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NY Times Tries to Untangle Analysts and Shills
twitter writes "The Register and others are examining a New York Times effort to eliminate bias from technology reporting by not echoing paid opinions. (Other coverage here.) They target Microsoft specifically. InfoWorld has an insightful summary of the two sides of this old debate. Fake think tanks, dubious sponsored research, and Astroturf are not considered but should be. Companies using these tactics deserve to be held at arm's length, but that's hard to do when the company is also a monopoly able to make or break any 'expert.' It would be refreshing to see the New York Times discover the FSF, opensource.org, EFF, and other sources of computing expertise."
Why? Aren't they biased, too? Maybe not in Microsoft or Oracle's pocket, but they have a definite point of view that should be taken into account as well.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
``It would be refreshing to see the New York Times discover the FSF, opensource.org, EFF, and other sources of computing expertise.''
Maybe they should rather make up their own minds. Much as I agree with the EFF and the FSF, they do have their own agendas.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
I don't get it. Are you saying that nobody qualifies as a computer expert without Microsoft's permission, and they'll revoke your expert status if you don't say nice things about them? And the NY Times should be looking at badvista.org for a more balanced perspective?
If the problem of technology reporting is that reporters don't know a damn thing and just repeat the words of marketing folks, the solution simple: Hire reporters who actually have a technological background. Is that so hard?
Shouldn't the reader be making this analysis anyway, no matter who the source? I mean, if we don't even trust our own President on his word alone (as we shouldn't), why in the world would we trust a newspaper implicitly?
Good for the Times, I say. It's a move in the right direction. You know all those movie posters that quote "reviewers" and give trash movies "four thumbs WAY up!!!1"? Remember when it was exposed that they were shills?
Sony ha
I imagine it's rather hard to find anyone to report on somthing, who has some sort of knowledge on the subject, that isn't one of theese three.
1. Involved with the product or the company producing the product.
2. Involved with the companies competition.
3. Being paid to do it.
If it's someone from the company, the competition cries foul stating the rep is only trying to make the product look good, which, if you work for a company that makes sense if you want to eat.
If it's someone from the competition, the company cries foul, again, if your competition is eating all the cake there's obviously going to be none left for you.
If they're being paid to do it, nearly everyone else cries foul, because they hadn't been informed there was going to be cake.
Who's left to report on theese products, who is also someone that would actually use them ?
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
These clowns give themselves grand sounding names so people will take them seriously. It even works once or twice but then people catch on to them.
My favorite example is the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution. It appears to be one guy, Ken Brown. When people were still paying attention to the 'SCO' thing, he wrote a book in which he called into question the paternity of Linux. It was really a lame effort. The result is that whatever credibility his institute had vanished in a puff of public indignation. http://www.cs.vu.nl/~ast/brown/followup/
The problem for such people is that, if they wish to continue in business, their credibility is all they have. Gartner did some questionable things, again during the early days of the SCO 'thing'. Later, a company who wanted to sell us a bunch of stuff quoted Gartner. My reaction was that Gartner would say anything they were paid to say. No sale.
Nonetheless, Richard Stallman and the like are upfront/open on their (ideological) reasoning, therefor transparent, which make them very good experts.
My god I'm sick of 'news' articles in our local media which are nothing more than thinly veiled adverts for companies and services.
In Melbourne, Australia we have a free daily 'newspaper' called the MX which is provided at train stations. It is created by the news outlet that creates the largest circulation paid for newspaper in the city (the Herald Sun) and shares a large amount of its content.
Every single issue there are at least 4 or 5 'articles' about 'surveys' or 'studies' which have discovered some new and exciting 'fact' about our populous. They headline and lead into these articles speaking as if the results are fact ('Australian workers love working longer hours', 'Women want more pampering'), and it's not until you read into the article that you find 'according to a web survey of 300 by recruitment company X', or 'says a study done by cosmetics firm Y'.
And people read the guff as fact, and reiterate it over and over.
And the number of ridiculous celebrity pieces of trivial shite that is reported that just so happens to be about some star of a movie that just so happens to be coming out next week...
