Slashdot Mirror
State Media Rushing Into Coverage Void Left By Dying Newspapers
derekmead writes "As newspaper budgets shrink, state-sponsored media outlets like RT, China Daily, and Al Jazeera have grown, hired more writers and offered more (free) coverage. Mark Mackinnon, writing for The Globe and Mail, explains the issue well: 'Throughout the recent crisis in Syria, and before that in Libya and Egypt, Xinhua and RT News have thrown unprecedented money and resources at reporting from the scene, even as Western media scale back on their own efforts. It's not too far-fetched to imagine a near future where it's Xinhua or RT, rather than the Associated Press or BBC, that have the only correspondents on the scene of an international crisis, meaning the world will only get Beijing or Moscow's version of what's happening.' But quality coverage still requires money, which means finding funding from somewhere. You see the effects of this every day: If your revenue is based mostly off of pay-per-click banner ads, a lowest-common denominator post, like a cheap roundup of cat pictures, is quite possibly going to pull in way more views for less money than a nuanced, deeply reported, and expensive dispatch from Syria. And, yeah, ads can be a bummer, especially when they're executed poorly, and paywalls aren't great. But when the alternatives are either fluffy, thin reporting; or worse, blatantly biased coverage sponsored by governments, we have to find a palatable way to fund good reporting."
or any other news channel
I want to hear about the state of the collective farms with the objectivity only the state can provide..
I am sorry, but I don't need instantaneous, round the globe coverage with whatever the hell happens in some God-forsaken corner of the world. it's a perk I'm passively receiving and if I get such news, then that's fine. If not, I'm not gonna curl in a corner, frightened of the unknown.
There were times when people found that their king died weeks after the dude passed away, and their life was not impacted. Granted, we can do better nowadays but still, I couldn't care less about some fanatic blowing himself up in some Syria busy market. Local news - that's what I'm interested in, followed by news from my country. Everything else (save from something HUGE like the Japan Earthquake) is optional.
Yes I know, the Syria whatever-the-fuck-happens-there could theoretically very slightly affect me through the butterfly effect but really... not worth my immediate interest. Give me the high level overview: Syria dudes are still beating each other; China launched some satellite; USA still has crushing debt and Greece goes down the drain. Have a nice day!
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
The BBC is state media, funded by TV licensing
From TFA: "This isn’t about who rakes in the advertising dollars – there’s precious few of those these days for anyone – it’s about the global conversation, and who gets to frame it."
I think that statement gets it spot on. In those few words, you can read a lot between the lines: elements of capitalism, paranoia and perspective.
It's kind of a wordplay on the oft-cited "history is written by the victor" phrase. Only this time round, TFA makes it like history is written by he who has the most money.
The Wknd Sessions - Malaysian and South East Asia independent music
I recently found this to be good source of main world information, especially if you read it 2-3 days delayed. Clean short description of what is happening in the world. Without ads.
Unlike the impartial and totally honest reporting of the private media?
I think the point of this TFS sentence was western media vs middle east/far east one's, as a second spin additionally to private vs state-sponsored broadcasters.
Look, obtaining good information isn't always easy (and sometimes can get you killed as the rising numbers of killed journalists will attest to). It is also VERY valuable, if the person playing the devils advocate wants to live WITH the deprived information access of the middle ages, he should be prepared to live IN the middle ages. Haven't you heard of the trite expression "if you think education is expensive, try ignorance?. Well information is like a real-time version of education and is probably even more valuable. (Ok, the devils advocate has a point about not necessarily needing instantaneous access but I still contend good information and Analysis is very worthwhile).
Unfortunately the world is now being divided into the rich, educated and well informed and the poor, uneducated and ignorant. Sadly, in many countries (like the U.S.) it is a self-reinforcing cycle where the uneducated ignorant don't realize that they're uneducated and ignorant. So they vote for policies that put them even further behind not understanding that the "liberal elites" are abandoning them to their fates and putting their kids in private schools etc. I'm looking at you, you home schooled creationist anti-global warming religious fanatics (not just Fundamentalist Christian but Ultra-Orthodox Jews and don't even get me started on madras attending Muslims).
Just as I'm a proud taxpayer because I feel it buys civilization (as opposed to Somalia), I immediately signed on to the NYTimes pay service without even bothering with the one month free trial. It buys very good journalism (as opposed to Fox).
Whitehall's version of events is pretty much the same as Wall Street's, so it's a good alternative for those who prefer their news to be biased in favour of big business instead of biased in favour of a particular state (which is, after all, the complaint here; that corporate bias is being replaced by state bias, not that the amount of bias is changing).
Because it isn't. The BBC is funded via the TV license, not taxation. It is not government controlled, it is an independent entity.
I really wouldn't trust AP as an unbiased news source just because they are privatized. At this point, in the US, privatized basically means "an excuse to hand out government contracts." That's mainly just a bitch against the right-wing, though, my main point was this article in which the AP version differed from other version, in favor of US interests.
Sky News have been reporting on this non-stop for weeks, constantly taking any free minute to drive home that the BBC is being subject to this inquiry. I'm so glad that non-government media is so impartial!
Sadly reason isn't exactly an emblem of unbiased reporting either.
flagrantly biased coverage by corporate interests.
"meaning the world will only get Beijing or Moscow's version of what's happening."
So? The world has been spoon-fed America's and Britains version of events for decades. Maybe some balance is needed?
No, BBC isn't state sponosred media, it's tax payers sponsored media (rather directly). While goverment has some oversight of BBC, comparing that RT or Xinhua is laughable at best. Both ar propaganda mouths of their respective goverments, and don't hide in shame about that.
Sorry, but I will take BBC over any of these any day. Call me Western capitalist whore if you like.
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
Most "news" is total crap.
In these days of ours, if something is actually newsworthy, then it ends up being documented and discussed in Internet fora, often in excruciating detail under all kinds of useful insights (diversity of bias is a great thing).
Newspapers and conventional media are dying because NOBODY NEEDS THEM ANYMORE; this is the nature of the Free Market—society evolves through variation and selection, but of course, people are trying to inhibit this most fundamental process by turning to the steel boot of would-be central planners, in order to pretend otherwise at everyone else's expense; when in doubt, bring out the violent coercion.
