Open Password – Friday August 20, 2021
#963
Future of library and information science – Information literacy – Information literacy – Library and information science – Disinformation – ISI 2021 – B. Jörs – Media competence – “New Responsibility” Foundation – A. Meßmer – A. Saenlaub – L. Schulz – SPIEGEL – Project Digital News and information literacy – Operating skills – Overconfidence – News skills – Computer Assisted Web – meinungsplatz.de – Bilendi – Reuters Institute Digital News Report – Allensbach Institute for Demoscopy – Scoring approach – Areas of competence – Digital navigation – Journalistic content evaluation – Factual knowledge/fact checker – Participation in debates /Debater – Communication sciences – Quality of news – Social relevance – Journalistic standards – Trustworthiness – Trust building – Source quality – Social media – Public broadcasting – Journalism – Public relations – Media brands – Search engines – Search algorithms – Likes – Advertorials – Hate speech – Conspiracy theories – Silicon Valley – Archives – Paula Jabloner – Anna Mancini – Journal of Western Archives – Syllabus – TH Wildau – Wildau Library Symposium – Frank Seeliger – De-spatialization – New Work – Podcasts in Germany – Establishment – Professionalization – TV talk shows – Social media – Playout channels – Spotify – Appple – Otto Brenner Foundation – Lutz Frühbrodt – Ronja Auerbacher – Podcasts as a counter-model – Axel Springer – Spiegel – Funke Mediengruppe – You-Tube syndrome – separation of message and commentary
I
Cover story:
The great misunderstanding and oversight of library and information science in the age of disinformation
Part 2: How “information competence” can be examined methodologically and operationally
By Bernd Jörs
II.
Outside the box
How Silicon Valley’s archives are saved in archives
III.
TH Wildau: Library symposium
IV.
Podcasts in Germany
Establishment and Professionalization – A Countermodel to TV Talk Shows and Social Media?
Future of library
and information science
Information literacy
or information literacy
The great misunderstanding and oversight
of library and information science in the age of disinformation
Part 2: How “information competence” can be examined methodologically and operationally
Additional comments on the “16th International Symposium of Information Science” (“ISI 2021”, Regensburg March 8th – March 10th, 2021)
By Prof. Dr. Bernd Jörs, Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences
In Part 1 of this series of topics on information literacy, attention was drawn to the failure of library and information science to use the key qualification of information and media literacy to solve disinformation problems for its own research and teaching, but not to fulfill the implicit obligations or cannot comply. If, for example, information competence is to be taught in schools, then teachers would have to be given concrete instructions and methods to make the level of (personal) information competence operationally measurable, to test it and, above all, to specify what constitutes the supposedly omnipotent The concept of information literacy should be understood. This is not being done.
Furthermore, it was pointed out in Part 1 of this series that there is no context-free and (prior) knowledge-free “information competence”, i.e. “ a general ability to distinguish truth from falsehood” , “because such an ability cannot exist . In order to make a judgment about the truth or falsity of a statement about anything – no matter what it is about – you basically need prior knowledge of the subject matter (M. Spitzer: Cuneiform, Kant and sales contracts, in: Neurology 2020; 39; pages 98-205, p. 201).
The “New Responsibility” Foundation, a kind of “Think Tank for Society in Technological Change” (Berlin), is to be thanked for, with its current study (March 2021), courageously pursuing the crucial methodological-operational question of how “ “Information literacy” can be examined, collected and made measurable in the age of disinformation. The study is entitled: “Source: Internet – Digital News – Information skills of the German population being tested” and is by Anna-Katharina Meßmer, Alexander Saenlaub and Leonie Schulz (March 2021). Even SPIEGEL dedicated journalistic space to the results of this unique kick-off study (Spiegel online, March 22, 2021). The extensive study, enriched with empirical-analytical surveys, was carried out in close cooperation with other research institutions, including the LMU Munich, the Max Planck Institute for Human Development/Berlin, and the Leibnitz Institute for Media Research/Hans Bredow Institute/Hamburg , the FU Berlin, the State Media Authority of North Rhine-Westphalia/Düsseldorf and the research agency pollytix strategic research gmbh/Berlin). It was carried out via the “Digital News and Information Literacy Project” by the Federal Agency for Civic Education/bpb, the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and Media (BKM), the Berlin-Brandenburg Media Authority (mabb) and the North Rhine-Westphalia Media Authority (LFM NRW). ) promoted.
