OMG so much bull in there I can't even be bothered refuting all of it. Let me just congratulate you on flip-flopping back to the "Bin Laden was no big deal anyway" default position beloved of GW Bush. If Bush had gotten OBL (yeah, big "if" since that would have involved having enough of a brain to send troops to the right fucking country) then you'd have been praising Bush as the greatest president since Lincoln.
Courtesy of US Military intelligence, lasting over eight years or more. Unless you can point to an image of Obama holding an M-16 in one hand and Bin Laden's severed head in the other, he (nor you) can't claim that one.
Going into the right country was kind of a prerequisite for getting the guy. There was plenty of US intelligence that was ignored by Dubya's administration because it didn't fit with their neo-con objective of stealing Iraq's oil. John McCain campaigned on the basis that he would not use force on Pakistani territory without the permission of the government. Obama was proved right on this one, because if he had gotten the government's permission it's a good bet that someone would have tipped Bin Laden's handlers off and he'd still be hiding somewhere. Fact is, the President made all the right calls and has as much right to take the credit for what goes right as he has to take the blame for what goes wrong.
And contrary to the lies spewing out of Fox News who were appalled by Bin Laden's death, Obama gave plenty of credit to the intelligence community and the personnel involved. If he wanted to take all the credit he could have done something really outlandish and obnoxious, like, say... I don't know... dressing up in some sort of flight suit and getting a Navy pilot to land him on the deck of an aircraft carrier before making a triumphant speech about it? Nah, that'd be crazy.
Educate yourself. A recession is two consecutive quarters of negative growth. We're no longer in negative growth. This is not "propaganda". This is fact. (I know that conservatives have a hard time with facts but I'll try my best to use them on you in the vain hope that they'll sink in eventually.)
General Motors and Chrysler, and the industrial heartland of the country, were saved from a catastrophe that would make the dust bowl look like nothing.
They were 'saved' by a loan that was given them when TARP was passed... in 2008. Signed into law by that guy you likely loathe to the core of your soul.
Maybe you missed the bit where Romney said he'd let Detroit go bust. He was opposed to saving the motor industry, Obama was for it. Fact.
An end has come to the era of people being condemned to death by for-profit insurance companies using the excuse of "pre-existing conditions" to deny people their basic human right to health care coverage.
So Medicare and Medicaid didn't exist before 2009 then?
Oh, so if you can't afford health insurance then you automatically qualify for Medicaid? So we do have universal health care after all?
Colonel Gadaffi was ousted from power without a single American soldier being deployed on the ground, and without adding countless billions to the deficit.
...thanks to the "Arab Spring", certainly. Same with Egypt, Tunisia, and hopefully Syria. Contrary to popular belief, the rest of the world is perfectly capable of fixing itself on occasion without a US president or military helping out.
The Libyan rebels were taking a pounding until NATO came in with air strikes to back them up. They could not have taken Gadaffi out by force without outside support. Fact.
That god-awful war in Iraq, the biggest foreign policy blunder since Napoleon invaded Russia, has ended.
...on schedule, no less. A schedule that was set years before Obama took of
We could maybe get back to actually governing this country.
The Democrats had solid majorities in every branch of government for two full years.
During that time, not a single budget was passed. Nothing changed from when Bush was president except that spending skyrocketed and energy production in America was subdued or stopped whenever possible.
So exactly what are we all to look forward to when you get "back" to governing? Drone strikes on any Republicans that survived the storm?
Just another liberal happy to kill for the cause I suppose. There sure are a disturbing number of you around these days, unwilling to debate and only to destroy.
Osama Bin Laden was killed.
The recession is over.
General Motors and Chrysler, and the industrial heartland of the country, were saved from a catastrophe that would make the dust bowl look like nothing.
An end has come to the era of people being condemned to death by for-profit insurance companies using the excuse of "pre-existing conditions" to deny people their basic human right to health care coverage.
Colonel Gadaffi was ousted from power without a single American soldier being deployed on the ground, and without adding countless billions to the deficit.
That god-awful war in Iraq, the biggest foreign policy blunder since Napoleon invaded Russia, has ended.
Since Obama took office, oil imports have dropped by an average of 1.1 million barrels per day and in 2010 domestic crude oil production reached its highest level since 2003.
