In a world where men strive only to quench their insatiate desire for recognition – where credibility is earned or destroyed with a simple tap on the keyboard, one has to be cautious as to where they get their information. Example: Fox News and the report of how Mass Effect features full and interactive sex scenes. Fox News twisted the truth around their finger and pointed it at the masses, as if to say “Ha! I told you video games were evil!”. After hearing the story, many-a-gamer became angry and proceeded to fight back at the news outlet and the people involved in what can only be accurately described as a frenzied nerd mob. According to Colin Campbell of next-gen.biz, this was completely unnecessary, as the damage had already been done.

Find out how after the jump.

In a rather impressive display of logic, Campbell points out that when making a colossal mistake such as this, the news media hurts themselves more than any flash mob ever could. His argument revolves around the idea that most news outlets report the same information, but with varying tone or emphasis. As such, the consumers are driven to a certain news source based on the trust that they've built based on the way their news is told. Therefore, when Fox News for example decides to report false information and claim to be experts, they break the trust that ties them to their viewers. Spam Cooper Lawrence's amazon page with negative reviews all you want, but there's nothing more crippling than driving away a large section of your fanbase with the material that brought them to you in the first place.

Why do I mention this? First, because I found the article to be a very interesting read, and suggest you do give it a look. Secondly, while this sounds perfectly sensible on paper, we must not forget that we're dealing with Fox News here. They deal with so much bullshit that they probably all believe they're fair and balanced when they cut the microphone of everyone who disagrees. If they go out on a limb and piss off the gaming community, are they going to even notice the change in viewers that follows? Campbell is essentially saying that nothing needs to be done in order for them to realize their mistake. Do you think this is true? If not, what should be done? Spamming them with hatemail and one-star reviews will simply not do it.

Source: next-gen.biz