Do you brown-shirts have nothing better to do than post your nazi ravings on slashdot? I respected this area as a place for the most intelligent people I ever knew to post, and I still do, so I hope never to see such as this posted under the guise of "comment".
I hear and agree with those who say the internet today is more important for news than any other medium. You can listen to the BBC or C4 on television, and their coverage of the live events was incomparable. Recent events were seen simultaneously on television by people around the western world.
However, when we start to look at the reporting of an event's aftermath, we see a different picture emerging. We get the plain facts (presidential speeches) etc. but the opinions are entirely those of the "political class", those who frequent the offices of government, and mainly those who agree with their government. Anyone anti-government typically has a problem creating a serious image on TV or radio, and comes off looking silly against the groomed, professional anchormen and ministers.
Now, we look at the net. For the basic information, everything is there, not just transcripts of the speeches, but audio and video too. The more sites it appears on, the more you can trust it. (I assumed the bombings on TV were a hoax or a film until I noticed it on all 4 channels) Sure, you might not trust the CNN website for whatever reason, but you can open 20 other news websites in 20 browser windows, and get the same story from all the angles, from various countries.
However, I find that many of the big news sites, those of TV stations, those of newspapers, those of the BBC tend to echo the opinions of their reporters in traditional media. No surprise there, but it still lacks the "opposing view" so essential to the balanced presentation of news.
But then I found slashdot, where people write the news for themselves. Since I started reading slashdot articles, I've only gone back to the BBC one or two times, to confirm things posted here. The "peer-to-peer news reporting" is much more useful than traditional websites, as people get the chance to discuss the news. If someone posts incorrect data, then you can read the comments, and see what the consensus is. You don't need to curse the smug newsreader on your TV; if you have a correction, you can say it.
So well done to everyone at slashdot for making the idea of internet news really work. The internet will become the staple of news coverage, especially for those in offices all day, and I hope that peer-posted and reviewed news sites become the standard in years to come.
So what does the record industry hope to achieve? They flounder in random directions with no strategic plan, and nobody who knows what they want the future of music to be?
So what's happening at the moment? I can't buy CD's from the shop (here in the UK) because they're becoming "copy protected" so that I can't play them on my computer.
But hang on, aren't all the computer manufacturers making most of their money selling CD players, sound-cards, DVD players and CD-rewriters to the public? To the naive home-users who don't realise that they are being cheated of the ability to play music?
To say nothing of the record shops themselves? Copy protection? Great. But how do they hope to deal with the slump in blank CDRs?
Or with the people who would have bought a CD on the premise that they could copy it, but now don't? (That's still a sale, even if it gets copied)
Or with the people whose main Hi-fi / CD-player is their brand-new computer, and will soon not be _able_ to buy CDs.
Or the people who pay hundreds of pounds for portable MP3 players (fuelling remarkable innovation in the industry) to play only songs which are available on their computers.
From the user's perspective, the future seems remarkably clear. If people want music, they have to go to iMesh or Filetopia. They get to sample music from new bands, and if they like those bands enough, they can go and get the CD, to save themselves days on the modem. Users happy, record-shops happy.
At least they could until now. So the record industry want to "erase" music players from our computers? They want the new windows with copy-protected music formats, they want to put people who download music in jail, and threaten their ISPs, they want to sue, sue, sue anyone involved.
So what options are they leaving their customers? "Just buy the damn CD, and who cares if you can't play it" they seem to be saying.
Does this not strike you as an industry cornered, scared, thrashing out at anyone they can? Does this not strike you as an industry essentially telling their customers to "go away, don't bother with music any more"
Let's put it in as simple terms as possible then. "If you want to change buying habits, provide something which customers want, and they will buy it." It's not terribly hard.
So, my message to sony, riaa, etc. is, "you didn't create the CD industry by outlawing tapes, you didn't create the tape industry by outlawing records, and you didn't create the record industry by outlawing live performances. So what's changed? If you want us to use something new, provide for us something new, and make it better, otherwise we'll make it ourselves"
Oliver White
London/Nottingham, UK
http://www.blibbleblobble.co.uk/
Slashdot Mirror
Do you brown-shirts have nothing better to do than post your nazi ravings on slashdot? I respected this area as a place for the most intelligent people I ever knew to post, and I still do, so I hope never to see such as this posted under the guise of "comment".
