Guangming Daily: Self-media is destroying the language of a generation

If we believe that high-quality reading is meaningful, everyone should have more respect for words.

On April 13, Guangming Daily published an article by Tang Jiachen titled "Beware of the erosion of Chinese language by the 'self-media world'."

The article points out that WeChat official accounts have become an important channel for us to obtain information, and many people have even completely replaced traditional reading with it. Among the many WeChat official accounts, the voice of high-quality and stylish articles in the information field is too weak. On the contrary, those curious, gossipy, and sensational official accounts have always been the topic leaders and "traffic harvesters" in the WeChat official account world, and these "100,000+" articles that are flooding the Moments may be quietly destroying the language of a generation.

The article believes that in the "self-media arena" where the number of readers determines the hero, the rules of the game for writing and reading have completely changed. In order to please readers, many writers have lowered their attitudes and bottom lines again and again, thinking that this is the life-saving straw of "new media transformation". However, this has largely eroded our discourse ecology, making it increasingly shallow and vulgar.

The article emphasizes that everyone should have more respect for words. At least, professional writers and media organizations should not follow the crowd.

The following is the full text:

According to media reports, the wildly growing self-media ecosystem has spawned a gray industry chain that specializes in "making accounts" to make profits. They produce "100,000+" articles like an assembly line, relying on plagiarism, piecing together facts, creating clever headlines, and even exaggerating rumors to obtain high readership, thereby earning tens of thousands of yuan a month in gray income.

Many people in the media industry are quite disdainful of the "100,000+" articles on WeChat public accounts, because many of the articles do not have a correct "three views". I used to think that this statement was a bit arbitrary, but after deeply participating in the new media work of my unit, I increasingly feel that this statement makes sense. Moreover, those "100,000+" articles that are flooding the WeChat Moments may be quietly destroying the language of a generation.

Nowadays, WeChat official accounts have become an important channel for us to obtain information. Many people have even completely replaced traditional reading with it. Among the many WeChat official accounts, there are certainly many high-quality and stylish articles, but their voice is too weak in the information field built by WeChat. On the contrary, those curious, gossipy, and sensational official accounts have always been the topic leaders and "traffic harvesters" in the WeChat official account world.

I cannot explain with my professional knowledge why some articles are so popular among people even though they are not nutritious and can even be called “information garbage”. However, for public account operators, unless they do not care about the number of readers, it is difficult to fight against this strange reading preference. Therefore, we can see that some serious media have also begun to abandon rigor and professionalism, and are becoming more and more like tabloids in terms of topic selection, style, and wording.

In the "self-media arena" where the number of readers determines the hero, the rules of the game for writing and reading have completely changed. In order to please readers, many writers have lowered their attitudes and bottom lines again and again, thinking that this is the life-saving straw of "new media transformation". However, whether for individuals or media organizations, those deliberately pandering articles, rigidly copied online language, "routine" titles, and watered-down reading volume are really more important than anything else?

Some senior media professionals have become fanatical "title parties" and rumor "setters" for the sake of profit; some public accounts imitate those "hot articles" in every article, deliberately punctuating the articles into a kind of difficult-to-read freak... We-media "hot articles" have become an industrial chain, which is undoubtedly the terminal display of shallow reading at the profit-making level. Compared with the depravity of individual we-media people, this organized operation has a greater impact on the language of this era. It has eroded our discourse ecology to a large extent, becoming increasingly shallow and vulgar.

When mobile phones become a part of our lives, it seems difficult to fight against the superficiality of the current trend. But I still think that if we believe that high-quality reading is meaningful and that the basic grammar, expression logic, and text beauty rooted in cultural genes are worth pursuing, everyone should have more respect for words. At least, professional writers and media organizations should not follow the crowd.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.