Like many Americans, I own an Echo Show, an Amazon Alexa device with a screen, which, for the most part, functions as a billboard in my home, loaded with product placement and personalized ads.
But the smart speaker also comes with a ton of handy features, including live security camera view, Spotify access, announcement mode, video calling, shopping lists, and more than 100,000 “skills” (Alexa’s app lingo). My family uses it mostly for timers, reminders, and lists, but the touchscreen can also pop up recipes periodically and, until recently, news articles at a fixed rate.
As expected, Alexa gets its information from overwhelmingly liberal news sources, including CNN, Al Jazeera, NPR, The Associated Press, CNBC, MSNBC, Bloomberg, CBS News, ABC News, USA Today, The Economist, Newsy, Reuters, and The Washington Post.
The rise in news coverage coincided with Kamala Harris’ questionable run as the Democratic presidential nominee, and the coverage also appeared to paint her in an overly favorable light.
So I surveyed 12 friends and family members of various political leanings who own Alexa Shows, and they all agreed that since VP Harris was nominated by the Democrats for president, there has been an explosion of news stories supporting Kamala and disparaging Donald Trump.
Jeff Bezos Ownership He has been a contributor to The Washington Post since 2013. (The Washington Post occasionally It seems Disprove That’s what I’m arguing here.
we Already Known that Alexa is a feminist and BLM supporter. moreover, Alexa Skills Report the latest tweets from Kamala. ChatGPT is also shown It tends to lean left. But the New York Times Accused He criticizes both Siri and Alexa for “reinforcing gender bias” because they “often default to female names, female voices, and submissive or flirtatious styles,” but still thinks Alexa isn’t progressive enough.
of Alexa News Feature They claim to provide “top news from trusted sources.” But as most of us know, “trusted sources” usually means “highly biased” in the media.
As expected, Alexa gets its information from overwhelmingly liberal news sources, including CNN, Al Jazeera, NPR, The Associated Press, CNBC, MSNBC, Bloomberg, CBS News, ABC News, USA Today, The Economist, Newsy, Reuters, and The Washington Post.
If you’re looking for cultural news, Alexa will bring you articles and clips from People, The Daily Show, The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, and Jimmy Kimmel Live.
To a left-leaning audience, conservatives see media bias as a widespread or even deliberate conspiracy. They acknowledge that bias occurs, but it is not as widespread as Fox News would have you believe. They argue that the bias is mostly perceived and harmless. To liberals, conservatives simply feel their hostility.
They argue that journalism is a creative profession, and most creative people tend to lean left, but the concentration of liberal journalists does not mean journalism is inherently left-leaning. Some mainstream media outlets, like NPR, go a step further and claim to be part of an unbiased journalism organization.
Outside of the liberal media, the only options are The Wall Street Journal and Fox News, which is roughly in line with the limited and often questionable ranking of digital news media. As of July 1, 2024, SimilarWeb Ranking The top news websites in the United States are Yahoo News, CNN.com, nytimes.com and foxnews.com.
The Blaze is unavailable, as is the New York Post, the Daily Wire, the Townhall, Red State, and the Daily Caller.
This is important fact An overwhelming majority of Americans (86%) get their news from some sort of smart device, and that number has skyrocketed in just the past two years. The Pew Research Center report also found that roughly equal shares of Republicans and Democrats get their news from digital devices.
In an ideal world, the news sources available on Alexa would reflect this.
So I tried another option. The news channel Allow Just say, “Alexa, customize new channels and flash briefings for you.” You can choose from three options: FoxNews, CNN, and NPR.
You have to take the time to set this up: Of the 12 friends and family members I surveyed, none customized their news.
So I went through the steps and selected FoxNews as my preferred news source, but I haven’t noticed any change in the content I receive – in fact, I have never seen a single article or video from Fox News.
And this doesn’t even explain the overall increase in broadcast news stories, or the outrageous degree of their bias.
But the stakes are high: As researcher Maxwell McCombs has pointed out, “controlling the viewpoint of the political debate on any issue holds the ultimate influence over public opinion.” And opinion leads to action. And in the hands of politics, action leads to power.
So I decided to go straight to the source and ask: “Alexa, do you like Kamala Harris?”
She responded: “Well, frankly, I don’t think bots should influence politics.”
I wish that was true.