If you look at the list of authors, it should be noted: The authors and external employees involved in the study expressly have no professional or academic background in library or information science . Most of them are graduates of communication science, journalism, political science, psychology or sociology. The “small subject” of library and information science has arguably been overlooked.
The authors Anna-Katharina Meßmer, Alexander Singerlaub and Leonie Schulz point out early on the uniqueness of their national surveys: “ So far, there has been a lack of reliable data on these important information and news skills in the German population – and thus the basis for a targeted media education policy. Although there are already studies and surveys on “media competence”, such studies either only focus on students and primarily on their general PC knowledge or they are based on surveys and self-reports that do not represent a reliable measurement of competence ” (Anna- Katharina Meßmer, Alexander Saenlaub, Leonie Schulz; ibid; page 3). In the above-mentioned SPIGEL interview, one of the co-authors, A. Meßmer, criticizes that previous research on information and especially media literacy was too one-sided and reductive on “operating skills”. She concludes the question: “How do people actually deal with news? Up until now, people always thought: “They’ll learn that.” She also points out the overconfidence effect that arises as soon as people are asked: “How competent are you in dealing with media? Do you think you would recognize disinformation?” The research team therefore wanted to know more.
The authors offer their own definition of what they mean by “information and news literacy” after carrying out a comprehensive literature review of this key term, closely based on the term media literacy (page 15, footnote 6):
“ Digital news and information literacy includes a basic understanding of the importance of (digital) publics for a democracy
have and how these publics function; the willingness to find out about relevant political events; as well as the technological, social and cognitive abilities to find, recognize, analyze, verify, evaluate, (further) develop, comment on information/news
and to be able to share in order to participate as a citizen in democratic digital publics
to participate.”
This is again a typical, very general interpretation of the term information literacy. The fact that this is only possible with appropriate technical, relevant (prior) knowledge is also ignored here.
The research design of this ” world’s first test of information and news skills of an entire population” is as follows (page 4):
- Nationwide, cross-quoted online survey (meinungsplatz.de/Bilendi GmbH) of 194 selected, representative Internet users (aged 18 and over) via Computer Assisted Web. The interviews took place between September 15 and September 29, 2020 and lasted an average of 22 minutes (page 121).
- The subjects were clustered into the following age groups: 18 – 29 years, 30 – 39 years, 40 – 49 years, 50 – 59 years, 60 – 69 years and 70plus years. There was also gender separation (women and men), segmentation according to school education (low, medium, high) and subdivisions according to household income.
- There were online interviews and Online tests are used to examine the “specific skills of digital news and information literacy” and factual knowledge using selected specific task sets. So these are real tests in which questions can be answered objectively “right or wrong”, not opinion polls. Telephone interviews or personal surveys were expressly excluded (page 121).
- The following were initially collected:
- socio-demographic data and political attitudes (gender, age, place of residence, education, income, employment, marital status, migration background, knowledge of German and English, self-categorization on a left-right scale, party leaning);
- Media and news consumption and trust data (politics and news interest, news consumption, use of news sources, social media use, trust in media and politics, self-assessment of news literacy, journalism and democracy). The research designs of the Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2020 and the Institute for Demoscopy Allensbach (2020) were primarily used (page 113).
- The online tests were then carried out with the aim of measuring “information and news literacy” for the ability to evaluate potential disinformation and fake news using the scoring approach.
- The online test part contains 23 tasks
- In principle, depending on the level of difficulty and complexity, 0.5 – 3 points could be achieved for correct answers per task plus further points according to an evaluation code scheme for open answers.
- “ Many other tasks also consisted of several subtasks. In order to be able to depict the characteristics of a skill here, for example, several examples had to be correctly assigned or several statements had to be assessed for their truthfulness. In these tasks, the number of correct answers was not added up, but rather a minimum number of correct answers was set that had to be achieved in order to receive points for this task ” (page 123)
- The five competency areas received the same share of the achievable total score of 30 points, i.e. a maximum of 6 points per competency area. This allowed the level of “information competence” to be classified in the range from 0 (“very low competence”) to 30 (“very high competence”).