Now, don't be confused. There is no doubt still value in expert analysis—value worth paying for (in the traditional sense). However, most of what we call "news" is not in that category. The death of newspapers is a good thing; oh, certainly, there will be some unpleasantness during the evolutionary transition (especially when central planners prolong the agony), but the result will be a society having adapted a more efficient form.
The TV license is a tax and the broadcast finances and license fee rises are negotiated with the UK Government every ten years. Think the Government and the British state don't have a large measure of control? Think again
The notion that the TV license isn't a tax and the BBC isn't state-controlled is a delusion.
But the summary says different sources of money of different media are the cause of this situation. And in that regard BBC is comparable to RT: both are publicly funded, they don't rely on advertising.
I can agree with that.
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
I had a friend in England who suddenly asked me how the (extremely important and vital to the Eurozone) Irish referendum of May 30th went. I was midly surprised that British media had reported it (despite the fact that they are right next to us) but it turned out he hadn't noticed anything about it on BBC or other British news services, but instead had started a habit of watching Russia Today on the news and learned about it on that.
So yeah, apparently a Russian news source is more up to date on the happenings of Ireland (especially when it relates to the EU as a whole) than British news sources.
While people in the west were crediting facebook and twitter for organizing the arab spring, the leaders in the middle east understood that it was al jazeera that actually was responsible for forming perceptions, in some ways it exerts more influence in the middle east than any other regime in the world. I suggest that interested individuals read "propaganda" by Edward Burnayes, whom was the nephew of Sigmud Freud but far more influential, by being responsible for corporate perception management in the USA. Of course the internet has thrown the media a curve ball, but they still hold asymmetrical power and influence, which is why governments want to filter out the internet.
I recently found this to be good source of main world information, especially if you read it 2-3 days delayed. Clean short description of what is happening in the world. Without ads.
This is an example of what post journalism should look like, more like citation based research conducted by qualified agents using the scientific method, analyzed and automated using Natural language processing and statistics including "reporters" as datasets. Once people can have a reasonable objective certainty of what is true and false, it will get alot easier to separate the wheat from the chaff in politics. However none of this will ever occur if we don't fight for the net neutrality and freedom of information, information asymmetry will be used to manipulate people and consensus for ulterior motives.
Which slants reporting towards the views of the state that sponsors it we need to figure out a way to fund private trustworthy news corporations that would never slant the news run by good honorable men like Rupert Murdoch or Hearst.
Or maybe, newspapers and news networks both state run and private can go to hell.
We live in a globalized world. I live and work in Egypt, colleagues work in Washington, I have family in Canada, friends in a dozen other countries. The world is a small place. I'm not even American, but I'm amazed at the ignorance of most Americans toward their own status in the world. The USA is deeply involved in most conflicts around the world, though I would argue in a positive way. Furthering the cause of freedom and democracy for the downtrodden and oppressed. The moment most Americans stop caring about this fact though, then all hope is lost. So, perhaps instead of deriding the reality that exists outside of your comfy bubble, perhaps you could educate yourself and become wiser.
The BBC USED to be government controlled, now it is a private corporation that is government funded. However the purpose and "company culture" that prevaded the BBC USED to be about public service, while in the west it was about propaganda and advertising, which is why the BBC was funded by taxes in the first place. However over the years things have changed, while the BBC is certainly better than the american media, has deviated from its traditional values considerably.
Twitter feeds and live blogs provide a surprising amount of information from citizen journalists that often proves more accurate than reporters.
RT: Totalitarians with inferiority complex
CCTV: Communist sympathizers who like to shop.
CNN: liberal bleeding hearts
FOX: biblethumpers and brimstone
BBC: elitist tea drinkers
I remember the events in ossetia from a few years ago. Sjaakashvilly (the good guy according to the west) invaded ossetia and started killing both people and international peacekeepers using US weaponry. This was timed with the opening of the Olympics.
The news reached Belgium (my country of ressidence) fairly quickly, but it took days for a first report to appear on CNN.
That report had the following headline:
Russia invades Ossetia
Yes, after days of trying to negotiate with Sjaakasvilly to cease fire, the Russians had enough of it and invaded, stopping the bombing of civilian cities. Those were the days I discovered RT and none-western media. And I must say, I found much less bias in the not western reporting for that incident + much more information.
But when the alternatives are either fluffy, thin reporting; or worse, blatantly biased coverage sponsored by governments, we have to find a palatable way to fund good reporting."
Weren't bloggers suppose to be the new reporters?
Al Jazeera is owned by the government of Qatar, so technically it's "state-owned". However, throughout most of the Middle East, its primary role is as a media outlet not controlled by either the national government or western business interests. And if you actually watch some of its reporting, you'll see that on issues outside of Qatar, its slant is different but certainly no more pronounced than your average western news outlet.
I am officially gone from
I, personally, see this trend as a major problem for democratic processes. If we can't really know what's going on, we can't vote sensibly on it. While this is a problem with mainstream media, anyway, the existing problem is a lot less severe than would be an unabashedly (or covertly) state-sponsored news media--and despite what we might think, people will undoubtedly believe such tripe, much as most people "buy into" the less-than-objective news we currently get.
So, I'm asking the brilliant minds of Slashdot what a better solution might be. I mean this as a serious question, so please no trolls, flames, etc.
For the sake of completeness/initiating the conversation/clarity: /. does. Possibly some "real" reporters will get in on it, but I don't know how they'll make a living. Otherwise, this means that everyone is doing journalism in a mostly (or strictly) amateur capacity, which will (typically) produce low-quality stories and lack journalistic legal protection in those countries that provide such. Also, it's likely to be dangerous for those who don't know what they're doing. This still won't address the issue of how much it costs to report important, non-easy news stories, but the lack of ad-driven funding could provide for a more "serious" tenor to the content (by way of not catering to popular-but-vapid content).
Options we have so far (which seem to be increasingly inadequate):
1) Traditional media. It's dying. I think we can all point to a handful of compelling reasons why it'll continue to die.
2) Paywalls. Nobody likes them, and they're arguably little better than unabashed state media, since one has to pay for a lot of them in order to sort out what's nonobjective. (If someone knows a fix for this, let's hear it!)
