news favoring one side or the other doesn’t necessarily mean bias. In the US news agencies are called biased when they report on climate change being a thing.

@ManfredKrug You are free to use your own preferred definition, but I would personally consider bias to be when explicit judgements are passed (e.g. x thing is good/bad) as opposed to stating facts (e.g. thing has happened), and/or when facts (or even outright misinformation) are stated/ignored selectively to support one side in a way that deviates from the nuanced truth. Necessarily the second point will depend on what one thinks the truth is, leading to disagreement. Perhaps one can conceptualise bias as similar to a qualitative equivalent of numerical accuracy.

Personally I would count reporting climate change being a thing with zero discussion (and following debunking) of climate scepticism to be a very slight point in favour of left-wing bias, but not a huge one since the scientific community is mostly in agreement.

The BBC sometimes falls short, exhibiting various biases in various directions, but the Torygraph doesn't even aim for impartiality!

@Fion they seem to be demanding it of others though lol

Of course, the one bound by royal charter to be impartial is likely to be more impartial. But that's rather the point... a privately-owned newspaper is entitled to its biases, whereas a state broadcaster funded by a compulsory licence fee should be strictly impartial

@a_l_e_x perhaps the BBC should indeed be held to a stricter standard, but it does still feel frustrating and hypocritical for a seemingly much more openly biased private newspaper to complain so much about a single instance of bias by a competitor that in general seems to avoid it much more consistently. It's like if Disney published a scathing review of Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio when they themselves made a version the same year that was generally considered to be much worse.

@TheAllMemeingEye if it were just a matter of bias, then yes, The Telegraph would be hypocritical. But again, the problem is not bias alone, it's the use of public funds to produce skewed content. And for that reason The Telegraph is not being hypocritical at all (although it might be blowing this one edit out of proportion)

@a_l_e_x hmm, I guess the tv license is in a bit of a grey area, because although it's optional to pay for the service unlike taxes, it is afaik organised by the government who themselves are publicly funded 🤔

@TheAllMemeingEye I realise it's possible to opt out but I wouldn't really consider it voluntary when it's required if you want to watch any live TV, not just the BBC

This isn't a perfect analogy, but if the government introduced a licence fee for phones in order to fund helplines, and said you can only opt out if you never make a call to anyone... I think that is compulsory in effect

At the very least, it's completely different to taking out a newspaper subscription, which no one is legally compelled to do at all

Bias go brrrrrrrr