I always love how someone makes an equally insulting troll against the Candidates, and people come out of the woodwork to defend "their guy", and ignore the insult against the other fellow. Because, of course, THAT one is spot on!
Of course the "insult" against the other fellow is spot on. Romney is a Jesus freak who will quote the New Testament. There's no need to refute that point, there was a need to refute the point about Obama because it's a load of bollocks.
One can't talk or think without the teleprompter...
Oh please, will you Fox News-watching nuts give it a fucking rest? Reagan used a teleprompter. Bush used a teleprompter. Clinton used a teleprompter. Bush II used a teleprompter. Did you not see Obama in his QA session with republicans in 2010? He answered every one of their questions point for point, not a teleprompter in sight. Watch. Could you imagine Dubya having a grasp of the issues and being able to think on his feet like that?
Political cartoons are typically short and to the point with a humorous slant. This would be a bit more detailed, it would be in the form of a story told over a handful of pages, so it would be more about being informative than putting a comedy spin on a story that everyone is already familiar with.
Just because the medium happens to be illustrations doesn't necessarily mean that it will lead to dumbing down. Fox News uses Hi Def cameras. Do High def cameras contribute to dumbing down? No, there's plenty of more legitimate news organizations that also use them.
Fox News uses computer graphics to convey information. Are computer graphics contributing to dumbing down? No. It is the abuse of these tools, be they high def cameras, computer graphics or illustrations that can cause dumbing down.
There are strengths and weaknesses to any medium. Just because news is presented in the familiar format of a person speaking to the camera doesn't make it any more reliable.
If "quality journalism" is resorting to cartoons of all things to try to save itself, then all hope is truly lost.
Might as well sell up the assets, liquidate the company and pull the plug. Anything else is just delaying the inevitable, because once you have reached the cartoon level of serious journalism, you crossed the line a long time ago.
Gotta love the sheeple who rip on FOX but praise the major 3 for their "truth." NBC edited the Zimmerman 911 phone call, or CBS who manufactured blatantly false documents to smear the president, or ABC who went on the witchhunt connecting the Tea Party to the Colorado shooting, or the ABC "reporter" who married an Obama press secretary. No no, let's all bash FOX instead.
That's because the amount of media manipulation, lies, spin, falsehoods and dodgy practices at the big 3 in a whole year adds up to less than about 5 minutes worth of Fox's typical output.
Let's all bash Fox because they fucking deserve it.
You could read through a bland paragraph stating that the Greeks are desperate to eject from the Euro mess that they've gotten themselves into, but with Germany calling the shots they're finding it very difficult. Or you could just have a shuftie at this. Which gets the point across quicker?
It takes a lot of skill to get information summarized into visually digestible forms, and it's a much more efficient way of communicating. It's the same as how a company's logo is more instantly recognizable than just the company name printed in plain text.
There's no need to be such snobs about "dumbing down". I take it you all only read newspapers and never listen to the radio or watch TV news?
Regardless of its format, 'traditional' journalism is now on the endangered species list of vocations and no amount of reformatting, rejigging or re-engineering can save it. One has to wonder why someone would even bother with something like this.
Because it's about bloody time someone tried something innovative to save quality journalism from oblivion? Because some people are not defeatist? Because some people have the balls to take risks?
This is exactly what the abject retards in the nations of America and Europe, and Islam need.
Pictures not words.
I've got a picture of your sister on all fours taking it in the ass while sucking dick.
Hi Sarah. you forgot to add Africa to that list of countries.
Re:Would you read a cartoon version of Slashdot?
on
And Now, the Cartoon News
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
When will people seriously get it into their think marketer heads that although cartoons or videos may be more initially eye-catching, they have low information density and are worse at getting actual information across than plain old text?
Not necessarily. Depending on what's being reported on, a picture can be worth a thousand words. And "information density" isn't always the only objective of journalism. A lot of stories are about evoking the emotion of the situation, so a lot of it tends to be descriptive. Quality news sources like the BBC are pretty good at almost transporting you there by capturing the sensations of what's going on. Illustrated news lends itself very well to that kind of reporting.
Indeed. Your lords and masters prefer it when you don't talk about anything freedom related; you're all slaves, you will never be free, why can't you accept that?
