The Internet has long been accused of precipitating a rise in partisan thinking, as people are able to seek out only the information that conforms to their existing point of view.

There have been a variety of projects that aim to ensure that what is reported is factually correct, whether that’s Grasswire or FullFact.

Despite these efforts, there is still the risk that people only seek out information that confirms what they already think, it’s just that they ensure this is factually accurate.

Offering different perspectives

A new project from the British publishers Trinity Mirror aims to change that by offering readers a balanced perspective of current affairs.

The venture, called Perspecs, is a news aggregation service that aims to give readers at least three different perspectives on each story.

The app trawls the web for the latest news, and covers sources ranging from the BBC and CNN to the Daily Mail and New York Times.  The aim is to cover each story from multiple angles and allow users to easily switch between them.  So it will cover (or aim to at least) the story from left wing, right wing and neutral perspectives.

“The aim with Perspecs is to offer readers the opportunity to make up their own mind about a story rather than relying on a single source of news,” the team say.

Bringing the horse to water

It’s certainly an interesting project, and has undoubtedly noble intentions.  It begs the question however of whether we have the confirmation bias because we only have limited information to hand, or whether its because of the confirmation bias that we seek out the information we want.

If it’s the latter, which I suspect it is, then the audience for Perspecs will not be those who most need it as they don’t really want a varied range of sources in their news coverage.

Nevertheless, it is a noble endeavor and one worth keeping an eye on.