3) Free (as in beer) news--ad-sponsored. It lacks funding required to do a lot of "real" investigative reporting, and as such, it isn't likely to send a reporter across the world to report on the latest war in which our soldiers are fighting. (Let's put the topic of what wars they should be fighting aside, for the moment.) Also, I'm sick of seeing "lowest common denominator" content--no matter how cute those cats are.
4) Purely user-contributed news--similar to an "open-source" approach. Also suffers from "lowest common denominator," but can have some amount of filtering, much like
5) Other?
One final thought: how can we prevent whatever we end up with from becoming just as bad/useless/corrupt/biased as current and trending options?
I look forward to reading your thoughts. I don't know how we might go about implementing any wonderful ideas we come up with, so if anyone cares to tackle that "porcupine," I'm all for it. Otherwise, it's a fun mental exercise, and might inspire some reader who actually has a say in such matters.
It is naive to think the government has no influence over the BBC, well, some governments at least. It is foolish to think the BBC is unbiased. True unbiased reporting is unheard of in the world, it would require every story to consume more storage resources then fit in the physical universe. What am I talking about? The Israel/Palestine conflict is a prime example, since it has been decades, no centuries, no millenia of tit-for-tat, if you want to report the full story, you need to include all of human history, each time. Would make the morning paper a bit thick.
Cut bits out? Then your bias is in the bits you cut out. The BBC always cuts so that Israel is the aggressor and never reports a story until Israel has retaliated. Check their reporting.
Fox does the opposite. Both are lying scumbags, just because you like the lies of one the scumbags does not make that scumbag unbiased.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Think the Government and the British state don't have a large measure of control? Think again
Officially they don't. There have been numerous governments that have criticised the reporting of the BBC but been unable to prevent it - the BBC dutifully reported NATO airstrike civilian victims during the Balkans wars, leading to government criticism that BBC in fact stood for "Belgrade Broadcasting Corporation":
"During the Nato bombing campaign the British government was sharply critical of BBC coverage. At one stage some government officials referred to us as the Belgrade Broadcasting Corporation."- The Guardian
Now, contrast this situation with an actual state controlled media - do you think such a media would even be allowed to report on civilians killed by the state military (a fact that goes against the military line that these are "no-collateral-damage precision airstrikes"?) And to continue to report on such victims of your military, even when it angers and displeases the government? And it was not just the Kosovo War, during the Falklands War government ministers accused the BBC of unpatriotic and neutral reporting - one minister angrily naming it the "Stateless Person's Broadcasting Corporation", another the "Bolshevik Broadcasting Corporation".
The notion that the TV license isn't a tax and the BBC isn't state-controlled is a delusion.
Compare the BBC and its successive spats with various governments to an actual state-controlled media and you will see a big difference. Do you think that real state-controlled media broadcasts any criticisms of the government? Would a real state-controlled media be allowed to report repeatedly on allegations that the government mis-represented the evidence for going to war? If so, why do we not see this kind of criticism coming out of, say, the Chinese state media?
Well I think the first problem is that you assume that "in order to vote on something correctly we need to know what is going on". The problem is that the actual voting process is completely agnostic to whether you actually know anything or not. Even if you were to make a scientific study and analysis of a certain policy up for vote, there will be the hundreds who won't bother studying the question at all. The democratic process has no intrinsic method of filtering competence from incompetence at the voting booth. In fact to even suggest something like a requirement to vote (such as property ownership) , have been deemed 'undemocratic'.
The problem is actually more fundamental than just good media, and I don't see an easy answer.
If there were protests in California (with 1 policeman and 8 rioters dead) and Russia would send tens of thousands of troops and tanks to California, to which US responded by attacking invading Russians... would that be considered an unprovoked attack on "international peace-keepers" as well?
All war activities (including bombing) started after Russian invasion in Georgia, what country in its right state of mind wouldn't defend itself?
South Ossetia is still under Russian military occupation...
5) Other: BBC -like,
that is a public news service, funded by the taxation or a license. Yes, it is not fully free from the government control, but it is still better than commercial services which seem to be levitating to more entertainment (cats) and to less expensive reporting (Syria).
Call me Western capitalist whore if you like.
Western capitalist whore!
That's not really the cause of the situation, though. The cause is that the self described bastions of free media aren't doing the job they promise their readership, and haven't done so in at least a generation. So the readership has wised up and no longer spends money on newspapers and "serious' magazines as they used to, and the alternatives "state sponsored media" therefore have an evolutionary advantage.
The solution isn't for the public to bite the bullet and accept unpalatable new ways to fund media, the solution is for the old media giants to either die off (most likely) or return to offering a quality product (most unlikely).
You're right about this, Celerant, but I have to point out that more people will vote sensibly if they have easy access to good information. Yes, most people are pretty feckless about it, and probably always will be (with no easy solution, as you've mentioned), but to my mind, "every little bit helps."
teh intarnet
Good suggestion.
From what I've gathered, it's similar to PBS and such, but with much more "serious" funding. I am, of course, "antsy" about the nearly-unavoidable government influence on anything the govt. funds, but if it can be somehow overseen in a meaningful way or mostly independent of such funding (perhaps by having its own income sources), this would be less of a problem.
This is the reason I develop Bitcoin. We desperately need a funding method to help keep the internet alive, but all the current "solutions" are easily corruptible (see PayPal/Visa/MasterCard and Wikileaks) *and* have a ton of friction involved - think of all the hoops needed for a sub-$1 payment - most just don't bother and go fuckit.
Once we inject the slightest flow of frictionless money into creative works on the internet, it will fuel a boom in media and free culture (including free software). Donation driven distributed patronage now becomes the norm and allows the consumers to connect with the producers on a more personal level, even becoming producers themselves.
In the online poker world, there is the possibility to send funds between sites. Because of this there is a rich community of people sending funds among each other, betting on StarCraft games, selling poker skins, posts with rewards for the best answer and so on. It's like when there's a tiny bit of money, there is a minature boom of activity and producitivity in that area. To borrow an analogy: in the highest poker play money games, nobody cares how they play and just click random buttons. But in the lowest *real money* games for 1c/2c, shit becomes serious. People start folding hands and thinking strategy. The leap in skill level is enormous, and only grows exponentially as you go up in poker stakes. Despite being a tiny injection of funds, people start playing to win, not playing out of boredom (mindlessly clicking anything or going allin every hand). Suddenly there is money on the table and the stakes have been raised.