So fantasizing about chopping peoples' heads off is "talking about anything freedom related" now?
So we stop a professionally trained killer in his tracks after indicating that he might be a mentally imbalanced homicidal maniac, and that makes us "slaves"?
I think people like you need to learn the definition of words like "slave" that you throw around so easily.
Perhaps every university should be required to write a letter to each prospective student, informing them of the ratio of graduates from that university with that particular degree in the last 5 years who are employed/unemployed, and the median salary.
What? A personalized letter? Delivered by the mail? I'm pretty sure there's a more efficient and affordable method of disseminating information.
Also, why isn't a 'medium' class anymore? One would think that any company that provided decent legroom at a reasonable price would make a killing.
United Economy Plus. Economy class but with that crucial extra bit of legroom for something like $40 more. I usually get it if I'm on any flight longer than 4 hours.
So many fallacies in there it's difficult to know where to start. Trains partly compete with roads in terms of the long haul 6-hour drives that people in America seem to think are a logical way of getting around. Last time I checked, the car-road combination doesn't work in the free market. You have to install huge expensive-to-install and expensive-to-maintain infrastructure as a government-run project. Gas prices in America are so pitifully low compared to the rest of the developed world ($4/gallon would be a bargain in the UK where it costs over twice as much) that they come nowhere near close enough to covering the cost of maintaining road infrastructure. As for the profitability of car ownership, let's not go there. And don't get me started on GM and Chrysler's bailout.
Airlines are solvent? I suppose they are now after getting bailed out. Airlines would not be able to do much business without runways, taxiways, terminals, access roads, and the enormous air traffic control infrastructure and the FAA that has to regulate the crap out of it to keep it safe. Who do you think pays for all that? The airlines? If you want to find an example of pure free-market ideology then the aviation industry is the wrong place to look.
And the reason Amtrak is so laboriously slow on most of its lines is because it has to make do with the primitive tracks that are privately owned by the freight companies. The infrastructure is just not designed for carrying passenger trains, hence people have a negative view of passenger trains in America which is totaly bemusing to anyone from Europe. Don't get me wrong, America's freight rail companies are great at what they do. But to suggest that passenger trains are crap in America because that's the verdict of the free market is completely untrue. Trains have simply been squeezed out by special interests. Road and air travel get huge government subsidies and people have been conditioned into thinking that this is normal, but as soon as mass transit tries to get its fair share of the infrastructure pie then the special interests pop up from their government-funded comfort zone and decry this "wasteful spending".
American values are supposed to be about letting people have a choice. In terms of transportation Americans have less choice than people in Europe.
I want safe, quick transportation from point A to point B at a reasonable price. Modern air travel mostly delivers this. It didn't use to.
Air travel was of dubious safety and blinding expense in the '30s, '40s, '50s - and wasn't particularly comfortable either. I don't wish to return to that era, one bit.
-Isaac
That was the secret of Cunard's success, their steamships were more reliable than the sailing vessels that went before. While their contract was for carrying mail, it was passengers that tagged along that made them profits and they came in big numbers because of the safety factor.
And interestingly the ocean passenger shipping lines used the same tactics as the early airlines in using celebrities to endorse the experience. They'd publish passenger lists so that the papers in London and New York would know "who's arriving this week on the Mauritania", and they'd go down to the docks to get their photos into the gossip section with the huge Cunard or White Star vessel looming proudly over them.
Thank you for being the first person to post something useful and constructive on the thread. Shame I had to scroll through the usual pedantic know-it-all minutiae about units and mass and weight to get to it.
I swear,/. is going severely downhill in the quality of discussion these days.
Slashdot Mirror
OMG so much bull in there I can't even be bothered refuting all of it. Let me just congratulate you on flip-flopping back to the "Bin Laden was no big deal anyway" default position beloved of GW Bush. If Bush had gotten OBL (yeah, big "if" since that would have involved having enough of a brain to send troops to the right fucking country) then you'd have been praising Bush as the greatest president since Lincoln.
Fucking conservative dickhead.
What is it with conservatives and their inability to get plain facts into their thick conservative skulls?
A recession is two consecutive quarters of negative growth. We're now in positive growth and it's been that way for quite some time. Fact.
