How social media shot down wartime propaganda

Reporters in the First World War, as Ernest Hemingway had it, either “wrote propaganda, shut up, or fought”.

That war provided an important lesson for governments. If they could put reporters into uniform as ‘War Correspondents’ they could appeal to their patriotism to produce heavily censored, upbeat copy designed to boost morale — in other words, propaganda. (The initial idea of a ‘WC’ patch was abandoned in favour of ‘C’ for Correspondent.)