Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Looking to Sell Slate Magazine
SeaDour writes "Wired News is reporting that Microsoft is in early discussions with five or six media companies over a potential sale of MSN's online magazine Slate. This comes mere weeks after Slate recommended Firefox over Internet Explorer."
Sigs cause cancer.
Is it any wonder people think Linux users are a bunch of flaming homosexuals when its fronted by obviously gay losers like these?! BSD has a mascot who leaves us in no doubt that this is the OS for real men! If Linux had more hot chicks and gorgeous babes then maybe it would be able to compete with BSD! Hell this girl should be a model!
Linux is a joke as long as it continues to lack sexy girls like her! I mean just look at this girl! Doesn't she excite you? I know this little hottie puts me in need of a cold shower! This guy looks like he is about to cream his pants standing next to such a fox. As you can see, no man can resist this sexy little minx. Don't you wish the guy in this pic was you? Are you telling me you wouldn't like to get your hands on this ass?! Wouldn't this just make your Christmas?! Yes doctor, this uber babe definitely gets my pulse racing! Oh how I envy the lucky girl in this shot! Linux has nothing that can possibly compete. Come on, you must admit she is better than an overweight penguin or a gay looking goat! Wouldn't this be more liklely to influence your choice of OS?
With sexy chicks like the lovely Ceren you could have people queuing up to buy open source products. Could you really refuse to buy a copy of BSD if she told you to? Personally I know I would give my right arm to get this close to such a divine beauty!
Don't be a fag! Join the campaign for more cute open source babes today!
$Id: ceren.html,v 7.0 2004/01/01 11:32:04 ceren_rocks Exp $
Pwn3d!
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
I'm offering a generous 67 cents and half a pack of generic menthols. I know -- more than it's worth, but...
-- I could tell right away that she was impressed with my HUGE Slashdot Karma.
If my employees were bashing my products publicly, I think I'd dump them too. Who wouldn't?
That is a bit of a shock. They are normally the hoards of the industry. Then again, you would think they would LEARN from the fact their own magazine downed IE. Possibly integration of yet another Open Source Technology. By the way, who actually reads Slate ?
...err .... Microsoft does take Monopoly money, right?
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
Slate has been going steadily downhill for several years now, both in readership numbers and quality of "journalism" **cough**rantingfarleftbias**cough. I think it's going to be a pretty tough sell and hopefully Bill will just put them out of their misery within the next year or so.
This comes mere weeks after Slate recommended Firefox over Internet Explorer.
I don't think the above is part of the reasons for such sales, as stated on the article, the sales allows MS to "create a partnership with another media company, which could potentially help increase advertising revenue on the MSN site."
One step backward, two steps forward.
Uselessful technology (Air-Charged
Brilliant!
beware the jabberwock, my son! the jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Right. Because any two things that follow in chronological order are neccessarily related. Just this morning, lightning struck down the street and, a few minutes later, my bank called about a bounced check.
Damn Lightning. It always causes problems.
Isn't that where Fred Flintstone got his news?
--
Power to the Peaceful
before Microsoft assimilates Firefox. Maybe they read the slate article, pulled their heads outta their asses and realised that soon IE isn't going to become the preferred browser.
Hmm... Let's see - I own an online magazine. Presumably I (the comapny) actually get to have a say in what gets published or not, and who gets hired or not.
Now - someone wants to publish an article recommending a competitive product - do I:
1) Stop them from publishing the article (I can do that - remember)
2) Let them publish the article so as to maintain a fair balance in the press
So let's say I select option two - am I then going to 'vinidictively' sell them off (so that they can continue doing the same thing for a different employer)?
That does not make sense.
If I wanted to be vindictive - I would keep the magazine, stop them from publishing the article, and fire the guy who wrote it. If - however - I wanted to make a profit I would publish the article (and similar ones) so as to grow respect in my reader base - and sell it off once it had a big enough base to be profitable.