Osama Bin Laden was killed.
Courtesy of US Military intelligence, lasting over eight years or more. Unless you can point to an image of Obama holding an M-16 in one hand and Bin Laden's severed head in the other, he (nor you) can't claim that one.
Going into the right country was kind of a prerequisite for getting the guy. There was plenty of US intelligence that was ignored by Dubya's administration because it didn't fit with their neo-con objective of stealing Iraq's oil. John McCain campaigned on the basis that he would not use force on Pakistani territory without the permission of the government. Obama was proved right on this one, because if he had gotten the government's permission it's a good bet that someone would have tipped Bin Laden's handlers off and he'd still be hiding somewhere. Fact is, the President made all the right calls and has as much right to take the credit for what goes right as he has to take the blame for what goes wrong.
And contrary to the lies spewing out of Fox News who were appalled by Bin Laden's death, Obama gave plenty of credit to the intelligence community and the personnel involved. If he wanted to take all the credit he could have done something really outlandish and obnoxious, like, say... I don't know ... dressing up in some sort of flight suit and getting a Navy pilot to land him on the deck of an aircraft carrier before making a triumphant speech about it? Nah, that'd be crazy.
The recession is over.
Even the New York Times isn't letting that bit of propaganda slip by unchallenged: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/10/us/recession-officially-over-us-incomes-kept-falling.html
Educate yourself. A recession is two consecutive quarters of negative growth. We're no longer in negative growth. This is not "propaganda". This is fact. (I know that conservatives have a hard time with facts but I'll try my best to use them on you in the vain hope that they'll sink in eventually.)
General Motors and Chrysler, and the industrial heartland of the country, were saved from a catastrophe that would make the dust bowl look like nothing.
They were 'saved' by a loan that was given them when TARP was passed... in 2008. Signed into law by that guy you likely loathe to the core of your soul.
Maybe you missed the bit where Romney said he'd let Detroit go bust. He was opposed to saving the motor industry, Obama was for it. Fact.
An end has come to the era of people being condemned to death by for-profit insurance companies using the excuse of "pre-existing conditions" to deny people their basic human right to health care coverage.
So Medicare and Medicaid didn't exist before 2009 then?
Oh, so if you can't afford health insurance then you automatically qualify for Medicaid? So we do have universal health care after all?
Colonel Gadaffi was ousted from power without a single American soldier being deployed on the ground, and without adding countless billions to the deficit.
...thanks to the "Arab Spring", certainly. Same with Egypt, Tunisia, and hopefully Syria. Contrary to popular belief, the rest of the world is perfectly capable of fixing itself on occasion without a US president or military helping out.
The Libyan rebels were taking a pounding until NATO came in with air strikes to back them up. They could not have taken Gadaffi out by force without outside support. Fact.
That god-awful war in Iraq, the biggest foreign policy blunder since Napoleon invaded Russia, has ended.
...on schedule, no less. A schedule that was set years before Obama took of
We could maybe get back to actually governing this country.
The Democrats had solid majorities in every branch of government for two full years.
During that time, not a single budget was passed. Nothing changed from when Bush was president except that spending skyrocketed and energy production in America was subdued or stopped whenever possible.
So exactly what are we all to look forward to when you get "back" to governing? Drone strikes on any Republicans that survived the storm?
Just another liberal happy to kill for the cause I suppose. There sure are a disturbing number of you around these days, unwilling to debate and only to destroy.
Osama Bin Laden was killed.
The recession is over.
General Motors and Chrysler, and the industrial heartland of the country, were saved from a catastrophe that would make the dust bowl look like nothing.
An end has come to the era of people being condemned to death by for-profit insurance companies using the excuse of "pre-existing conditions" to deny people their basic human right to health care coverage.
Colonel Gadaffi was ousted from power without a single American soldier being deployed on the ground, and without adding countless billions to the deficit.
That god-awful war in Iraq, the biggest foreign policy blunder since Napoleon invaded Russia, has ended.
Since Obama took office, oil imports have dropped by an average of 1.1 million barrels per day and in 2010 domestic crude oil production reached its highest level since 2003.
How you got an "insightful" mod I do not know.
Sue the actual developer? How would you propose to do that if they're working for an incorporated company with limited liability?
