I think the issue here is poorly framed as "trust". Journalists are humans, and humans make mistakes. Mistakes don't destroy trust. What destroys trust is the inability to correct mistakes. Usually, there are editors and fact checkers, but they are human too.

Papers and news magazines exist by selling copies to people, and people want compelling stories. It's a reporters job to write something readable, while covering the facts.

A few commenters seem to have disdain for "mainstream" media. But, who are they? Is that a stand in for popular, or top 5? top 10? Fox news is one of the most popular in prime time, and their anchors tend to be politically biased in one direction. But if a more "neutral" network report favorably in the other direction, we hear cries of unfair coverage.

> News media shouldn’t have a “side.” This is rubbish, straight up. First, news should have a bias for the truth, and not reporting what it thinks the audience would like to hear (ala Fox news). Second, it should be Objective in the coverage. People all have internal biases, but good reporters can check that to go after the story.

Web 2.0 was supposed to give us better info; I think in a lot of ways it gave us easier access to propaganda, without always having the tools to know that.

I'm not saying you should blindly trust any "media", but how do you hold the media to account? Do you vote with your wallet for quality outlets, or do you scream into the comment section of blogs?