Slashdot Mirror
The Media in 2014
Alexandre Van de Sande writes "Robin Sloan made a flash video as a "documentary" of how big enterprises like google and amazon converged medias and changed the way we see news by 2014.
It's a vision of what could be (or will be) the world with personalized media, made by peers, and the guy knows what's going on on those big heads. It ends with a sad view on which, althought some people get their news in a way they could never before, most of them just get a bunch of untrue gossip and sensasionalist trivia. And that's exactly what they wanted." This will take a few minutes to watch, but stick it out to the end. I think there's a lot in there that you really should think about.
Wasn't this posted not to long ago?
I find that google news is a good way to get a picture of many different news sources all at once, although it doesn't really help the fact that, like you said, many of those sources are skewed in the first place.
thisnukes4u.net
how big enterprises like google and amazon converged medias
'Media' is the plural of 'medium'. Hence, 'medias' is nonsense.
Like car accidents, most hardware problems are due to driver error.
But the guy has a good sense of humour: the guy on the Googlezon ID card is called Winston Smith!
I find that www.csmonitor.com sticks to the who, what, where, why, and when questions as long as you stay away from the editorial content (which is as it should be). Unfortunately, they don't cover very much.
I think the worst thing that can happen is getting all your news from one source. We need to at least expose ourselves to the viewpoints from across the spectrum, and especially to viewpoints from outside of our own borders if we're to see what's really going on. It takes alot of effort to be more informed.
Yeah, right.
(And of course this gets modded up)
How many times did Fox claim that WMDs had been found in Iraq? It became a running joke in our house to guess how long it would be until they made their next false discovery.
Huh?
FNC is one of the several channels on in my office all day. They only claimed WMD were possibly found when a source within the government, military, or other source in Iraq claimed WMD were possibly found.
No. Really.
They never "made up" stories that WMD were found. And, in fact, trace amounts of WMD were found, several times. I'm not saying any of these constitutes finding WMD in the context of our initial claims, but trace amounts of WMD were found nonetheless. I'm sure there's some blog(s) somewhere that alleged to track "falsehoods" from FNC. I have never seen a story that was later found to be inaccurate (with regard to WMD, WMD trailers, labs, etc.) allowed to stand. And no, they don't just silently sweep it away, they often spent the next several hours saying that the initial reports were inaccurate.
The difference with FNC is that they reported on things much earlier and with less verification, resulting in less reliable news at any point in time, but MORE TIMELY news over an extended period of time. After watching FNC alongside CNN, MSNBC, BBCWORLD, and even Armed Forces Television, I recall extremely numerous times that FNC was reporting on a news item fifteen to thirty minutes, and sometimes up to an hour, before any other news outlet. Most of the time, the story was generally accurate. The other news organizations seemed to be more conservative about reporting. This sometimes came back to bite FNC, but ultimately resulted in much more timely information from FNC *if* you watched it long enough to see potential corrections. Reporting that could be termed inaccurate or incorrect was BY NO MEANS the norm, and was ALWAYS corrected/retracted if it was incorrect.
Actually, the cogent and relevant portion of my post was the italicized portion, which I feel speaks to the issues surrounding this slashdot story; i.e., the idea (correct, in my opinion) that going to "blogs" and "journalism" where everyone contributes is a Bad Thing.
Since the quote in question used Flight 77 as an example, and I knew there would be readers who *actually believe* the conspiracy theories about Flight 77, and would respond to my post, I attached a pre-written footnote, labeled as such, briefly debunking the ridiculous conspiracy theories (though anyone who believes that Flight 77 didn't really crash into the Pentagon on 9/11 likely won't believe any of it anyway).
But thanks for your concern.
2 words, Bill Cliton
Ah, the ultimate straw man, Slick Willie. To those of us who aren't die-hard Democrats or Republicans, such a statement is silly at best. Criticism of Bush does not nessecarily imply support of Clinton.
There's still good journalism in America, but you have to read it, not watch it:
The New York Times is widely derided for having a "liberal bias," but there is still no paper in the US that covers as much of what is going on in the world today and presents as wide a range of intelligent and interesting commentary. The print edition is jam-packed with info, and while people complain about the fact that you have to register to get free news from NYT online, it's more than worth the money. ;-)
The Christian Science Monitor, despite the name is a scrupulously independent voice. Their print version is formatted not to bring you every ounce of news, but to pick and choose stories of interest from around the world. CSM doesn't focus on immediacy, which is quite refreshing in the era of instant news stories without any meat.
The Wall Street Journal takes flak because it represents the voice of The Man, but if you recognize that the Journal's bias is in favor of the capitalist marketplace, it's an excellent source of information. The reporting is solid and the range of coverage is impressive.
Getting back to the theme of going beyond knee-jerk immediacy, there are several excellent weekly and monthly magazines available in the states. I'm partial to The Economist, which is not published in the States, and so provides much more coverage of the rest off the world. I happen to agree with most of their editorial bias, but I sometimes disagree with it. One of the nice things about the Economist is that they state their views in a way that allows you to separate the facts from their views.
I'm also partial to The Atlantic, a monthly magazine that explores a wide range of issues. Their coverage of 9/11, the war in Afghanistan, and the war in Iraq has been superb for its depth, range of viewpoints, and clarity.
There are plenty of other great news sources in the United States. I merely listed some of my favorites. My point is that if you expect the television to provide you with serious news coverage, you'll continue to be disappointed. If you take the time to sift through a few print publications, you may be amazed at what's out there.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