Face it guys - buisness is about making money - not being vindictive (though those two do tend to overlap at times)
I don't think that Microsoft would _sell the magazine_ because of a critical article. If they really cared, I'm sure they would have censored the article before it was published (went live?). M$ is evil and vindictive, but I'm not sure that they really care if people use IE or not, as long as they aren't using Linux, *BSD etc.
"...recommended Firefox over Internet Explorer."
Yeah, because they dumpbed MSNBC a long time ago for writing less than flattering articles about their products and sdervices. What's that? You mean Microsoft is still in partnership with NBC? One more Slashdot conspiracy exposed.
Microsoft is finally starting to realize maybe it doesn't make sense to engage in ventures with no reason to exist? ...naah, probably just freeing up resources to start up more irrelivant and money-losing business ventures. I foresee a website to deliver fruit baskets internationally in Microsoft's future.
- Microsoft pays $35billion or so to shareholders in a one-time dividend.
- Microsoft unloads Slate
- Microsoft increases future dividends.
- ???
- Profit! (sorry, always wanted to do that.
This doesn't mean that MS is annoyed with Slate, it means they are changing their business strategy. I would hazard to guess that Microsoft has decided that, rather than becoming an evil empire that owns a small country and runs its own Media etc., they will go back to being just a software company.I would look for them to off-load other products not related to their core competencies in the near future, and I expect they will divest themselves from many of the sidelines they've gotten into. The question in my mind is: what happens to MSN as a whole? Is Microsoft giving up on being a content company altogether? What about their promised search engine? The Xbox?
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
"This comes mere weeks after Slate recommended Firefox over Internet Explorer"
I don't think the fact Slate trashed IE has anything to do with the sale.
In fact, the article says Slate would still be accessible from the MSN Website, even though they would no longer hold any "property" ties with Microsoft. And what would that accomplish? Slate would be even more content-free than it already is, as it wouldn't depend on Microsoft at all, but it would still have the popularity / visibilty it enjoys being right there, in the MSN Website.
I mean, if Microsoft wanted to silence their editors, they would do anything but loose their power over the magazine. Instead, they are giving them a free ticked to say whatever they want, still enjoying the visibility they have.
I don't know why Microsoft chose to sell the magazine, but it can't be because of their trashing IE.
Just my 2c
What difference does it make? Remember -- Microsoft basically says that Internet Explorer doesn't exist anymore. It's a part of Windows, they say. So why does it matter if an MSN online magazine recommends Firefox as a stand-alone web browser on top of Windows, when Internet Explorer is already an integral part of Windows?
It's not as if Slate recommended that users switch to Linux or something like that. They're still using Windows, which means, whether they like it or not, they're still using Internet Explorer.
It's more likely that Microsoft would try to strong-arm the editors and the writers responsible for something like that into resigning rather than selling the entire magazine. I think they just don't care about it anymore and don't care to pay for it if someone else will.
Microsoft is in early discussions with five or six media companies
I think the submitter means "Microsoft is in discussions with THE five or six media companies" (thanks Michael Powel for allowing this, by the way. Shame on you...)
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
If you have a problem with the attitude towards Microsoft on Slashdot, stop reading Slashdot. It's always been that way here, and is likely to be for th forseeable future.
It's not a "legitimate" news source. It never pretends to fairness and balance, and shouldn't be held to such a standard. It's a news opinion site. Deal with it.
The conspiracy theories are plainly pants.
Still, Slate has an excellent reputation and the money involved is just a rounding error in Microsoft's accounts. So why sell it?
If Michael's right about the reasons for Slate being dropped... what does this say for the Department of Homeland Security?
**dramatic music**
" If my employees were bashing my products publicly, I think I'd dump them too. Who wouldn't?"
Your products, or your employees?
MS is not unloading on Slate. They just trying to get into a partnership with another company to make more money.
Could they have been given a go with articles criticizing MS in order to seem more 'objective' and thus offer more incentive to a future buyer? maybe the editors knew the sell was in the cards?