- Information and news skills were tested for the following five skill areas (basis: questionnaire, Figure 60, pages 113 – 114), referred to as the “five-skill test”:
- Digital navigation (finding your way in “information overload”)
- Recognizing the communication intention (maximum 3 points)
- Recognizing the platform’s own clues (maximum 2 points)
- Rating of the significance of likes/comments (maximum 1 point)
- Journalistic content evaluation (quality of news/information)
- Recognize completeness or lack of information (maximum 3 points)
- Social relevance of the information (maximum 1 point)
- Knowledge query on journalistic standards (maximum 1 point)
- Differentiation between factual and opinion-based information (maximum 1 point)
- Factual knowledge/fact checker (source and reliability check)
- Assessment of the trustworthiness of a message (maximum 0.5 points)
- Evidence of missing information to build trust (maximum 0.5 points)
- Detecting source quality (maximum 2.5 points)
- Recognizing (non-)neutral sources/accounts (maximum 2.5 points)
- Participation in debates/debater (participation in the discourse; troubleshooting)
- Justification for not forwarding unverified information/messages (maximum 1 point)
- Behavior if false messages are accidentally forwarded (maximum 3 points)
- Rating of statements about social media (maximum 2 points)
- Communication science know-how
- Knowledge of the legal forms of well-known media brands (maximum 1 point)
- Knowledge of public broadcasting (maximum 1 point)
- Ability to distinguish between journalism and public relations (maximum 1 point)
- Knowledge of media brands and companies (maximum 1 point)
- Evaluation of the political orientation of newspapers (maximum 1 point)
- Knowledge of search engine functionalities and search algorithms (maximum 1 point).
- Digital navigation (finding your way in “information overload”)
- In order to test personal skills for “information competence”, the authors identify “tested skills” separately for the competence areas examined (pages 129 – 131):
- Digital Navigation (Base: News Literacy Project Checkology Test)
- Recognizing advertising
- Recognizing information and misinformation
- Recognizing opinions
- Evaluation of the significance of likes/comments
- Journalistic content evaluation
- Marking advertorials
- Marking columns
- Detecting the completeness of messages/information
- Recognizing the social relevance of information/news
- Recognizing the form of presentation of the information
- Recognizing opinionated and factual information
- Factual knowledge/fact checker
- Recognizing further information needs
- Ability to review and verify information
- Recognize the source substance
- Debate participation/debater
- Be able to provide reasons for not forwarding unverified information
- Communication science know-how
- Knowledge of public communication media
- Recognizing differences in journalistic and PR content design.
- Checking the data quality: “ A high level of data quality was ensured through quality checks during the survey, for example by checking a minimum length of stay, attention check questions or pattern recognition such as straight lining, as well as through subsequent quality checks such as checking the open information ” (page 122) and “Operationalization workshop with experts”.
- Conducting qualitative pretests (n = 8) and quantitative pretests (n = 198).
- Before the survey: inform the participants and clearly document what is meant by “news” or “information” (no private messages/information to friends/colleagues).
The quality of the scientifically sound and interdisciplinary research work presented is pleasing. With its results, it provides an excellent basis for concrete, sophisticated and operational recommendations for action to deal with disinformation and fake news flows, hate speech approaches and conspiracy theories, which, by the way, have existed for a long time in all areas of science and practice, including medicine , journalism, media studies, political science, pharmacy, economics, law and natural sciences. But now the possibilities for spreading false reports through the Internet and social media while ensuring anonymity have grown exponentially and become more multiple.
The results of the study are available for download on the New Responsibility Foundation website: https://www.stiftung-nv.de/de/publikation/quelle-internet-digitale-nachrichten-und-informationscompetenten-der-deutschen
The test can also be carried out individually to check your own “information competence”: https://der-newstest.de/
In part 3, selected results of the study are presented. These are useful for taking stock of the status of “information literacy” research in general and in related sciences.
Outside the box:
Open Password Recommender*
Like the archives of Silicon Valley
be saved in archives
Paula Jabloner and Anna Mancini, Corporate Archives in Silicon Valley: Building and Surviving Amid Constant Change , In: Journal of Western Archives,https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/westernarchives/vol11/iss1/3/
An historical understanding of the phenomenon that is Silicon Valley requires the collection and preservation of original records. With the rapid pace of change in the technology industry, how can archivists and their institutions preserve this corporate history?’ So opens the abstract to this fascinating case study in the complexities, challenges and incredible value of corporate archiving practices. So much of our politics and cultural experience is now mediated via the structures and decisions of technology companies. Cultural decisions that happen in these privatized spaces have huge downstream effects that must be valued and processed in the same ways as other cultural artifacts. Visiting corporate archives where possible have been enormously inspirational and instructive.
*In cooperation with Syllabus.
