The craptastic reportage of the Cyprus situation made me think of renewing this topic. Then the below piece crossed my radar. We got plenty of sports related craptasmic examples to discuss as well.
The amount of money that U2 maintainers and personnel get for being "deployed" there for 4 months is disgusting. The lowest ranks will clear 20 grand easy. It's awful.
just pick another photo... don't understand the thought process on that one
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Wed Apr 17, 2013 8:48 pm
by The Sybian
Brontoburglar wrote:just pick another photo... don't understand the thought process on that one
Or crop. There are 1000s of pictures to go with here, and this one wasn't any better than so many others I've seen. And the injury wasn't all that gory to begin with. Really a bizarre editorial decision here.
That's just awful. Do they not have editors over there? How can any responsible adult think that sort of thing is OK?
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2013 9:53 am
by testy boxcar
The good news is, if he is innocent (and it certainly sounds like he is), he'll probably be set for life financially before even graduating high school!
testy boxcar wrote:The good news is, if he is innocent (and it certainly sounds like he is), he'll probably be set for life financially before even graduating high school!
Word. Lawyer up and sue the fuck out of the Post. It's one thing that a bunch of amateur sleuths are circling them with MS paint in pictures and spreading it all over Reddit. Whatever, I feel bad for the kids, and I thought they looked a bit suspicious and that the one backpack could have been the same as the exploded pack. I also thought the "military gear" was completely baseless. Post has to be held accountable, that is unexcusable. Especially since a bunch of people on Reddit found evidence that the kids weren't the bombers. I realize the Post is a fricken joke of a paper, but this is out of control.
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2013 11:34 am
by howard
That is so awesome. In the sense that maybe it will convince a few more people of the utter worthlessness of the Post and virtually anything Murdoch other than amusement.
I have glanced through many of the photos online, some marked up. My first impression of each of those two was 'naw, they don't look it'. Nothing has changed that; The Post reinforces it.
TV is Putin’s priority. Unlike Stalin and Brezhnev, he understands he doesn’t need total media control. Sauer says the state still leaves his websites and newspapers alone. “We don’t notice any change. No phone calls, no pressure, nothing.” Russian internet use is soaring, yet Sauer says: “We all think, because we’re in the media, that these changes happen very fast.
But in reality most people still get their news from TV.” That’s true not just in Russia, where perhaps 80 per cent do, but even in the US. Russian newspapers are comparatively tiny: few sell more than 100,000 copies, a figure representing under 0.1 per cent of the population.
“The funny thing about Russia,” Sauer had told me in 2005, “is there’s complete press freedom for the informed but none for the uninformed. The informed, the people who read papers like Vedomosti or Kommersant, know a lot anyway because they also see satellite TV and the internet. There’s no point trying to suppress us. It would just create a fuss and international criticism.” Moreover, allowing some critical voices only makes Putin’s propaganda on TV more credible.
And so Moscow’s middle classes are allowed pockets of freedom of thought. These people aren’t about to oust Putin. Sauer says: “There’s no question of an Arab spring happening here. For a revolution you need lots of unemployed young people.
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Thu Jun 27, 2013 3:55 pm
by Sabo
As some may have heard, the Chicago Sun-Times fired their entire photo staff recently and armed reporters with smartphones so they could take pictures.
It's safe to say it's had some effect on the quality of photos in the paper ...
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Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Thu Jun 27, 2013 4:07 pm
by howard
Since this thread bumped, here's a death of newspapers item I saw on the bloomberg tv this am.
More "security trumps the bill of rights" bullshit, in direct violation of decades of court precedent, from the supremes down. But, no one cares, so this freedom will die silently.
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Sat Jul 20, 2013 4:56 pm
by Pruitt
So the 2nd amendment is more sacrosanct than the first amendment...
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Thu Aug 01, 2013 12:47 pm
by Sabo
Yesterday, the Cleveland Plain Dealer laid off more than 50 reporters and editors as part of a corporate restructuring. (Coincidentally, they posted nine job postings on JournalismJobs.com for their new business unit, which happens to be a non-union shop.) The PD editorial department unionized (Newspaper Guild).
The absence of even a gesture of bipartisanship was a reminder of the enduring political legacy of the civil rights battles.Since Democrats led the passage of civil rights legislation that marchers pushed for in 1963, Republicans have struggled to recover with black voters, leaving a stark racial divide in American politics.
Yeeeeeeeeeeah, right. Even worse, that article cites four "writers" as having contributed. Why bother reporting anything when you can collectively make shit up and pass it off as fact.
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Wed Sep 18, 2013 5:38 am
by rass
It might be a little harsh to call this an example of the "end of journalism", but at the very least CNN needs to update their simile-tron so it gives them a little more variety:
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Wed Sep 18, 2013 8:37 am
by Jerloma
The GOP didn't like Obama's tone after the shooting? What was his tone?
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Wed Sep 18, 2013 9:03 am
by The Sybian
Jerloma wrote:The GOP didn't like Obama's tone after the shooting? What was his tone?
His voice sounded "too black."
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Wed Sep 18, 2013 9:19 am
by A_B
The Sybian wrote:
Jerloma wrote:The GOP didn't like Obama's tone after the shooting? What was his tone?