I see the same thing happening with digital culture as Bitcoin becomes a real possibility in the future.
Unfortunately the BBC TV is no longer the 'bastion of truth' that it used to be. With the introduction of 24hr news, it has fallen into the trap of chasing quick and cheap headlines , much like a tabloid newspaper, and is really now just a marketing outlet for better prepared organizations to deliver their message to one and all. Look for any searching questions or background checks on the 'experts' and you will be watching for a long, long time. It is quite rare to find strong cases made for issues against the BBC's own agenda, which is of course very left of center politically. BBC radio is a better option for informed debate and comment.
Contrast that with RT. Laughable you say ?
Well, I find some of the programmes far more informative since they actually debate and argue the issues rather than delivering the official line, as with the BBC.
Lets take a look at three progs from RT that you wouldn't get on the state sponsored BBC.
Julian Assange show: The world tomorrow.
Love him or hate him, what you get is influential world figures giving their point of view direct.
Far more informative than the spun versions of isolated quotes you get in mainstream.
Keiser report:
Difficult to find too much wrong with the logic delivered by this guy.
Alternatively, you can listen to the BBC , IMF, Euro muppets etc. telling you every 6 months that "The banks are NOW solvent".
(at least even they have been questioning the rhetoric recently, but it took some years AND they simply don't dig deep enough)
Cross Talk:
You actually get debates / heated arguments about the issues. Again, much better than some PR exec delivering a sermon.
So I'd say that if you want to have a rounded , informed opinion, then you need to take channels such as RT onboard and not dismiss them as some 1970's Soviet mouthpiece, which I'm sure they were in the past. They even had a debate criticizing Putin heavily a while back when he was being re-elected.
You western capitalist....
The BBC is pretty good.
The CBC (Canada) is generally decent, but is pretty left leaning, even for Canada.
I'm finding too many errors in "news" articles, some of it is nitpicking, but some of it is blantantly wrong. I've switched to being skeptical on everything.
I think the thing about the BBC is that while they are state "sponsored" (extorted?), due to clever maneuvering, they have more influence on their government, than vice-versa.
Not sure if that makes things any better...
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
Getting reports on explosions in marketplaces (Side note: It's horrible how blase we are about such things!) isn't the thing we will be missing. It's the hidden stories that take time to get at. A TV station can put a report on a blast together from social media sources and footage bought from local media cheaply. So they always will - it bleeds, it leads.
But telling you the story on why it is happening, how your government is involved, and how it is going to affect you requires reporters on the ground, who have worked for years understanding the culture and cultivating relationships that allow them to get the information. Expensive stuff.
That is going to apply to local stuff too. There are reports that can't be delivered by a part-time blogger. If cash strapped media has no more resources than them, what happens? How do we find out about this century's Watergates?
In 'free' countries, you have independent state-funded media outlets to take up the slack - ABC in Australia, BBC in UK, and other examples in other countries. Most of them doing a decent job. But is that something to rely on?
You are always going to be told about terrorists in Syria. What you are not going to get is the important stories. And knowledge if the important stories has been an important part of society. And, no, I don't have a solution to offer.
Prediction for end of Universe #42: Fencepost error in Quantum_bogosort.cpp
a cheap roundup of cat pictures, is quite possibly going to pull in way more views for less money than a nuanced, deeply reported, and expensive dispatch from Syria.
... I prefer Fuzzies to Muzzies
State Sponsored is the problem with the wording
The BBC is funded via the government (through a tax on possessing equipment capable of receiving) but is not government controlled, how independent it is is a matter for debate, but the alternatives in the UK have not shown they are any more independent of government influence ...
RT is government funded, controlled and run ...
Puteulanus fenestra mortis
If you think Fox News or the BBC or NPR don't already have a strong editorial bias, you're fooling yourself. Even if politically neutral (which none of them are), they all have a market-bias (commercial or otherwise). Fox of course is trying to embarrass its compeition, NPR is deliberately slamming Fox during its begging, er, 'pledge' drives.
At least with government-controlled media, the bias will be overt and inarguable.
-Styopa
Maybe in the future, you'll have ordinary citizens posting their short (tweet-like) reports, photos or videos of a breaking or continuing event to a refereed news site.
It will be the job of designated editors to filter the truth from the trolls and propagandists. The editors will be helped by simple algorithms. Posters who have already proved reliable both in terms of information and timeliness will receive the equivalent of a karma bonus, making them a more attractive "source" for the editors.
This Is different from Wikinews, which doesn't differentiate between reporters and editors. Everybody can report and edit.
I'd rather take several different state-funded television stations than several corporate-funded ones. The latter all have similar agendas because their funding all comes from the same place, the former tend to report accurately when their particular state is not involved and thus tend to complement each other.
It has an overall budget that the government provides, but the government gets no say in how it is spent ...
It has a controlling BBC Trust who regulate it, but have no say in the day to day running
It has a public service broadcasting remit so it must produce a certain amount of certain types of programmes, and it must get approval for new ventures from the Trust, but otherwise it is run as a non-profit company ...
Like PBS with money, a remit to produce good worthy programs, and government oversight at arms length ...
Puteulanus fenestra mortis
I think that we will end up with individual reporters posting to the web, supported by subscription. If you have access to a copy of Marc Stiegler's Earthweb, read it, paying particular attention to the part where the reporter interviews "The Predictor".
I know 2 newspaper persons who moved to work at Al Jazeera 7 years ago. They got far better pay and were able to write stories without editors (and managers / owners / advertisers / etc...) interfering. The money is spent on actual journalists, not talking heads and management. Al Jazeera are doing it better - that's all.
Thanks for the information, JasterBobaMereel. This does sound quite good.
This article is red meat for right wing and libertarian nutjobs.
Sorry but this is almost all wrong. The BBC has never been government-controlled. It is state-owned and has been since 1927. It is not a private corporation at all.
It is subject to public service broadcasting requirements (as are Channel 4 and ITV, but not sure about Sky) and of course it has to comply with stuff like DA-notices but those apply to the whole media.
I have to agree that it isn't quite as good as it was, but IMVHO it is still ahead of the most popular traditional media in the US. There are quality US outlets though, but they're just not huge organisations.
The point, and it is a valid one is that purely being state media doesn't define poor/biased reporting. Obviously the BBC is much more independent than Xinhua, which is great.