I hear and agree with those who say the internet today is more important for news than any other medium. You can listen to the BBC or C4 on television, and their coverage of the live events was incomparable. Recent events were seen simultaneously on television by people around the western world.
However, when we start to look at the reporting of an event's aftermath, we see a different picture emerging. We get the plain facts (presidential speeches) etc. but the opinions are entirely those of the "political class", those who frequent the offices of government, and mainly those who agree with their government. Anyone anti-government typically has a problem creating a serious image on TV or radio, and comes off looking silly against the groomed, professional anchormen and ministers.
Now, we look at the net. For the basic information, everything is there, not just transcripts of the speeches, but audio and video too. The more sites it appears on, the more you can trust it. (I assumed the bombings on TV were a hoax or a film until I noticed it on all 4 channels) Sure, you might not trust the CNN website for whatever reason, but you can open 20 other news websites in 20 browser windows, and get the same story from all the angles, from various countries.
However, I find that many of the big news sites, those of TV stations, those of newspapers, those of the BBC tend to echo the opinions of their reporters in traditional media. No surprise there, but it still lacks the "opposing view" so essential to the balanced presentation of news.
But then I found slashdot, where people write the news for themselves. Since I started reading slashdot articles, I've only gone back to the BBC one or two times, to confirm things posted here. The "peer-to-peer news reporting" is much more useful than traditional websites, as people get the chance to discuss the news. If someone posts incorrect data, then you can read the comments, and see what the consensus is. You don't need to curse the smug newsreader on your TV; if you have a correction, you can say it.
So well done to everyone at slashdot for making the idea of internet news really work. The internet will become the staple of news coverage, especially for those in offices all day, and I hope that peer-posted and reviewed news sites become the standard in years to come.
Oliver White
My news
So what does the record industry hope to achieve? They flounder in random directions with no strategic plan, and nobody who knows what they want the future of music to be?
So what's happening at the moment? I can't buy CD's from the shop (here in the UK) because they're becoming "copy protected" so that I can't play them on my computer.
But hang on, aren't all the computer manufacturers making most of their money selling CD players, sound-cards, DVD players and CD-rewriters to the public? To the naive home-users who don't realise that they are being cheated of the ability to play music?
To say nothing of the record shops themselves? Copy protection? Great. But how do they hope to deal with the slump in blank CDRs?
Or with the people who would have bought a CD on the premise that they could copy it, but now don't? (That's still a sale, even if it gets copied)
Or with the people whose main Hi-fi / CD-player is their brand-new computer, and will soon not be _able_ to buy CDs.
Or the people who pay hundreds of pounds for portable MP3 players (fuelling remarkable innovation in the industry) to play only songs which are available on their computers.
From the user's perspective, the future seems remarkably clear. If people want music, they have to go to iMesh or Filetopia. They get to sample music from new bands, and if they like those bands enough, they can go and get the CD, to save themselves days on the modem. Users happy, record-shops happy.
At least they could until now. So the record industry want to "erase" music players from our computers? They want the new windows with copy-protected music formats, they want to put people who download music in jail, and threaten their ISPs, they want to sue, sue, sue anyone involved.
So what options are they leaving their customers? "Just buy the damn CD, and who cares if you can't play it" they seem to be saying.
Does this not strike you as an industry cornered, scared, thrashing out at anyone they can? Does this not strike you as an industry essentially telling their customers to "go away, don't bother with music any more"
Let's put it in as simple terms as possible then. "If you want to change buying habits, provide something which customers want, and they will buy it." It's not terribly hard.
So, my message to sony, riaa, etc. is, "you didn't create the CD industry by outlawing tapes, you didn't create the tape industry by outlawing records, and you didn't create the record industry by outlawing live performances. So what's changed? If you want us to use something new, provide for us something new, and make it better, otherwise we'll make it ourselves"
Oliver White
London/Nottingham, UK
http://www.blibbleblobble.co.uk/