This article discusses the opinions of Spanish journalists on the quality of their professional work and how it is being affected by the current economic, technological, commercial and professional context. The results are based on a questionnaire in which 363 Spanish journalists participated, all with a minimum of three years experience. Their answers reflect on the structure and behavior of media companies and current production of news. The article specifically focuses on exposing the journalists’ opinions on the quality of their work. The results show that 81% of the participants state that standards of quality in journalistic production has deteriorated. This deterioration is believed to be connected to the effect of the economic struggles in the sector. They suggested that the principle motives of this decline lie in the lack of economic and political independence, a lack of private investment and in the problems caused by technological changes. These situations all fall into the context of a precarious labor market within the sector. The article also links the results with academic works that have analyzed the quality of journalism over recent years. It offers, for the first time in the Spanish academic context, the Spanish journalists’ own point of view on these issues. Este artículo expone los resultados de una investigación acerca del modo en el que los periodistas españoles en ejercicio enjuician la calidad periodística y cómo esta se ve afectada por el contexto económico, tecnológico, empresarial, laboral y profesional actual del periodismo. El texto recoge los resultados de una encuesta en la que participan 363 periodistas españoles con al menos tres años de experiencia en medios de comunicación. Sus respuestas aluden, entre otros aspectos, a las reflexiones acerca de la estructura y el comportamiento de las empresas informativas, así como las características predominantes de la información periodística en la actualidad. En particular, el artículo se centra en exponer las consideraciones de los periodistas acerca del cuidado o esmero de su labor profesional. Entre los principales resultados destaca que el 81% de los encuestados reconoce un empeoramiento de los patrones de calidad del producto periodístico, que ligan a la crisis del sector. Entre las posibles causas se mencionan la falta de independencia económica y política de los medios, la falta de inversión empresarial y los problemas derivados de los cambios tecnológicos, todo ello en un contexto de precarización del mercado laboral periodístico. El artículo vincula estos resultados a otros estudios internacionales que han abordado, de manera sistemática, la calidad periodística, aportando por primera vez en el contexto académico español una perspectiva de la cuestión a partir de los propios profesionales.

Information disorder involves wide-ranging content that challenges democratic rules and social harmony. Pseudo-media that relies on conspiracy theories and misleading versions of the social reality contribute to feeding the disinformation ecosystem by reinforcing biased messages with expressive patterns and polarising practices. This article focuses on the content published (N = 1,396) by seven far-right wing Spanish pseudo-media. Based on qualitative and quantitative methods, it analyses headlines, types of text and sources, as well as the distortion strategies of journalistic conventions. Results show that the emotional component is expressed by means of polarised headlines that rely on clickbait to gain attention and build a particular jargon, exacerbated by disinformation and populist practices. The absolute dependence of conspicuous headlines is evidenced by the limited resources of pseudo-media, whose production lies in a mix of opinion text and the processing of online content. Plagiarism from mainstream—mainly conservative—media, social networks and website siblings fuel these outlets that play the role of the ambiguity, mimicking journalistic conventions and mocking them by means of disinformation practices, with a particular focus on reframing social issues, progressive policies and measures to manage the pandemic.

This paper analyses the context of disinformation in Spain from the perspective of the pseudo-media (i.e., websites that mimic conventional media to offer partisan content based on alternative facts). Using a quantitative (N = 1,143) and qualitative (n = 396) methodology, this research analyses publications from eight Spanish pseudo-media that reach more than 4 million unique users. Results reveal an interest in three topics: vaccination, restrictions and speculation about Covid-19, national politics –focused on criticism against government– and topics related to human rights –mainly LGBTI, gender, immigration– with a total of 58.1% of the content published in four sections (International, Spain, Society, and Economy). The study reveals a growing trend towards polarisation and the use of clickbait techniques in four out of ten headlines. The Internet and social media are the most common sources quoted, while a third of the items lack sources or correspond to opinion pieces. Minorities and vulnerable groups are framed as a social threat, and the presentation of the coalition government as a danger to Spain that must be put to an end, which makes the discourse of these websites in tune with the ideology of the far right wing.

The evolution from a public space such as the one defined throughout the twentieth century –characterised by unidirectionality and political and media intermediation– towards a digital scenario –with multiple actors and multi-directional messages– has not resolved the problems that existed beforehand, and has also generated others. This public space crisis has been aggravated by the fragmentation of audiences, often absorbed into their own echo chamber, and by the dispersion and jumble of voices that are an impediment to any possibility of unravelling the terms of public debate. Faced with enormous challenges such as disinformation, the conventional media, who have traditionally held the responsibility of providing quality information, address these issues from a position of extreme vulnerability, due to the disintegration of the former economic model and social credibility. In a context of uncertainty, crisis, and fragmented public spheres, and there being no alternatives that can guarantee distinct dialogue, the initiation of a social debate that prioritises quality of information is essential.

El relato periodístico multimedia, caracterizado por el multilenguaje y multiformato, conforma una nueva ‘arqueología de la composición’ (Manovich, 2005) rebautizada como una ‘nueva textualidad’ (Anichini, 2003). Justo cuando los medios digitales cumplen 25 años de vida (Salaverría, 2019) esta investigación surge con el objetivo de comprobar el estado actual de esa narrativa en las informaciones periodísticas de actualidad. Así, se estudian los elementos definitorios de la narrativa multimedia en los medios de información generalista, a través de la observación de los recursos de hipertextualidad, multimedialidad e interactividad. Esta investigación recurre a la metodología de análisis de contenido que permite sistematizar la observación y descripción de parámetros predominantes mediante el estudio comparativo de cuatro medios: dos nativos digitales (elconfidencial.com y eldiario.es) y dos con matriz impresa (elpais.com y elmundo.es). La muestra (N=560) se conforma con un amplio espectro de las noticias de actualidad más inmediata posicionadas como las más relevantes por los medios en su portada web. Los resultados principales reflejan un uso limitado de los elementos multimedia en la ‘narrativa de inmediatez’. Se detecta especialmente un abuso ineficaz de la hipertextualidad, una interactividad carente de protagonismo y una escasa presencia de recursos multimedia, procedente de agencias más que de producción propia. Un panorama que confirma la visión más escéptica de la ‘tecnoeuforia’ que caracterizó los primeros tiempos de los medios digitales y que apunta a la necesidad de enriquecer la narrativa multimedia pegada a la actualidad, más allá de la mera yuxtaposición de recurso digitales, que caracteriza el contexto del primer cuarto de siglo de existencia.

The Coronavirus pandemic has triggered an authentic infodemic, which is a global epidemic of disinformation that has spread throughout most of the world. Social media platforms and pseudo-media outlets have contributed to the problem by producing and disseminating misleading content that is potentially dangerous to public health. This research focuses on a rather unknown phenomenon, which involves digital sites that mimic the appearance of news media but provide pseudo-information. Five Spanish pseudo-media have been analyzed with the aim of enhancing understanding of the issues and the frames presented. The results show clear links with the far-right ideology as well as the presence of a populist, polarized discourse through the use of belligerent, offensive expressions to refer to institutions and their representatives. Politics is the main issue represented, with a frame that clearly points out the incompetence and cynicism of the Spanish government. Conspiracy theories associate the origins of the pandemic to a Chinese laboratory and emphasize a global plan to establish systemic control. Measures to stop the virus are framed as harmful and ineffective, linked to a euthanasia scheme targeted at older people, especially regarding vaccination, which is presented as a solution offered for economic interests.