All news will have a bias. News International probably has more bias than many state media outlets. Charity or non-profit news will still show the bias of the people running it.
Our local political parties pay people to sloganeer in the comments of the local online newspaper. This sloganeering ruins the experience for everyone else. Since they apparently have stacks of cash to pay college students to astroturf, they should share the love and charge astroturfers a fair and reasonable advertising rate. So end anonymity, force commenters to post while linked to a facebook profile, and start charging on a sliding scale. Other than the charging, thats Exactly what my local dying newspaper is slowly moving toward doing online.
Not just politics but anything real estate related has astroturfers spamming the comments section, etc. Especially restaurant reviews, where if they charged astroturfers, it would be a license to print money.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
To be fair, the BBC seems to be more like state sponsored media of other governments...Pravda for instance or China Daily.
It seems like you have a perspective problem. If you're used to only having self-funded or advertising-funded media, then all "state-funded" media must be the same. But they're not.
The BBC collects its license fee itself. If you don't feel like funding the BBC, don't buy a TV. RT is funded centrally from tax money. Russian income tax pays for it whether you have a TV or not.
The Russian government owns RT. The British government does not own the BBC. At best, they own the decision about which private corporation has the right to be the national broadcaster and could take that away from the BBC.
The Russian government decides at all levels who runs RT, as it owns it. The UK government only gets to decide the BBC's director general and its charter; much like shareholders in a private company, the UK government is an outsider with a stake in the BBC, rather than the operator.
The Russian government likely tells RT what to say. The BBC frequently says things the the UK government doesn't want broadcast and has to take the BBC to court because it has no control over what the BBC says beyond "we might recommend to the independent review body that they cut your funding in 2016".
If the BBC was located in Russia and acted the way it does in Britain, the Russian government would have closed it down and murdered its chief executive by now.
The BBC's equivalent to RT is a small part of the BBC called the World Service - this is not the same as BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of the BBC. The World Service has always been funded directly by the state, from taxes, but from 2014 onwards the BBC has to pay for it by itself.
Does my bum look big in this?
It has an overall budget that the government provides, but the government gets no say in how it is spent ...
How naive can you possibly be?
All of a sudden, the hint gets dropped that the budget will be lowered unless a couple of those politically annoying reporters get sacked.
It has a public service broadcasting remit so it must produce a certain amount of certain types of programmes, and it must get approval for new ventures from the Trust, but otherwise it is run as a non-profit company... Like PBS with money, a remit to produce good worthy programs, and government oversight at arms length ...
What are "good worthy programs"? What constitutes "government oversight at arms length"? Who sets the quotas for "certain types of programmes"? These are decisions that should be made in the Free Market. It is dangerous to put your faith in a centralized power structure run by supposedly "noble" bureaucrats, who gaze into their crystal balls and then push and pull naive buttons and levers based on what they think they see—there is no such thing as an Intelligent Designer.
What could possibly go wrong. /s
I think state media is fine if it exists in competition with private media. But the supposed separation between the journalists and the people writing checks is at best a wire mesh door. It might stop overt manipulation but you're not going to get a state media that is highly critical of it's primary backers in government.
You might get the state media to attack one party in political systems that have more then one party. But they'll be consistently loyal to a given political faction. That is their camp in the government and separated from that alliance they wouldn't be able to attack either party.
It's amusing hearing countries like China, Russia, or Saudi Arabia being cited as examples of successful state media. These are all countries with spotty histories of tolerating political decent in media. In all three countries journalists have been jailed or killed at intervals for rocking the boat.
So sure, state media is working in those countries but in large part that's because it isn't totally safe to be a journalist in those countries. Russia has gotten a lot better and china is getting better. But there are always lingering allegations of secret police shutting up journalists. Not long ago an outspoken critic of Putin was killed in a mugging. And the notion that it was actually an assassination of a political critic was a popular conspiracy theory. No one besides the muggers really knows what happened. And both China and Saudi Arabia still openly jail journalists that piss off the wrong people in government.
I have no problem with state media. But if it's your primary source for news then you're ultimately having your impression of the world formed by at least one powerful faction in the government if not the ruling faction. Private media is also biased. But it tends to be the bias of the owners which can be a much smaller faction in the society. Further, where private media exists there tends to be a lot of it. And while one source can be biased most of the bias is canceled out if you consume a lot of different media.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
The one-credit-card rule is to make it harder for political parties to bankroll lots of students, especially under-18s.
If I want to say that Councillor Bent Warpson is a thief, a liar and a serial sheep abuser, I can always write the local newspaper a letter.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Budget is set on a yearly or biannual basis, cannot be changed fast enough to punish one reporter ...
Any government threats are likely to be leaked to the press before any pressure could be served
The types of programmes are set by the BBC Trust, are long term and not reactionary to current events, and published freely
The competition, (ITV, Channel 5, and BSkyB mainly ...) are free market and mostly compete with each other, but are held to the standards of the BBC, and constantly complain about getting compared to it because they would prefer to make more cheap reality shows but are forced to make quality programs simply to not look shoddy compared to the BBC ...
I don't trust 'noble' bureaucrats...I trust journalists that don't like government interference and will shout when they see it ...
Puteulanus fenestra mortis
In addition to state funded we should include other agenda-funded media like the Murdoch empire.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
BBC is a public broadcasting service in the UK & its funding is provided by the government through a tax levied on UK residents. Although operations outside of the UK are not funded by the UK government & the BBC runs more as a commercial news entity
Assoc Press rec's funding from member news organizations, so it would seem likely that they will remain on the job internationally. If newspapers can't afford to mount their own offshore news coverage, it makes sense that the funding received from all of its members would pay for offshore reporting for all of its members. It's a good economy of scale achieved that way
NPR has world wide coverage of serious news, and is less biased than most news outlets
Corporate media can be as bad as state run media. There was/is barely any criticism of the Iraq and Afghan wars in the US mainstream press. Good luck finding more than a few select criticisms of any soldiers either. The army has become a sacred cow in the US; angels with machine guns it seems.
I prefer the BBC and the CS Monitor over the major news sites like CNN or MSNBC. Fox News might as well be USSR era Pravda. The NYT is somewhere in the middle.
Hey, that's a neat trick!
