By DIYA VASUDEVAN

I am a freshman who hopes to major in journalism one day and, even as I write this blog post, I am still learning, growing and improving. Writing is not just about putting words on paper, it is about using accurate sources and grammar and essentially being able to communicate a story in the best way possible.

In a world where online media are the No. 1 source for information, anyone can post an article and often times it is difficult to tell whether the information you are receiving is credible or not.

Oftentimes, when we see an interesting article posted on Facebook, we tend to click on it right away and, more often than not, these articles tend to either be advertisements or even mischievous viruses of some sort. Most of these articles contain incorrect information, wrong sources and are, at the core of it, poorly written pieces.

You can argue that media such as Google allow us to consume more information than ever before. However, if the information we consume is incorrect, how does it impact the way we view society?

Along with Photoshop with tools for editing, we cannot completely trust what we see. That is where the problem lies in journalism today. There are many news and information Web sites; therefore, there are numerous platforms for anyone to showcase what they have written. And anyone can create a new Web site, too, if that is the desired way to publish.

However, when does this start to devalue journalistic work? And in today’s world, what criteria can we use to decide what is and is not real journalism?