Author: Cassandra Jeffery

There’s no question that Mr. Trump has added copious amounts of fuel to the fake news fire, but the dissemination of sensationalized, censored, and heavily biased news is nothing new in the 21st century.

The real question is, what are we going to do about it?

Taking a stab at this issue, we have emerging news curating platform, Decentralized News Network (DNN). Equipped with the robust power of the Ethereum blockchain, the virtue of DNN is in the name itself: a decentralized network that can never be hacked, taken down or censored.

Designed to run as a peer-reviewed, content generating website, DNN is holding the community at large accountable by addressing the concept of fake news. The premise behind the platform is to disrupt the current climate of disinformation in North America by encouraging everyone — from readers to writers — to take an active approach when it comes to consuming news.

“DNN presents news in a thoroughly accurate way, combining the openness and freedom of blogs with the formal fact-checking of news organizations,” reads the DNN website.

Photo Credit: Pexels.com

Curbing traction of biased or fictional news, in other words, starts at a grassroots level: everyone has to be asking the tough questions, and we only have to take a glance back in time to see why accountability is so important.

In October, 1941, American ship U.S.S Kearny was hit by a torpedo from a German u-boat off the coast of Greenland. Confining the damage, crew quickly controlled the flooding and the ship eventually regained power. Eleven men were killed and 22 others passengers were injured. Leading up to the explosion, U.S.S Kearny participated in an exchange of depth charges (explosions) with German u-boats.

The details of that incident, and the response garnered from it, are easily accessible to anyone with an internet connection. In fact, dated news clippings from the time, and even Former U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt’s speech to the nation, post-explosion, are readily available via online U.S. archives.

After perusing media clippings and Roosevelt’s speech, one quickly connects the dots: Roosevelt’s administration spun the explosion to illicit already brewing hatred towards despised German Nazis.

“America has been attacked. The U.S.S. Kearny is not just a Navy ship. She belongs to every man, woman, and child in this Nation,” reads an excerpt from Roosevelt’s address.

Regardless of who fired the first shot, Roosevelt effectively leveraged on this tragedy as a way to spark outrage among Americans, and the media quickly followed suit.

Photo Credit: Pexels.com

Roosevelt’s tactic is nothing groundbreaking in our current social culture. This sort of PR stunt happens virtually all day, every day, and in all corners of the globe. What’s different however, is that we now have a tidal wave of information coming at us from various different mediums and perspectives — thanks social media!

The concern then, is how do we possibly determine the facts and consider various sides of the story when we’re constantly bombarded with so much information?

We can accuse the media for our sensationalized transgressions, we can wave a chastising finger at politicians for propagating questionable or fake news; we can even point a finger to blame at modern day citizen journalists for immortalizing one perspective of a story, but in reality, aren’t we all culpable for our current information predicament?

Accountability in information, particularly of the political news variety, is everyone’s burden to bare. Simply put, a quick fix solution does not exist. It’s time to tap into those critical thinking skills and take responsibility for the information we consume and produce.

That engaged, critical thinking process is, in essence, the service promoted on the DNN platform. With of course, the added monetary and security benefits of having that service run on the blockchain. So, whether it’s wartime Roosevelt or modern day Trump tribulation, we can turn to an outlet that will layout the facts, sans all of the third-party publishing stipulations and sensationalized hubbub.

Think of it as…accountable news that answers to you.

For more information on DNN or how the platform works, click here.