Digitally Fueled Rants Kill Objectivity, User Trust
Reuters reports that one in five U.S. mortgages are underwater; the people paying them owe more than their house is worth. The real flood, however, is swamping the Internet , where gloomy financial news headlines and the antics of TV-based business reporters threaten to inundate your typical Web surfer.
Financial news that now travels at the speed of fright, thanks to the Web, was much easier to digest and much happier during my time at CNBC. Ten years ago this month, I was a tech reporter at the network's Fort Lee, N.J., headquarters, watching the Dow smash through the 10,000 mark. The Nasdaq was closing in on 5,000 and the air in the dot-com bubble smelled oh so sweet.
Ten years. My battered 401K tells me that was about three lifetimes ago. Social networks, iPhones and Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) make those days seem like the Jurassic period of technology, if you're measuring in Internet time, and why wouldn't you? And the recent doings of some current CNBC staffers tell me that things have truly changed since I worked for the world's leading financial news network.
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