I am very well informed on news events. I do not watch or read traditional media on a regular basis. I rarely will flip on a cable news net during a breaking story like this shooting. But less and less often, because of crap like this.
I did not watch a single second of coverage of this shooting incident on Monday. Not a drop. Because to do so is counterproductive--I would be less informed, and I would be subjected to the fear mongering and other cheap emotional appeals.
Fuck that. I managed to be well informed with my little computer and an AM radio. (And, of course, wulax.)
I have been a keen consumer of tv news my entire life. I studied and analyzed news media formally in high school (yes--two courses, if you count 'Sports Literature') and college. Lived with and nearly married a big-city TV news reporter/substitute anchor. Even participated in news gathering and reporting on occasion (if you count sportswriting, and the occasional emergency assisting my girlfriend as an ad hoc field producer). I've taken a harshly critical view of the industry and product since Lee Harvey got it on (nearly) live TV until Barry's weird speech last Tuesday. I've developed a complex set of filters to sort through the crap and fluff, and extract the (shrinking proportion of) useful data.
But there is nearly none that remains. Rapidly approaching zero.
There is plenty of journalism being practiced today. But, not on the main TV outlets. Not in the Pravda, Izvestia and TASS of our homeland evil empire (NY Times, WaPo, BosGlobe--fun game: match the two sets!)
I watched a Frontline documentary last night on the Egyptian Revolution. Utter crap. Such an emotional-laden, insight-devoid film I seriously doubt would've been air-able by the same show a decade ago. There was plenty of fact and useful anecdote interspersed with the 'look at me and my journey' theme and approach of the reporter and 'oh, the emotional ups and downs of the supporting characters so touched my reporter heart' device which drove the film.
The piece even lacked a coherent political bias that PBS used to typically and unapologetically color their documentary work. My key complaint here is the lack of coherence. Yeah, it's a challenge to report an incoherent story; shit, that is one benefit of a strong bias in reporting--at least you can produce a logical path, that can be accepted or rejected by the viewer.
They barely even tried. But they sure elicited a bunch of hope, fear, sorrow, pity, sadness and other emotions. Not much fact or analysis, though. But who needs that shit? Emotion keeps 'em coming back.
Pusillanimous Pussyfooters
Posted: Fri Sep 27, 2013 6:14 pm
by howard
Sy Hersh speaks to the topic of this thread, and to other stuff
I am very well informed on news events. I do not watch or read traditional media on a regular basis. I rarely will flip on a cable news net during a breaking story like this shooting. But less and less often, because of crap like this.
I did not watch a single second of coverage of this shooting incident on Monday. Not a drop. Because to do so is counterproductive--I would be less informed, and I would be subjected to the fear mongering and other cheap emotional appeals.
Fuck that. I managed to be well informed with my little computer and an AM radio. (And, of course, wulax.)
I have been a keen consumer of tv news my entire life. I studied and analyzed news media formally in high school (yes--two courses, if you count 'Sports Literature') and college. Lived with and nearly married a big-city TV news reporter/substitute anchor. Even participated in news gathering and reporting on occasion (if you count sportswriting, and the occasional emergency assisting my girlfriend as an ad hoc field producer). I've taken a harshly critical view of the industry and product since Lee Harvey got it on (nearly) live TV until Barry's weird speech last Tuesday. I've developed a complex set of filters to sort through the crap and fluff, and extract the (shrinking proportion of) useful data.
But there is nearly none that remains. Rapidly approaching zero.
There is plenty of journalism being practiced today. But, not on the main TV outlets. Not in the Pravda, Izvestia and TASS of our homeland evil empire (NY Times, WaPo, BosGlobe--fun game: match the two sets!)
I watched a Frontline documentary last night on the Egyptian Revolution. Utter crap. Such an emotional-laden, insight-devoid film I seriously doubt would've been air-able by the same show a decade ago. There was plenty of fact and useful anecdote interspersed with the 'look at me and my journey' theme and approach of the reporter and 'oh, the emotional ups and downs of the supporting characters so touched my reporter heart' device which drove the film.
The piece even lacked a coherent political bias that PBS used to typically and unapologetically color their documentary work. My key complaint here is the lack of coherence. Yeah, it's a challenge to report an incoherent story; shit, that is one benefit of a strong bias in reporting--at least you can produce a logical path, that can be accepted or rejected by the viewer.
They barely even tried. But they sure elicited a bunch of hope, fear, sorrow, pity, sadness and other emotions. Not much fact or analysis, though. But who needs that shit? Emotion keeps 'em coming back.
Holy crap, I need to see what Big Poppa Pump had to say. Remember when CNN was a respected news organization?
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 4:17 pm
by Scottie
The Sybian wrote:Remember when CNN was a respected news organization?
No.
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 4:56 pm
by Sabo
The Sybian wrote:Holy crap, I need to see what Big Poppa Pump had to say.
Re: (The End of) Journalism Thread
Posted: Mon Nov 11, 2013 7:40 am
by Pruitt
The devastation in the Philippines is truly horrifying. This morning, I was scanning my usual news sites and came across this - the main story about this disaster on the front page of the Telegraph.