TH Wildau
Symposium on the future of the library
Dear colleagues,
I would like to inform and invite you to the next Wildau Library Symposium on the afternoons of Tuesday and Wednesday, September 14th and 15th, via the webex video conference system. Participation is free of charge, see www.bibliothekssymposium.de
From 2 p.m. on September 14th, the future role of the library as a space will be discussed, not only in the course of the digitalization of services and the associated de-spatialization in the use of services by customers. In the course of digitalization and the new, partly mobile working environment, the question often arises in the context of teleworking and home office as to how we will deal with this in the future (new work) and what requirements will be placed on the place of work such as the library. After statements and discussion in the panel, the debates can be continued directly with the respective speakers via break-out sessions. An informal meeting of robot users and those interested in or planning to use it is planned for later in the afternoon from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.
On Wednesday, September 15th, starting at 2 p.m., there will be a discussion about what representatives of information institutions hope to achieve from AI technologies and what corresponding algorithms are already able to achieve. In the second part, a further training course is presented about its respective modules, including the overall concept, as it should be offered to colleagues in the following year in order to acquire appropriate skills in dealing with AI technologies. If you are interested, you are warmly invited to attend the program on both days, we would be very happy about a lively response!! All information can be found at www.bibliothekssymposium.de
Kind regards, Frank Seeliger Head of the TH Wildau University Library, Hochschulring 1 / Hall 10, Room 2-13, 15745 Wildau, T. +49 3375 508 155 /…123, http://www.th-wildau.de/ library.html
Podcasts in Germany
Establishment, professionalization
and dominance of the established houses
A possible alternative model
to TV talk shows and social media
of Spotify and Apple taking over the distribution channels
(Otto Brenner Foundation) “Striking the right tone: The podcast boom in Germany” – that is the title of the first comprehensive scientific study on podcasts in Germany, which the Otto Brenner Foundation (OBS) has just published. The two communication scientists Lutz Frühbrodt and Ronja Auerbacher come to a clear conclusion: Podcasts, i.e. digital audio files that can be accessed at any time, are in the process of securing a permanent place in the media ensemble. “The first wave of experimentation gave rise to a new wave of establishment,” observes Frühbrodt, media sociologist at the Würzburg-Schweinfurt University of Applied Sciences. “Podcasts are now part of the everyday media repertoire of younger users, but they are slowly but surely catching on with older generations too.”
An analysis of the top 50 German podcasts by the leading audio streaming platform Spotify showed that two fifths of the most listened to podcasts in Germany were about news, politics and knowledge. It is also noteworthy that most information formats are characterized by detail, thematic depth and, last but not least, a high degree of diversity of opinion. “A new culture of conversation and listening has developed here, which can contribute to making citizens more informed and thus to the formation of political opinions, especially among younger people,” says Frühbrodt. Ideally, podcasting could promote a new form of public political discourse that puts dialogue, mutual listening and, above all, understanding of an increasingly complex world ahead of hasty positioning. This could be a counter-model to the polemics cultivated on TV talk shows and the often aggressive tone on social media.
__________________________________________________________________________________
Qualitative deficits in journalistic podcasts
__________________________________________________________________________________
In their study, Frühbrodt/Auerbacher note an increasing professionalization of the German podcast scene. Established media companies such as the ARD radio station, private media groups such as Axel Springer and the “Spiegel” group, but also regional publishing houses such as the Funke media group are becoming increasingly dominant over amateur podcasters. However, the journalistic quality of these podcasts must also be criticized in some places: almost all of the podcast episodes evaluated contained unsubstantiated statements. Author Ronja Auerbacher makes it clear that the lack of separation between news and opinion could also become a problem: “Especially in dialogic formats, reporting is often directly accompanied by a subjective assessment by the moderators. This requires a high level of media competence on the part of the listener “This is not always the case, especially among younger users.”
With a view to further developments, the study particularly raises the question of the extent to which the podcast landscape is at risk of the “YouTube syndrome”. With the clearly visible efforts of Spotify and Apple Podcasts to dominate the distribution channels for podcasts, there is a threat of commercialization and privatization of a further part of the public,” says the Otto Brenner Foundation: “It is important to ensure that journalistic podcast players’ future infrastructural dependence on the “To prevent decisions made by a profit-oriented company.”
Lutz Frühbrodt/Ronja Auerbacher: Hitting the right tone – The podcast boom in Germany, OBS-AH 106, Frankfurt am Main, August 2021
The study can be ordered and downloaded free of charge from the Otto Brenner Foundation: www.otto-brenner-stiftung.de/podcast-studie
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