;)
Apparent time order of events is irrelevant, as relativity shows
Now if they had gone down the road of web-based applications then maybe this would have been a different story - but right now IE is a suitable sacrificial lamb that will boost Slate's reputation just before a potential sale/partnership.
In fact, Slate appears to be part of trend at MS, what with blogs and all, to promote the idea that MS goes in for a little self-criticism... wonder why?
Maybe MS feels that self-attack is the best form of defence against their only true threat - worldwide Governments - and appearing to be self-governing is a common method used by large industries to avoid government-regulation.
Not that I'm suggesting that MS is really trying to be so underhand - but I guess they can't help but appear to be so.
...am I then going to 'vinidictively' sell them off (so that they can continue doing the same thing for a different employer)?
Sure, because when they bash your product for someone else, they're not doing it under your name.
Now, if we can just get the folks in the Office division to start recommending other operating systems over Windows, we could finally get that part of the business sold/spun off to a separate company... just like the judge wanted.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
MIR landed in the ocean you dipshit. did you embalm some dolphins or sumthin?
Microsoft has too many products, I don't think Microsoft cares about the article so much. If all articles recommend MS products only, it just blow away their readers.
MIR didn't land you fscking moron, it dissintergreated in the atmosefear. he embalmed a coupld seagulls.
That does not make sense.
Factoring in the usual attention span of the general populace it does.
1. My magazine does bad review of one of my products.
2. Wait a few weeks.
3. Sell off magazine
4. Um, what was 1. again??
I suppose I should add
5. Profit!
- - - - - - - - - - -
I am a programmer. I am paid to produce syntax not grammar. Deal with it.
People who use "loose" instead of "lose" lose all credibility.
hey microsoft is just lucky nobody recommened linux over windows, and besides, internet exploder is bundled with WinD'oh!s, so what do they care. but who reads "slate" anyway but i found some lies burrayed in this article: That said, be aware that getting started with Firefox isn't a one-click operation. firefox is pretty damn easy to install, i can't imagine anyone having a hard time, the only configuring you really have to do, is change a few settings like your default web browser (firefox), and change your homepage (slashdot) hahahaha, firefox is better, if firefox had a filemanager built in, i would never touch internet exploder again!
After all, look what happened to somebody else who crossed Microsoft!
Microsoft manager died from drinking antifreeze
By The Seattle times staff
SEATTLE -- Daniel Feussner, a former Microsoft manager who died suddenly two months ago while facing federal charges for allegedly stealing $9 million in company software, had ingested ethylene glycol, the main ingredient in automobile antifreeze, the King County medical examiner has determined.
But the Medical Examiner's Office said it cannot say whether the 32-year-old, German-born computer expert committed suicide or accidentally ingested the poison.
Feussner died Feb. 7 after being rushed to a Bellevue hospital. He had been free on bail while awaiting trial on 15 counts of wire, mail and computer fraud in U.S. District Court. Prosecutors alleged Feussner financed a lavish lifestyle by obtaining software from the company and selling it. If convicted, he could have faced up to 20 years in prison.
http://www.joegrossberg.com/archives/000573.html
John Kerry is a Joke!
Its been well known that Slate was an experiment for MS, just like Sidewalk etc a few years back. I'm not surprised they are looking to sell it. I'm surprise they waited this long.
Um... NO WE DON'T!!!
Oh, and:
Ermm... I'm "learbing" as fast as I can!
refuse to do business with the government any longer because homeland security and cert dissed their browser? One would HOPE SO, I mean, MS has some pride and ethics, correct?
A technology magazine needs to be able to write about Microsoft objectively if they expect anyone to pay attention to their articles.
(Maybe Slashdot should also consider this.)
am i alone in not even knowing microsoft even HAD a magazine?
www.gaian-mind.org - eco-punk/crust coop and collective | www.anarchistfederation.org - so cal anarchist federation
Does a spinoff count?
Are you implying the slashdot blurbs are meant to be taken seriously?
...after a Microsoft banner ad was displayed in the face of an unsuspected director that decided to read the daily news :)
VKh
if not, parent is a great example of why there should be.