"State government's aren't funded by sales taxes, they're funded by a license fee on retail purchases."
"Local public schools aren't funded by property taxes, they're funded by a land-ownership license fee."
"Roads aren't funded by gasoline taxes, they're funded by the pump license."
What's next? "We don't send people to jail, they just go on a 'Graybar Vacation'."
I'm stupid enough to be fooled by labels ... and I vote!
Information theory is life. The rest is just the KL divergence.
That's a distinction without a difference.
But where is the money going to come from to hire these “qualified agents”? That’s the issue for me, and I think Derkmead has it right.
Newspapers where a bundled item. You got 1. “qualified agents” (a.k.a. reporters) and 2. A distribution channel.
The Internet does a wonderful job of distribution and aggregating information. Wiki, Google, and it’s ilk do a decent job of promoting and editing important stuff. What it does not do well is original, unbiased research.
But you still need a unbiased reporter on the ground in Syria taking pictures gathering data. This is something the Internet is good a providing. It’s got ADD and has a hard time concentrating on a single issue at depth.
The government is looking to change it's independance right now (interview are happening 'now'), and they have specifically allowed 'politically influenced' candidates - which people are NOT happy about.
we need a watson-like news aggregation to read all the sources of news for us and then glean the truth
even if any one state news product is biased on particular events every state news product won't be biased the same way regarding the same event the same way
and if anything aggregating multiple news sources would produce a more reliable picture of the "truth" then any one trusted news source
Not in any meaningful way, thanks to the charter.
In addition to right-wing agenda-funded media you should include other agenda-funded media like GE and George Soros.
First, even if you don't consider the license fee a true tax, the BBC World Service is directly funded by the Foreign Office.
Second, the BBC Trust which governs the BBC is run by appointees of the crown and confirmed by British government. The trust has ultimate oversight and appoints the Director General of the corporation who acts as both editor-in-chief and chairman of the board of executives. I fail to see how this is somehow `independent' of the British government.
So it seems to me that calling the BBC independent in a way that al-Jazeera or RT is not independent is special pleading. Especially al-Jazeera which has a goal of eventually becoming self-funding through advertising and licensing deals. After initial funding, its only continued government subsidies have taken the form of loans.
That said, there are meaningful differences. RT is more tabloid. They cover many (if not most issues) in a sensational way, especially if doing so can poke "The West" in the eye. A fair argument can also be made that RT is more tightly controlled by the Kremlin. But that is more a function of the nature of the Russian regime compared to the British government than a difference in kind in how the organization relates to the government.
My solution sucks: wait. Wait for the lies, deceptions, secrets and rumors to start choking our society. Wait until people find bulldozers at their front lawn because nobody told them about the secret backroom deal the city council did with the land developer. Wait until children die by the millions, because nobody showed their parents what was medicine and what was quackery. Wait until the cops are shaking people down for protection money, but nobody can complain. Wait until we repeat our own lies to ourselves so completely that society howls and shrieks with amplifier feedback.
*Then* people will understand the value of good journalism, and be willing to pay for it. The only question is, will they be able to?
"What it does not do well is original, unbiased research."
The traditional media don't do that either.
1) It may turn up information sponsors don't want known.
2) It may criticise a group who will complain to sponsors
3) It may embarrass the owners
4) It's more work
5) Nobody cares
although that last one is the perception of the marketing department and owners more than the truth. It's true enough for enough people to keep making money, though. The internet does a much better job of unbiased research. In fact, doing ANY research at all is better than traditional media manage today.
are the best news outlets out there simply because they report on real newsworthy events like politics, the economy, world conflicts, and so on. NPR has become a series of puff pieces on sports and entertainment with perhaps one or two very *badly* researched news stories. CNN too focuses on entertainment. Fox is a propaganda noise machine. The networks are bland pablum, safe for 6- and 86-year olds, while the rest of the USA's media are at the level of Entertainment Tonight, The National Enquirer, AM talk radio and NewsMax.
If you want real news now, you go international. You go to blogs. You go to the remaining local papers across the world. Any privately owned major media outlet now is just a corporate propaganda and distraction device.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
"I suggest that interested individuals read "propaganda" by Edward Burnayes, whom was the nephew of Sigmud Freud but far more influential, by being responsible for corporate perception management in the USA."
http://archive.org/details/AdamCurtis_TheCenturyOfTheSelf
Canadians support TPP by staying at home/work
Posted by: ID0001212 on May 12, 2014
Carly Dodd from Washington, DC writes:
Today tens of millions of Canadians showed their support for the TPP Agreement by staying at home, going to school or work as usual. Aside from the international trade benefits, Canadian media conglomerates will have an extra 20 years to monetize their assets before they become economically irrelevant (also known as "Public Domain").
A sentiment StateDot can only full-heartedly agree to.
Read the 2 comments./p>
Here's how the BBC gets funded:
The TVLA collects the license fee. They give that license fee to the BBC. End of story.
Land ownership license fees (rates) are paid by the landowner to the local government. That money doesn't go to the schools directly.
Pump licenses (petrol taxes) are paid by the car owner to the central government. That money doesn't go to the road fund directly.
You really ARE stupid enough to be fooled by labels. You have just demonstrated it. "Oh, if I'm forced to pay IT'S A TAX!!!!! EBUL TAXESSS!!!!".
You fuckwit.
Listening to the BBC in comparison to RT or Euronews is a bit like watching Eastenders in comparison to The Good Life, or Holby City in comparison to Scrubs.
I don't think there is any evidence that the decline of the corporate advertising vehicles that make up the major commercial "news" media has made people less able to know what is going on.
I also think its amusing to see the decline of the influence of a set of outlets including the BBC and the rise of a set of outlets including Al Jazeera portrayed as the decline of private news media in favor of state outlets. The BBC is no less a state outlet than Al Jazeera is.
Traditional news media is free-as-in-beer ad-sponsored media, they aren't alternatives to each other. At least, traditional broadcast news is; traditional newspapers might as well be -- the retail cost (and even moreso the subscription cost) is nominal and doesn't even cover the cost of printing, but exists largely so that newspapers can have paid circulation (i.e., people that can reasonably be expected to be reading it) numbers to use in marketing to advertisers.
Special legal protections for institutional journalists (as opposed to those that apply to anyone performing a journalistic function regardless of institutional status) are a form of state sponsorship of institutional media outlets.
