion isn't worth much. There are good and bad biases; they're still biases. What's bad is when a news source exhibits particular vices, e.g. superficiality, willful naïveté, wishful thinking, dogmatism, epistemic blindness, etc. So rather than asking the unhelpful question of is this news source biased, it's better to evaluate whether and how a news source exhibits these undesirable traits. Another thing to think about is that objectivity is not a real goal or ideal for news sources. Without getting too philosophical here, these types of accusations are cliché and outdated. The nice thing about living in 2010 should be we can fast forward to see where these went. Avail yourself of this possibility. Again, instead we should consider what's meant by objective, and reformulate our criterion for evaluation. Are they attempting to get at the truth of the matter or are they trying to construct a persuasive narrative which the reality of the situation doesn't allow? Related, I also don't understand the whole pretense to non-partisanship. Politics has historically been understood as a factional enterprise between rivals. The press is a democratic institution like the Church, Jury, or Militia. When it allows itself to become a tool of others, that's not a good thing. However, the idea that it can't takes sides or offer a perspective is ridiculous.
Notice I didn't mentioned "balanced" up above. That's because it's a joke. Both or two-sides is a farce and pretense. There are multiple perspectives and sides to any event or issue. As human beings, there is no substitute to getting a plurality of viewpoints. Moreover, they need significant diversity. IOWs - switching between news sources that are basically sharing the same take is NOT diversity.
One last thing, traditional news is a "packaged deal". With the expanding business, the market strategy shifted to customizing products to satisfy a demographic. Technology has allowed this to obviously be taken to a new level. Some of it works for us though, and that includes as mentioned in the previous post the ability to filter news which is of interest to you. You no longer have to get the whole New Yorker Review to read a trusted author. You can just read the articles in the papers on beer if you prefer. The main limitations are your own creativity and awareness of what's out there as well as topical literacy. Take advantage of this.
I also lied, I'm going to post another rethinking news part.
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