These two types of 'news' really do account for about 50-60% of the content of this rag.
And the big brother of the MX, the Herald Sun... yeah, not so much better.
Sigh... will teach me for being a cheap bastard and not buying a real newspaper I suppose.
The achievements of these organizations are commendable, but portraying the FSF (or e.g. the EFF) as entirely neutral on technology issues probably wouldn't be "entirely accurate" either. ;-) And indeed neutral they shouldn't (even need to) be - journalists ought to be able to see (i.e. find and expose) the truth behind the whole range of different views, rather than exclude the ones with the most obvious bias (some of whom might be right nonetheless)...
Giving up on the prospect of objectivity and resorting to "balancing" biased opinions is lazy journalism.
Example: On any given political issue, a lazy journalist will get the official Democratic perspective and the official Republican perspective, regurgitate these, and consider the topic thoroughly reported. On any local environmental issue, they get the Sierra Club perspective and the local chamber of commerce perspective, regurgitate those, and consider it a job well done.
What's the problem? Well, your choice of sources biases your reporting, even if your two sources disagree. Let's say there are (shocking!) more than two opinions on the matter (!), and that the two sources you choose, combined, still represent a minority view (example: when reporting on free trade deals, which both Democrats and Republicans support, but most US citizens are against, etc)
Or look at the FOX News method. You get the extreme right-wing Republican view (Hannity) and the moderate Republican view (Colmes), and this is presented as the national dialog. That's "balance". Or even worse, knowingly reporting false information because pointing out that one side is lying would suggest bias from the news source (FOX News won a lawsuit in which they were sued for knowingly reporting fiction as fact, they argued they were not legally obligated to attempt to be truthful, and they won).
Objective truth exists, even if we can't ever know it. News organizations can never be called truly objective, but those who do not even make an ATTEMPT at objectivity are hardly even journalists--they are just as much shills as their sources.
Bias is opinion. Opinions are useful if you are aware they are opinion and can "consider the source."
Many news sources have an obvious political leaning, but the fact that their bias is obvious means that their bias can openly be considered when evaluating what that source is saying.
Anyone reading my stuff is also aware that I similarly have strong personal views on technology. Bias is only deceptive when it is hidden. The Wall Street Journal doesn't pretend to be liberal, and the NY Times doesn't pretend to be conservative. I enjoy reading both, because both offer viewpoints and interesting information without pretending to be something they are not.
Hidden bias is used by writers such as Paul Thurrott - he suggests he really likes Apple stuff, only to spin everything he says in a deceptive and negative way.
Microsoft is behind a huge wave of fraud marketing, and has a history of these tactics, from its attack on Linux and its affiliation with SCO, to its regular FUD comments against Apple - including Ballmer's suggestion that the company is not interested in selling Windows for Macs because they only care about "Real PCs." The Zune campaign is a new example.
Being biased can be entertaining and engaging - consider Jon Stewart. Even Rush Limbaugh, when he's not making fun of the handicapped, is fun to laugh at; however, pretending to not be biased and stating opinions as uncontroversial facts is misleading and slimy.
--
One interesting effort in ranking news is NewsTrust, althought it could conceptually be subverted by astroturfing.
It seems that people are far more gullable in believing anonymous hearsay than they should be. Facts can be "called into question" by the most rediculous claims, and those nebulous claims are given equal airtime. It happens in science ("global warming is only a theory!!!") in software ("vaporware vs a real product, we say wait to see how this vapor turns out!!!") and in politics ("global warming is only a theory!!!").
Just give me transparency about your sources, and I'll make up my own mind.
And they don't work through straw men to appear unbiased.
Asking Microsoft why they think people should upgrade to Vista is fine, and I hope New York Times will continue to do so. Microsoft is openly and obviously biased with regard to their own products, and getting their side of the story is valuable.
The problem is when you ask some "independent analyst" for their opinion on a possible upgrade, and that analyst happens to be funded by Microsoft.
Bias is not a problem, hidden bias is a problem.