I always love how someone makes an equally insulting troll against the Candidates, and people come out of the woodwork to defend "their guy", and ignore the insult against the other fellow.
Because, of course, THAT one is spot on!
Of course the "insult" against the other fellow is spot on. Romney is a Jesus freak who will quote the New Testament. There's no need to refute that point, there was a need to refute the point about Obama because it's a load of bollocks.
One can't talk or think without the teleprompter ...
Oh please, will you Fox News-watching nuts give it a fucking rest? Reagan used a teleprompter. Bush used a teleprompter. Clinton used a teleprompter. Bush II used a teleprompter. Did you not see Obama in his QA session with republicans in 2010? He answered every one of their questions point for point, not a teleprompter in sight. Watch. Could you imagine Dubya having a grasp of the issues and being able to think on his feet like that?
...than current political cartoons,
Political cartoons are typically short and to the point with a humorous slant. This would be a bit more detailed, it would be in the form of a story told over a handful of pages, so it would be more about being informative than putting a comedy spin on a story that everyone is already familiar with.
Just because the medium happens to be illustrations doesn't necessarily mean that it will lead to dumbing down. Fox News uses Hi Def cameras. Do High def cameras contribute to dumbing down? No, there's plenty of more legitimate news organizations that also use them.
Fox News uses computer graphics to convey information. Are computer graphics contributing to dumbing down? No. It is the abuse of these tools, be they high def cameras, computer graphics or illustrations that can cause dumbing down.
There are strengths and weaknesses to any medium. Just because news is presented in the familiar format of a person speaking to the camera doesn't make it any more reliable.
If "quality journalism" is resorting to cartoons of all things to try to save itself, then all hope is truly lost.
Might as well sell up the assets, liquidate the company and pull the plug. Anything else is just delaying the inevitable, because once you have reached the cartoon level of serious journalism, you crossed the line a long time ago.
Like I said. Defeatism.
Gotta love the sheeple who rip on FOX but praise the major 3 for their "truth." NBC edited the Zimmerman 911 phone call, or CBS who manufactured blatantly false documents to smear the president, or ABC who went on the witchhunt connecting the Tea Party to the Colorado shooting, or the ABC "reporter" who married an Obama press secretary. No no, let's all bash FOX instead.
That's because the amount of media manipulation, lies, spin, falsehoods and dodgy practices at the big 3 in a whole year adds up to less than about 5 minutes worth of Fox's typical output.
Let's all bash Fox because they fucking deserve it.
You could read through a bland paragraph stating that the Greeks are desperate to eject from the Euro mess that they've gotten themselves into, but with Germany calling the shots they're finding it very difficult. Or you could just have a shuftie at this. Which gets the point across quicker?
It takes a lot of skill to get information summarized into visually digestible forms, and it's a much more efficient way of communicating. It's the same as how a company's logo is more instantly recognizable than just the company name printed in plain text.
There's no need to be such snobs about "dumbing down". I take it you all only read newspapers and never listen to the radio or watch TV news?
I also want my cornflakes to be blended - I don't have time to chew - then shot into my mouth.
Because obviously that's better.
Personally, the powdered stuff that settles to the bottom of the packet is my favorite part of Corn Flakes.
Regardless of its format, 'traditional' journalism is now on the endangered species list of vocations and no amount of reformatting, rejigging or re-engineering can save it. One has to wonder why someone would even bother with something like this.
Because it's about bloody time someone tried something innovative to save quality journalism from oblivion? Because some people are not defeatist? Because some people have the balls to take risks?
So, why read a cartoon version when you can just watch the news? I really don't see what this is trying to accomplish that video won't.
Why read manga when you can just sit back and watch anime? I really don't see what manga us trying to accomplish that anime doesn't.
This is exactly what the abject retards in the nations of America and Europe, and Islam need.
Pictures not words.
I've got a picture of your sister on all fours taking it in the ass while sucking dick.
Hi Sarah. you forgot to add Africa to that list of countries.
When will people seriously get it into their think marketer heads that although cartoons or videos may be more initially eye-catching, they have low information density and are worse at getting actual information across than plain old text?