What if being vindictive makes you more money than being respected? Slate recommending a competing product could cost more money in losing their web monopoly than it means in higher subscription rates in Slate. I could see Microsoft saying, "Yeah, it might be true, but find a different way to increase readership or find another job." That's what I would say, anyway.
Matt Drudge has had this as a headline for days now.
Under the current ownership, Microsoft still has some control over Slates content; for instance, in the mentioned Firefox article the author states: "You've probably been told to dump Internet Explorer for a Mozilla browser before, by the same propeller-head geek who wants you to delete Windows from your hard drive and install Linux." This almost derogatory comment undermines the assertion of IEs quality by focusing on the idea that switching from Windows to Linux is a bad move. Under new leadership the author may have been more straightforward and written Youve probably heard of the benefits of open source software before, but now they are becoming even more practical. To make a long story short, this isnt about Slates content.
-Lanimilbus
When I first read the Firefox boo boo and nothing from MS. I thought, wow Microsoft has got to a point that they dont mind shots at them anymore they might even be trying the self deprecating route that many actors are doing these days with success. But now seeing this I guess Microsoft hasnt changed that much at all, or should I say the heads that created the culture at MS havent changed that much at all.
Recommending an alternate browser would be the equivalent of posting pictures of Macs on your blog or walking around campus with a Mac. You might recall unpleasant stories about people who made those mistakes.
I can imagine the conversation was like this:
Assistant: Mr. Gates, someone at Slate wrote an article recommending people use Mozilla.
Bill Gates: That's got to be the dumbest thing I've ever heard. Fire the asshole! His editor too. What kind of idiots do we have over there? Shit, just sell the whole thing.
Ass: I'll talk to the lawyers.
The first mistake, of course, is working for M$.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Sure just toss it over the transom and make it a forum for Dom Imus to drool and prattle on about being a recovering born again psychochristian far right wing paranoid wingnut.
Show me one MSNBC article that recommends anything but M$ garbage. Everything I read about computers from them looks like it got scrubbed by M$'s PR people if it was not written by them in the first place. It's hard for them to not report on multi-billion dollar M$ vectors rolling around, but they never come out and blame M$ for the problems and never recommend that anyone use anything else. Heck, I don't think I've seen so much as a M$NBC Mac hardware review.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Does anyone remember the Stale.com website that came out shortly after MS's "Slate" came out?
You've got a great point. I mean, a lot of people are going over to FireFox simply because it has tabbed browsing, a feature that Microsoft definitely WON'T be implementing in their next version. If Microsoft cared how many people used their browser, they'd pay a bit of attention to the user feedback. This whole thing is just a way for them to change corporate policy and get their hands further into the media market.
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
-Arthur C. Clarke
Like all those other profitable things they have sold off? I can't think of one, can you? It might be nice if they sold off Office or their OS, the only things they have that make money. It might also be nice if they decided that they were an obsolete hindrance and disbanded giving all their shareholders the $6/share that $54 billion dollars represented.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Who the hell wants noisy schmucks like you broadcasting the vulnerabilities of the Democratic Nation Convention for Al Queda to walk right through?!?! Dont rock the fucking boat you damn hippie!
get some uncommon commonsense.
the poster's name is michael and from the blurb, I'm guessing this is michael moore.
Mod me off-topic, but I think it's ironic and therefore on-topic since this is a news website that has been bashing microsoft as if it were the bush administration.
If MS wanted to punish Slate's editors for allowing an article recommending Firefox over IE, someone would be fired, or more likely would resign for 'personal reasons' a few weeks later. Selling a division is a business issue, not a content issue. It's not even necessarily a punishment: Newell Rubbermaid just sold off a bunch of divisions that didn't turn clear profits, which put those companies into better positions to succeed because they didn't have to pay the parent company's tithe any longer (the division for which my brother works was bought by private investors who want to expand it). More likely, Ballmer has decided that MS needs to get out of the content game, at which they've never done very well.
Anyone who loves or hates any language, platform, or manufacturer, doesn't know what they're talking about.