The most eggregious FUD site I have ever seen is this one.
The site advocates that people should "procure software on its merit" -- which sounds fine on the surface -- but it turns out that they refuse to recognize that free licensing could ever be considered a "merit".
It's quite amazing to see such a large and pretty site devoted solely to trying to convince customers that they are wrong to care about free licensing, and that they should evalute software ONLY on the basis of its functionality.
The message is: "Customers are wrong to think the way they do. They need to think the way we tell them to."
The FSF has a clearly stated agenda of eradicating proprietary software, as it's immoral according to them. How is that not going to constitute a biased approach when debating industry topics ...
I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around this. Standing up for your rights is a bias but isn't that the one you want in your news? Would you prefer some kind of industry shill to tell you what's good for you? How can you even begin to equate these two diametrically opposed things?
The New York Times has decided it's not in their reader's best interest to pass on advertisements, aka paid opinions, as legitimate reviews. Good for them and good for everyone. As someone else pointed out, they are indeed discovering better sources of information. The Registry's hostility to this is as difficult to understand as your hostility to the FSF.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Blogosphere....blogorhea.....astroturfing by Sony.....analysts bought off by vendors (oh my!).
There isn't one truth, and never will be, as long as there are two people left alive. Yet, there are those that try, both in the blogodesert and in print-- (and The Online Edition)-- to get it right. Just the facts. No pre-judged bias. No orthodoxy. No guilt-driven blather.
Let's encourage them to be as truthful as we can, because as seen in too many places, bullshit just doesn't work well.
And it smells.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
Yeah, the NY Times sucks because one of their journalists did a bad job 4 years ago.
Thank god neither of us screw up, eh? That'd mean we suck, too.
1. They are not being paid to have the bias they have
This is nothing against any of the organizations that are mentioned, but just a note about non-profits in general. Having worked at a non-profit I know that the people who work at them are better off (financially and social status-wise) the more people agree with them. Thus, they do have a vested self-interest in promoting their point of view. These days non-profit only really means "without shareholders" - it's naive to assume that non-profit status implies anything beyond that.
See also, Charity is Selfish
Maybe they should take the 2 by 4 out of their own eye first.
I didn't make that part clear enough. Fox News is just turning things completely on their heads. The old MSM was based on integrity, in that they wanted to find out and report the truth, and they also had to build their credibility, which is what the main article is actually focused on, in that the NY Times realized that their credibility was being destroyed by biased 'reporting'. (Not to imply that they had much credibility left.) However, Fox News never made any pretense of having any impartiality except for their bogus motto/logo. Fox just created something that looked like a news network and expected people to think it automatically had some credibility. Certain advertisers are willing to support the scam. I haven't checked, but I'd assume they're the same companies that support Rushbaugh.
Actually, the more interesting assault on reality involves the destructive redefinition of the linguistic modeling of reality. A very prominent example is that the word "liberal" has been completely redefined, but I actually received an interesting example in my email yesterday. Any form of disagreement with Dubya means I'm a Bush-hater, and my correspondent (a wealthy neo-GOP) insists that he gets to define my mental reality for me. He even included a list of new equivalences for "hate", stuff like disdain or disapproval or disrespect. Me, I think such word games are fundamentally intellectually dishonest. If I actually hated Dubya, I even think I'd be the first person to know it. The meaning of existing words should be respected, and if you need to describe a new concept (such as BushCo, Rushevik, Bushevik, and Rushbaugh), then you should go ahead and make it clear why a new term is needed--and then you should attempt to be consistent in how it is used to convey clear meanings, not to destroy old ones.
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
Uhhh, no. Look at how popular religion is. Look at how many people believe political lies, and distrust scientific fact. Look at how many people believe common myths. Being honest or correct does not guarantee popularity. In fact, it usually means less popularity.
... and then they built the supercollider.
"Fake think tanks, dubious sponsored research, and Astroturf are not considered but should be"
Sounds like this applies to many areas of interest today, whether its politics, the environment, or terrorism.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.