False Impressions: How Digital Editing is Altering Public Discourse

DOI: 10.5176/2301-3729_JMComm12.93

Authors: Bill Loving, Brady Teufel

Abstract:The purpose of this paper is to explore how digital editing technology is facilitating public misrepresentation – specifically, how easily it is perpetrated, how widespread it has become, how damaging it is to public discourse and finally, what remedies there are to curb it.

Keywords:libel; media credibility; mainstream media; altered quotations; Barack Obama; Mitt Romney; Paul Ryan; Jerry Falwell; Larry Flint; Jeffrey Masson; Janet Malcolm; New Yorker; you didn’t build that; 2012 presidential campaign; Audacity; YouTube; iMovie; Windows Movie Maker, digital editing; misquotation