For a minute there I thought they were talking about this magazine.
Even in the age of Fox there are still some concepts of journalistic independence and ethics in existance. Slate is not in the business of publishing MS press releases, it's a news and commentary magazine and would lose a lot of credibility (and writers) if it was thought to be nothing but a company shill. I, not a big fan of MS, have read slate regularly since it started partially due to the corporation's hands-off policy toward the editorial content. If I thought that MS was suppressing non-flattering content, I'd have a hard time taking it seriously.
The truth, as always, isn't quite the same as what you read in the tame corporate media (and, yes, Slashdot does fit that description).
In fact, the author of that article died in a car accident three days after it ran. The Seattle police claim that there was "no evidence of foul play", but there was no autopsy and the body was cremated within a week, which some observers think was a bit hasty. There are been a number of requests for an in-depth investigation from concerned citizens, but the police insist that these people "have no standing", that there is "no evidence of anything", etc. etc. The usual story. Of course there's no evidence; the police haven't looked for any. Without an investigation, doubts will remain, and rightly so.
There are a lot of unanswered questions. As usualy, the media are not even asking them.
I've never yet met anybody who'll admit to posting on Slashdot. So who are all these people?!
Almost all their writers are firmly on the side of Big Business.
eat shiat and bark at the moon
You have never worked for Boeing, have you? (Me either, but I know many former Boeing employees. They say that politics is often more important than job performance in keeping your job. Is this not generally true in corporate America?)
Err, uhh.. isn't worth the bandwidth it takes up?
More /. silliness. Slate has for years snarked about some of Microsoft's products. If The Company was that thin-skinned they would have brought the hammer down a long time ago.
You want to know who isn't running Firefox 2.x? They spell it "definately" and "rediculous".
Maybe MS allows Slate to publish the anti-IE article to improve it's perceived value before selling.
Make's it look 'independent' like it has a brain of it's own and 'edgy' like it's relevant.
When I read that commentary, I thought of five words that I learned in a logic course in college, anyone care to guess what they are?
as a matter of fact, just what he's forgotten, is likely more relevant to communications/commerce, than everybodIE in the kingdumb of payper liesense/stock markup FraUD softwar gangster felon execrable, .combined?
so, whois ready for the gnu millennium?
never mind robbIE's fauxking PostBlock censorship devise, it's still under development?
Microsoft used to own Expedia and Terraserver as well. Expedia is no logner owned by Microsoft and neither is Terraserver. Terraserver was initally started to promote a new version of Terraserver. Microsfto probably did not sell this when planned because there was noone who would buy it. Now they have a buyer. Microsoft is slowly but surely getting out of the content business only to keep some of the units that are doing well like MSNBC(which they only own part of).
Gorkman
Maybe it happened the other way around:
Slate hears rumblings that Microsoft is looking to dump it. The editors say, "Well if we're on the chopping block anyway..."
M$ doesn't want anything to do with any group who will not support M$'s lies.
When I read that commentary, I thought of five words that I learned in a logic course in college, anyone care to guess what they are?
Correlation DOES NOT Equal Causation.
Or, if you need it expressed programmatically:
Correlation != Causation
(You also learn this in Statistics classes)
I'm still not sure why MS bought Slate in the first place. "e-mags" are notoriously hard to generate profit from and MS did nothing to do help out in that department. As MS stops pretending its a rapid growth company it will have to tighten budgetary belt. That means stuff like Slate are first on the chopping block.
Although it was amusing how the timing worked having Slate give props to Firefox has nothing to do with MS selling Slate. Its purely a business move.
Sorry. As soon as I saw your nickname I just had to say that.
After installing Slate Mag 1.0 on thier portal the new owners discover it only accepts users running on IE v6+, it's loaded with a bunch of spyware and seems to keep linking thier readers over to MSN... hmmm.
"Enjoy what you're doing! If it becomes drudgery, you're doing it wrong!" - Jim Butterfield
This comes mere weeks after Slate recommended Firefox over Internet Explorer.