Not necessarily. Depending on what's being reported on, a picture can be worth a thousand words. And "information density" isn't always the only objective of journalism. A lot of stories are about evoking the emotion of the situation, so a lot of it tends to be descriptive. Quality news sources like the BBC are pretty good at almost transporting you there by capturing the sensations of what's going on. Illustrated news lends itself very well to that kind of reporting.
Spare a thought for all those poor people at Comedy Central who have to watch Fox News all day in search of comedy material for Jon Stewart.
Indeed. Your lords and masters prefer it when you don't talk about anything freedom related; you're all slaves, you will never be free, why can't you accept that?
So fantasizing about chopping peoples' heads off is "talking about anything freedom related" now?
So we stop a professionally trained killer in his tracks after indicating that he might be a mentally imbalanced homicidal maniac, and that makes us "slaves"?
I think people like you need to learn the definition of words like "slave" that you throw around so easily.
Here it comes. "B .. b ... but anyone should be free to say anything any time" in 5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1...
Perhaps every university should be required to write a letter to each prospective student, informing them of the ratio of graduates from that university with that particular degree in the last 5 years who are employed/unemployed, and the median salary.
What? A personalized letter? Delivered by the mail? I'm pretty sure there's a more efficient and affordable method of disseminating information.
Also, why isn't a 'medium' class anymore? One would think that any company that provided decent legroom at a reasonable price would make a killing.
United Economy Plus. Economy class but with that crucial extra bit of legroom for something like $40 more. I usually get it if I'm on any flight longer than 4 hours.
So many fallacies in there it's difficult to know where to start. Trains partly compete with roads in terms of the long haul 6-hour drives that people in America seem to think are a logical way of getting around. Last time I checked, the car-road combination doesn't work in the free market. You have to install huge expensive-to-install and expensive-to-maintain infrastructure as a government-run project. Gas prices in America are so pitifully low compared to the rest of the developed world ($4/gallon would be a bargain in the UK where it costs over twice as much) that they come nowhere near close enough to covering the cost of maintaining road infrastructure. As for the profitability of car ownership, let's not go there. And don't get me started on GM and Chrysler's bailout.
Airlines are solvent? I suppose they are now after getting bailed out. Airlines would not be able to do much business without runways, taxiways, terminals, access roads, and the enormous air traffic control infrastructure and the FAA that has to regulate the crap out of it to keep it safe. Who do you think pays for all that? The airlines? If you want to find an example of pure free-market ideology then the aviation industry is the wrong place to look.
And the reason Amtrak is so laboriously slow on most of its lines is because it has to make do with the primitive tracks that are privately owned by the freight companies. The infrastructure is just not designed for carrying passenger trains, hence people have a negative view of passenger trains in America which is totaly bemusing to anyone from Europe. Don't get me wrong, America's freight rail companies are great at what they do. But to suggest that passenger trains are crap in America because that's the verdict of the free market is completely untrue. Trains have simply been squeezed out by special interests. Road and air travel get huge government subsidies and people have been conditioned into thinking that this is normal, but as soon as mass transit tries to get its fair share of the infrastructure pie then the special interests pop up from their government-funded comfort zone and decry this "wasteful spending".
American values are supposed to be about letting people have a choice. In terms of transportation Americans have less choice than people in Europe.
I want safe, quick transportation from point A to point B at a reasonable price. Modern air travel mostly delivers this. It didn't use to.
Air travel was of dubious safety and blinding expense in the '30s, '40s, '50s - and wasn't particularly comfortable either. I don't wish to return to that era, one bit.
-Isaac
That was the secret of Cunard's success, their steamships were more reliable than the sailing vessels that went before. While their contract was for carrying mail, it was passengers that tagged along that made them profits and they came in big numbers because of the safety factor.
And interestingly the ocean passenger shipping lines used the same tactics as the early airlines in using celebrities to endorse the experience. They'd publish passenger lists so that the papers in London and New York would know "who's arriving this week on the Mauritania", and they'd go down to the docks to get their photos into the gossip section with the huge Cunard or White Star vessel looming proudly over them.
Thank you for being the first person to post something useful and constructive on the thread. Shame I had to scroll through the usual pedantic know-it-all minutiae about units and mass and weight to get to it.
I swear, /. is going severely downhill in the quality of discussion these days.