Newspapers are not dying everywhere in the world, you know? I know it's happening a lot in the US, but we Europeans seem to keep buying and reading them :)
I can't speak for everyone, but I know my [country's] newspapers are doing very well thanks to both print and the web/apps. Lots of new revenue options including non-news services.
secure.wikimedia.org, Nice link for those of us who miss a 'news hour' that actually contained mostly news. Thanks...
Fox TOLD us they lie. They told us they want the RIGHT to lie.
And there are objective facts. The colour of a clear sky is not a matter of opinion. If you are unable to accept there are any objective facts, you are a Fox News watcher.
What could possibly go wrong? Oh wait, in the USA, they're the same now.
Same question though.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
BBC is is what you want an independent academically styled institution to be. The truth will out so to speak.
The Cameron and Harper governments are both not fond of the BBC or CBC news arms respectively, because as arms length organizations interested in facts gets in the way of their narratives. But of course that happens to every government to some degree. When you give people free speech and tenure they'll say things you don't like. The BBC over the years has made the case very that they are interested in reporting facts, and the public on the whole, including the public outside the UK generally recognize that.
In the particular hot spots of the world right now Xinhua and Al Jazeera and Russian state news agencies have special access in that the people in question don't want to make enemies of China/Russia or the arab people. They're already enemies of the UK so shooting BBC reporters wouldn't be much of an added burden for them.
The 'programming' arms of BBC and CBC, that bid for olympics and TV shows and so on are probably legitimately not needed at a public level anymore. There was a time when you wanted to ensure quality programming was available to anyone on the cheapest TV and Radio options available, but I think the time and mechanism for that have moved on, at least from how they're doing things now.
...angels with machine guns it seems.
Well, you're close
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
You do what politicians do in Canada - you cut funding. The CBC is effectively state-sponsored and they manage to piss everyone off because they cover things that'll make everyone hate them at one time or another. The conservatives see them as too liberal, the liberals see them as too conservative and they run programming that often irritates those in power
I believe what it's really saying is that the 'Anglosphere' might no longer be able to dominate coverage of world events.
The state vs private spin is largely made up to play on the readers' cultural insecurities: There is no "private" news bureau from the post-1990s West that hasn't been driven out of existence or made extensive campaign contributions and deals that provide, among other things, control over access to most of our culture in the form of maximalist 'IP' laws, regional monopolies in some parts of the US (and the possibility to form more), and an "embedded with the military" status. We are talking about the media aspect of the corporate plutocracy... they no longer get the benefit of being considered separate from the state.
As far as pure funding goes (in the direction of the media) the BBC's foreign reporting is funded from the UK government's budget. PBS and NPR receive significant funding from the US government budget. But in light of the above, it seems almost quaint to point this out.
I thought the UK sponsored Al Jazeera as well.
Remember kids, if you're not paying for the service, YOU ARE THE PRODUCT THAT IS BEING SOLD.
It sounds to me like we've got two types of "News" that are at issue here. Current Events and In Depth Reporting. For current events issues, all we really need to know is what's happening now. That can be inexpensive to produce in most instances and distribution happens almost automatically over the internet. This type of news can be ad supported as it doesn't require a lot of expenditures.
The In Depth Reporting though, that seems to me to be the pervue of News Magazines. That's the kind of thing that should be paywalled / subscription based. While I may not personally choose to subscribe to Newsweek for example, I might prefer to pay a slightly smaller sum of money to view their content online. This is something that ISPs could use to distance themselves from their competition. I could go with Plan A from a local ISP, say my regional cable monopoly, and get internet access for X number of dollars. Or, I could go with Plan B from them for X + n dollars, but that also grants access to a selection of "premium" internet content, including news sites that are normally behind a paywall. Perhaps the local Telco is also an ISP and can offer a different package for a different price. This kind of thing could be VERY popular in the future. It would also provide a constant revenue stream to those news services that could help them in providing the kind of well researched articles that we want.
That is the future I see. Current EVents being reported through advertising payed for sites and in depth news being relegated to paywalled stes from traditional and non-traditional news magazines or whatever they evolve into.
I, for one, welcome our new computer overlords.
Reading it helps me feel like a useful idiot.
Have you come across information clearing house? I've been looking for reliable, independent news media for a while and while I've found a few good sources I like I'm kind of on the fence about this guy. He is very open about what he does and why he does it, and he manages to dig up a lot of well-cited stories that I wouldn't hear about elsewhere. The editorial bias is thick, but he's upfront about it and seems to provide a good service simply because he's passionate about it.
Thoughts?
Much Madness is divinest Sense --
To a discerning Eye --
Much Sense -- the starkest Madness
Yes, in the past the BBC has gone against the government (Christine Hamilton, wife of a prominent Tory, said it stood for Buggars Broadcasting Communism, but then again she is a stupid bitch) - but it has been defanged ever since it reported (correctly) that the Dodgy Dossier was a load of BS, but weren't able to back up their reporting to the standard a government inquiry demanded. Its worth noting, that the outright fabrications in the dossier were subject to no such official scrutiny. Since then, the BBC has been much more careful, and much less willing to take the government to task.
The BBC reported the collapse of WTC7 (the third tower to collapse on 9/11 even though it was not hit by an airplane) approximately 23 minutes before it happened. With the building still standing behind her in plain view, Jane Standley reported "live" that the collapse had already happened. It's actually quite funny how the BBC quickly tried to cover it up, "lost" the tapes, and denied everything. The video is freely available online so they were finally forced to apologize, citing the "confusion of the day".
http://www.wtc7.net/bbc.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ky90eEIzStw
Oh, should I have sugar-coated that?
It still is, but Rupert Murdoch continues to work to change that, by hook or by crook.
Besides the independence that people below have noted, I also think it's a big difference between being state-run and party-run. Having connections to the state isn't a bad thing, having direct connections with just one party is. The powerful, one party countries like China blur that distinction, and so a lot of people have come to think of them as one of the same, but they are not.
There are numerous examples of decent state owned media outlets with as even of a slant as any other outlet, if not more so. On the flip side, there are several news outlets right here in the States even that though privately owned, have heavy ties to one party that are more political platform and awful new sources.
The CBC was pretty left-leaning.
