Q: What is the significance of the authenticity and representation of the truth in the media that you consume on a daily basis? What is the role of a live broadcast?
A: The authenticity and representation of the truth in the media that we consume on a daily basis affect our cognition of the world a lot. As for news, the authenticity and the representation of the truth is extremely important. In this digital age, we can receive super huge amount of information every day through different media. In other words, media helps us know the world and it can control what it wants us to see. If some of the news on this media are fake, then it will lose its authenticity because we won’t trust it any more, or our world view may be somehow distorted by invisible but powerful hands. Therefore, as Hito Steyerl said in “The Uncertainty of Documentarism”, “doubt will never be cast aside fully.” We will suspect all the information we see because different forms of representation show different perspectives of one thing. But this can be exhausting and unnecessary.
However, for the media with the property of entertainment, the authenticity and the representation of the truth is not at the first place. We don’t care about the truth and we just want to see the emotional power of the information it conveys.
A live broadcast gives the audience more sense of reality. It makes us feel what we see is real and eliminates the uncertainty. We believe that the picture and the recorded video can be edited but a live broadcast can’t be edited. We want to see what is happening now directly so no one can lie to us. Also, the bullet comments allow us to communicate with who is on the broadcast. It’s more like the interaction with the audience but not one-side conveying information. Therefore, it satisfies our need of seeing reality with our own eyes and engaging with it more.