Wait a second - are you implying that Microsoft would make such a move to protect the bottom line? How dare you! You shall be punished for your insolence! I'm a l33t windows user and I'll haX0r your... [this computer has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down]
What you have passed is black, but it does not caw. Check the dates on those articles. The Slate article was published June 30th. Your MSNBC article was posted July 7th, two days after the Slashdot attention to the Slate article and probably after Uncle Sam was recommending the same. It's possible that all of them picked up on the Slate suggestion and took it as a M$ endorsement.
That one article is not much to crow about. Can you find me something else? They still don't admit that a user can do without M$ and recommends that people keep their IE handy. I'm getting tired of M$ humble pie, surely you trolls and apologists can do better than that.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
By leveraging innovative technologies, content providers streamline compelling enterprise solutions.
Translation: By using software from Microsoft, your business will have its trade secrets, customer information, employee records, and banking information stolen by some hacker in Uganda, which will bring you billions of dollars in lawsuits, when your company has a million dollars in assets, meaning that your company will have to go bankrupt and close down.
(The meaning of an agile business is one that has the agility to dry up and disappear overnight.)
Microsoft. Software for the agile business.
Microsoft, the Microsoft logo, and the phrase "Software for the agile business" are the property of Microsoft.
Sun endorsement, not. The author calls Sun's straight forward description bragging, "With that type of bragging I couldn?t resist." Says, "the SuSE installation process is nearly perfect," as if you have to install on a computer bought at Walmart and as if Windoze installs are "perfect". Then this slam, "The laptop installation was another story. It seems the version of SuSE that was used is old ? and getting older all the time. ... Nothing worked. " And, of course, the best is yet to come, " The next versions of JDS could be extremely interesting." That's hardly a ringing endorsement. If the author had written as candidly about an XP install, he'd have been fired.
Lindows endorsement, no, more FUD. I don't even want to read an article that's titled "Getting Better". It goes on to complain about "room for improvement", that it was slow, blah blah blah. The author goes on to complain that it can't do VPN and a host of other things that's just plain bullshit as free software's networking capability blows Windoze away. This article rings more like another ringing endorsement of Winblows to me. Of course, the right distro to try Linux with is a live CD such as Knoppix or Mepis. Both of them are available as free downloads and neither touch your computer till you tell them too. To recommend Linsows over such things is incompetence or malice.
The "Open Source" on the server article is SCO style FUD at it's finest, "The communal aspects of open source can lead to thorny legal questions, particularly when a company claims its proprietary code has seeped into a project. Because developers typically don't offer warranties, end users could be held liable for infringements." Blah, blah, clueless bullshit that at no point recommends free software over M$ cruft, especially on the desktop.
Your final article, about how "biodiversity analogy has it's limits", is a defense of M$'s pathetic security record. It attempts to blame all the problems M$ is having on it's popularity instead of on poor design. While you might consider this to be unflattering to M$ because it admits to problems, it's highly deferential in the way it explains and denigrates the extent of those problems. An honest reporter would note that the same kinds of exploits have been happening across all versions of M$ since people were silly enough to connect that junk to the internet.
The titles of those articles are provocative, but the contents are M$ party line, FUD and nonsense. The truth of the matter is that free software installs easier, runs better, is easier to use and costs less than M$ crap. MSNBC is oblivious to these facts or you can't find the articles. Try again please.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
So now the web mag that nobody reads will be owned by someone else I pay no attention to.
And somehow it's news.
God I love slashdot.
Simple. One leads the corporate line through the stern chock, ensuring that it is well protected by chafing gear, and makes it fast to the stern deck padeye of the towing corporation. (That padeye rests on heavy foundations which are worked down among the assets of the corporation).
Needless to say, a pelican hook must be placed between the padeye and the corporate line, and an executive of the towing corporation must stand watch with a mallet, prepared to strike loose the pelican hook if the towed corporation gets out of hand.
Afterwards, if the corporate line is of wire rope, it should be overhauled and slushed down with grease.