Even now it tries, and could be called directly responsible for the implementation of some of Canada's best social programs.
However its currently being silenced on most issues by the Harper Government. Its actually ridiculous the amount of control he's been exerting over the CBC.
I guess this is my confusion over the increasing reliance on advertising, and the decreasing educational programming and replacement with reality television over the years. so once I heard that they were going to change from the board of governors to the trust model with executive leadership I assumed it was changing into a private model just as margaret thatcher would have loved.
Well, there is only ONE state where as corporations tend to exist in competition.
That doesn't mean all the corps can't have the same bias. But a government news source is going to be ONE voice controlled by a faction in the government. Without exception. With corporations you get what amounts to the voices of the owners. So that's going to be rich guys which I'm assuming you don't like for some reason... never mind that your political causes are likely bankrolled by them. But whatever.
If you look at campaign finance statistics you might question some of your positions. Just saying.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
All corporation do have one bias. They are all serve themselves. Concentrations of media ownership means you only get the points of view that serve the ownership of those major corporation. Specifically, that's these guys: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlocking_directorate.
Feel free to find a real conflict between them. I'd be interested to know what that might be.
The problem with "rich guys" is that they effectively have become the government. Money = power, and a portion of that power comes from media ownership. As for "political causes," I'd like not to be ruled by an oligarchy of the wealthy as I have an old fashioned affection for democracy and have the perception to have noticed that while an inventor or an entrepreneur is productive, a hedge fund synthetic derivatives trader is a parasite.
Having a government that responds to middle class folks like me depends on having a minimal parasite load.
If you only know about business or politics, you won't get this.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
rt and al jazeera have much better in-depth coverage of events than the biased fluff pieces US media run. also US media don't cover anything outside the US. a classic example was CNN `international` I saw last year in Kuala Lumpur where all five `international` news stories were about the US.
Yes but in serving themselves they don't serve each other.
They have to make an argument for tuning into or buying their newspaper and not someone else's. Or clicking on their weblink and not someone else's.
And you can't pretend that all media companies love each other. They don't. The might respect each other but there are bitter rivalries some of them outright hate each other.
Your general anti corporate argument is lazy and ignores the actual complexity of the issue.
Again, I'm not saying there aren't prevailing biases but you'll find such things in any human organization.
For example, lets say we set up 300 MILLION news stations. We'll use magic for this... some how everyone has their own news station and everyone has total control over it. Would it surprise you if ALL of them had consistent biases amongst them? That is nearly all of them would have certain biases or prejudices?
It shouldn't. They're people. People are like that. They're not gods. They are prone to such things. And the foolish conceit is that journalists are capable of being unbiased. They can try but you can't help being biased. Everyone has a perspective. And media outlets even if they try to be unbiased will be. They can't help it.
As to rich guys... I don't have enough deodorant for that conversation.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Which I find odd, because I've been fairly satisfied with reporting of RT and Al-J(at least when it comes to reporting on international stuff like US government activities), but the BBC is utterly wretched when it matters. Their war mongering in 2002-3(they had one of the largest ratios of pro-invasion interview airtime to anti-invasion) was just unforgivable. Meanwhile all the stuff I see on RT completely bucks that trend. Maybe they appear more trustworthy to me because they are not prone to sucking up to the USG for securing interviews and favorable legislation. I have no idea if they behave similarly with respect to the government that has power over them.
I would gladly pay for non-agendized news.
If that is not already a word I claim it.
john
The main problem with western media is that those who enter "Journalism" tend to have a socialist/left political bias. The result is worse than RT and XInhua as its promoted as a free press. Another problem is the change to "Journalist" rather than "Reporter", It used to be "Report the facts/truth" a credo I personally haven't heard for a long time
Your'e all thinking it, I just said it for you
I have no idea if they behave similarly with respect to the government that has power over them.
Yes, they do behave similarly. I prefer not to watch what RT is reporting about Russia and, respectively, what Al Jazeera is reporting about Quatar's interest spots, such as Syria and Libya.
Let's make the distinction explicit then, because this argument is rather fact-less so far.
The TV license fee is set by one agency and benefits another (government and BBC). Taxation is set by the same agency that benefits from it (government). That is an unambiguous difference.
More insightful than you think: this is the "last resort" solution by way of being a more-or-less unavoidable eventuality--unless one of the other solutions manages to "fix" things. We'll keep this one in our "back pocket," eh? ;-)
I guess this is my confusion over the increasing reliance on advertising, and the decreasing educational programming and replacement with reality television over the years.
Have you tried the other BBC channels outside One and Two? I think BBC Four has a lot of the educational stuff now - I may be wrong here, I always go through iPlayer to watch anything, but recently I watched a program where some scientists discussed plans for a probe exploring the solar system, and my partner watched a short series on the role of women in British history. QI is a very popular show (and is on either BBC One or Two) that seems to educate a lot of people.
The BBC collects its license fee itself. If you don't feel like funding the BBC, don't buy a TV.
Pedantic mode: You need to pay a license if you have any device that you use to watch or record programs as they are being broadcast (which can include computers, phones etc.). You can have a TV and not pay the license fee if you do not use it to watch programs as they are being broadcast - I didn't pay it when I was a student because I only used my TV to watch DVDs and play a games console (I didn't even have an aerial). Source: http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/check-if-you-need-one/topics/what-if-a-tv-licence-is-not-needed-top12/
The Russian government likely tells RT what to say. The BBC frequently says things the the UK government doesn't want broadcast and has to take the BBC to court because it has no control over what the BBC says beyond "we might recommend to the independent review body that they cut your funding in 2016".
The BBC is also one of the few places to report on news about criticism to itself. The most recent example if reporting on a story about a presenter of one of its TV shows engaging in tax evasion. Contrast to, for example, newspapers reporting the bad things being uncovered by rival papers in the Levison enquiry, but omitting to mention anything uncovered about themselves.
In either case, the government can use the power of the purse to control the news outlet's actions. The distinction between taxes and licenses makes no difference to the power relationship between the BBC and its government.
There are countries where a tax on blank media goes to music/video/content producers. That doesn't mean they're government controlled. Maybe the other way round....
The BBC is independent, if you don't believe this search for Jeremy Paxman and see how much regard the BBC gives our elected ministers.
If you think someone isn't free to have a different definition of "freedom" you may be a tyrant.