Or you could just actually just, you know, watch the movie understanding what parts are fact (such as: there was a plan to build this pipeline through Afghanistan in the 90s, moves were made to remove U.S. interests from this project during the late Clinton administration, moves were made to restore U.S. interests into this project during the early Bush administration, and the U.S. backed government after Afghanistan was invaded was headed up by a man with very close ties to this project) and which parts are conjecture (such as: the U.S. implementation of the war in Afghanistan was colored by oil-related interests, and more effort was placed into furthering these business interests than into locating Al-Qaeda), react to each of these accordingly, and possibly form independent conclusions of your own other than the conclusions Moore was promoting (such as: the early Bush Administration did not seem to consider the known harboring of terrorists an important factor in its dealings with the Taliban, the selection of Hamid Karzai is of questionable ethics and may in fact be an instance of some sort of cronyism and this bears looking into further). That would be a good third alternative to slavishly worshipping Michael Moore and discarding everything he had to say offhand.
I'm sure there are some Michael Moore fans who do what you describe, but your implication that this extends to all of them is hardly fair. You may or may not have been able to discern the difference in Moore's presentation between his reporting and his op-ed, but for some of us the division came across as pretty clearly demarcated.
Of course it's always best to try to double-check the things Moore says with other sources, since otherwise you might miss things like the 60-minutes-hackjob mess that was the smear attack segment on Charlton Heston in Bowling for Columbine, but that's true with pretty much any form of media.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
I'm drunk, can I sell Slate too?
God,
Fahrenheit 9/11 has made an estimated $116,880,000 as of July 25. Other than that minor correction, the point you made is excellent. Disney gave away the profit on the distribution of a movie that has made more than $100 million gross.
Lets not let that tail wag the dog TOO much, huh?
Case in point: the current lead piece, "Lay Off the Bush Girls." It's a rundown of the resumes of the wastrel First Kids that concludes they're finally due some good press because being high-profile fuck-ups inevitably causes a surplus of bad press. You plow through it feeling that author Michael Crowley would really be much happier going harumph about the capital gains tax; like much of Slate's cultural material, it's indistinguishable from the political stuff. The piece is awkward, overlong, pedantic, and frankly a let-down after reading the teaser on the index page ("They drink. They party with P. Diddy"), which seemed to promise more than a dullish reminder of kids-will-be-kids. The most interesting thing about it is a self-admiring correction appended afterward: "The article originally claimed that both girls were wearing Calvin Klein gowns." Now, that's fact-checking.
There's nothing wrong with Slate if all you want from journalism is to be poured a nice big steaming mug of complacency. (Complacency never hurt business at Microsoft.) But there's the New York Times and a zillion other places for that. Slate could vanish tomorrow, and consensus thought would be just as loudly trumpeted by all the other pet publications of billionaires. I'd rather read Harper's Magazine, The Baffler, The Utne Reader, and Counterpunch, publications and sites that proceed from the idea that journalism is an act of independence.
It is refreshing to note that for once microsoft is trying to sell something rather than buy companies out !
Chris ,
Php Programmers.
As this short movie clearly explains, Bush is a trans-species mutant with no brain: This Land.
Actually, it was a brave and commendable thing that MSN did not become Yet Another Wire Feed. In fact the wires themselves are a serious threat to real journalism. When 90% of the content of any on line and off line news service becomes the parroting of what other people have said (With varying amounts of misinterpretation), we are headed for a world of GroupThink.
:(
All news services should write their own news stories or don't bother reporting. That way we would have multiple news services that were all source level and considerably more diverse and accurate.
But of course I realize that people are lazy and would rather pick their new sources by the color of someones hair and hear the roughly same thing as anywhere else they might go....
No point running a marketing tool that fails to achieve its required goal. The original story was interesting only because everybody accepted the bias in slate as a matter of fact hence it's complete in-effectiveness as a MS marketing tool. So will slate be sold for real or will this be an attempt to rebrand it so it can become an effective marketing tool again.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen