Otherwise the rest of the news networks just repeat the same stuff and the pundits just spout off whatever they feel like. Does anyone think the pundits actually do any journalism... research??
One could assume that a TV news channel airing such idiocy should not be taken seriously by reasonable people, not that it should be closed down and summarily disposed of.
But CNN never was a truly excellent news outlet, nor was it supposed to be.
It brings news in quantity, immediacy, rush, with a background of drums and trumpets, and grandiloquent headlines. Not that you won't find some well-made, intelligent segments from time to time.
I myself am more interested in getting a more precise account of current events than in being ?the first to know?.
Other so-called intellectual TV news outlets, which might have had stricter standards some years ago, are no better, and often worse.
A few months ago I saw a ?documentary? which was not only sloppy in its research and substituted way too many slogans (the kind which pollute internet fora) to critical analysis, its overall content seemed lifted from proto-fascist propaganda leaflets eighty years of age, or from TASS agency rejects forty years of age.
It might be a personal victory for Mr. Murdoch that many of his most rabid media enemies are resorting to his preferred style of journalism.
During the first Gulf War, my brother and I found out that you could get something really interesting from CNN Headline News by watching it at all-hours. The 4am story would actually be kind of meaty. By 8am it would be nerfed for the morning crowd. By evening, if it was still in the cycle, it had been gelded into someone's party line.
More recently, CNN aired a report on an alleged rape of an Iraqi woman by a US soldier. Throughout the report, the camera zoomed slowly in on one male soldier after another, until you could see their faces quite clearly - and every single one of them was black.
This was just one more incident that affirmed my years-old decision not to own a television. If it were only an idiot box, it could be written off as harmless. The real tragedy is that it's worse than merely fluff.
Yes, this isn't to say that the other major TV news outlets fare any better. But I do think CNN was better if not News Hour and Frontline (and Washington Week, etc.) better. It really should be expected that you have to pick and choose what news content to watch, others merely filling the vacuum: Russert on NBC, Matthews on MSNBC, Dobbs on CNN, and maybe 2 or 3 other individuals elsewhere that I'm forgetting right now.
CNN puts their money on younger, more "sympathetic" news casters than they used to, and while they're certainly justified in trying to reformat to keep up with the competition, they should at least revise how they choose their personalities. I don't really care if they look better. If Larry King did something other than suck up to his guests and ask "their" questions, I'd certainly watch.
I quit taking CNN and Headline News seriously when the AOL merger was announced. Since that time, it's been nothing but a flashy, trumpet blazing nightmare. The last time I watched either one, I couldn't figure out what was going on with all the crap on the screen. I blame AOL for all the shit in the media today. We've raised a generation of AOL-kids who can't type, spell or punctuate properly and think LOL really means something.
I quit taking CNN and Headline News seriously when the AOL merger was announced. Since that time, it's been nothing but a flashy, trumpet blazing nightmare. The last time I watched either one, I couldn't figure out what was going on with all the crap on the screen. I blame AOL for all the shit in the media today. We've raised a generation of AOL-kids who can't type, spell or punctuate properly and think LOL really means something.
AOL is not the problem..... All the shit on the screen is due to one person:Teya Ryan . She previously oversaw operations for Headline News and is responsible for the look of the channel that they have today... She then moved on to CNN domestic... but has since been replaced. As far as the ticker that is at the bottom of the screen...... CNN was the last to adopt this. BTW, the ticker happened only because of 9/11 (on 9/11).
For the record, I think FOX is even worse. CNN at least doesn't have a rabid slant reputation, in my mind.
I *do* however, expect simple, basic fact checking from my news sources. When those simple basic facts are ones that any high school graduate should have in their belt, it really makes you wonder how badly they're screwing up the rest of the stuff they report, even when they're trying to be fair.
They're not biased, just amazingly incompetent. :P
Not that I really ever thought of CNN as a serious news source, but still.
Most "news" is bias and/or stupidly wrong. News at 11.
Off the top of my head, the only good news sources I know of are The News Hour and World News (on SBS, the Australian equivelent of PBS). The Fin is pretty good.
All of that is about 0.1% of the news sources I know of. Sad. But it reflects the fact that 99.9% of the world are idiots.
350-pound man who died after being beaten by police when they tried to subdue him had an enlarged heart, and cocaine and PCP in his system, the Hamilton County coroner's office said Monday.
Look at that sentence! Normally you don't make such sentences, do you? I mean, a first grader, yes, but cnn, yes, they too.
Remember boys and girls, the average IQ is 100 by definition.
If *THAT* doesn't keep you up at night...
IQ is an overblown concept. It's 100 by definition because it doesn't mean a damn thing. Standardized scales mean absolutely nothing out of context and they're only good to tell you where something falls relative to everything else in that sample.
Some people are smarter than others and that's all something like IQ tells us.
You know, at the turn of the 20th century, the average IQ was 100, too. But by today's measures everyone would have scored one standard deviation lower than they did back then (that's about 16 IQ points. IOW, the average IQ would be 84 on today's scale). Are we getting smarter? Nope. Not in the sense that everyone thinks of when they think "smart." The construct of IQ just sucks...
I knew someone was going to take umbrage at that... heh.
IQ is irrelevant. It's an idiotic 'standard'. Totally agree with you there.
But still, stop and think for a second on what you expect a 100 IQ individual to be like... then realize that that's *AVERAGE*. A large chunk of the population will be below that.
Them's some stupid people out there, folks. :P
(And here we see the failing point of a democracy - mediocrity, unless the voting populace is kept educated and motivated. We're doomed.)
I knew someone was going to take umbrage at that... heh.
IQ is irrelevant. It's an idiotic 'standard'. Totally agree with you there.
But still, stop and think for a second on what you expect a 100 IQ individual to be like... then realize that that's *AVERAGE*. A large chunk of the population will be below that.
Them's some stupid people out there, folks. :P
(And here we see the failing point of a democracy - mediocrity, unless the voting populace is kept educated and motivated. We're doomed.)
Sorry, I'm a psychologist... I can't help it.
But you're right. I think of some pretty dim-witted people when I think of people with IQs of 100. That *is* a scary thought.
The rules were changed by congress to accommodate NewsCorp... bumped from 35% to 39%... coincidentally Newscorp already owns a 39% share in many markets.
Newscorp had already acquired more than their 35% share in anticipation of FCC rule changes... so the republican's accommodated them after the president threatened a veto.
For the record, I think FOX is even worse. CNN at least doesn't have a rabid slant reputation, in my mind.
I *do* however, expect simple, basic fact checking from my news sources. When those simple basic facts are ones that any high school graduate should have in their belt, it really makes you wonder how badly they're screwing up the rest of the stuff they report, even when they're trying to be fair.
They're not biased, just amazingly incompetent.
Absolutely. The problem with CNN is that currently (really since the war) they are only willing to report on what comes out of the mouths of bush admin officials. It might be that they are reacting to being labeled as 'left' rather than 'center.' They want to be the news source for everyone and with all of the loonies that follow the fox/coulter/limbaugh hallucinations about lefty media bias (which is really just their ideology reflecting off objects in the real world), CNN is trying to fill the imaginary 'center' position.
This is combined with rewards for extreme journalistic laziness gives us a source that is rapidly becoming just a bunch of headlines made up of Bush admin quotes.
Comments
Otherwise the rest of the news networks just repeat the same stuff and the pundits just spout off whatever they feel like. Does anyone think the pundits actually do any journalism... research??
O'reilly calls himself a journalist. Hysterical.
But CNN never was a truly excellent news outlet, nor was it supposed to be.
It brings news in quantity, immediacy, rush, with a background of drums and trumpets, and grandiloquent headlines. Not that you won't find some well-made, intelligent segments from time to time.
I myself am more interested in getting a more precise account of current events than in being ?the first to know?.
Other so-called intellectual TV news outlets, which might have had stricter standards some years ago, are no better, and often worse.
A few months ago I saw a ?documentary? which was not only sloppy in its research and substituted way too many slogans (the kind which pollute internet fora) to critical analysis, its overall content seemed lifted from proto-fascist propaganda leaflets eighty years of age, or from TASS agency rejects forty years of age.
It might be a personal victory for Mr. Murdoch that many of his most rabid media enemies are resorting to his preferred style of journalism.
More recently, CNN aired a report on an alleged rape of an Iraqi woman by a US soldier. Throughout the report, the camera zoomed slowly in on one male soldier after another, until you could see their faces quite clearly - and every single one of them was black.
This was just one more incident that affirmed my years-old decision not to own a television. If it were only an idiot box, it could be written off as harmless. The real tragedy is that it's worse than merely fluff.
Originally posted by chu_bakka
That's why I watch the News Hour on PBS.
Yes, this isn't to say that the other major TV news outlets fare any better. But I do think CNN was better if not News Hour and Frontline (and Washington Week, etc.) better. It really should be expected that you have to pick and choose what news content to watch, others merely filling the vacuum: Russert on NBC, Matthews on MSNBC, Dobbs on CNN, and maybe 2 or 3 other individuals elsewhere that I'm forgetting right now.
CNN puts their money on younger, more "sympathetic" news casters than they used to, and while they're certainly justified in trying to reformat to keep up with the competition, they should at least revise how they choose their personalities. I don't really care if they look better. If Larry King did something other than suck up to his guests and ask "their" questions, I'd certainly watch.
news.com.au: http://www.news.com.au/common/story_...35%5E2,00.html
cnn.com: http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/...ain/index.html
Originally posted by pensieve
I quit taking CNN and Headline News seriously when the AOL merger was announced. Since that time, it's been nothing but a flashy, trumpet blazing nightmare. The last time I watched either one, I couldn't figure out what was going on with all the crap on the screen. I blame AOL for all the shit in the media today. We've raised a generation of AOL-kids who can't type, spell or punctuate properly and think LOL really means something.
AOL is not the problem..... All the shit on the screen is due to one person:Teya Ryan . She previously oversaw operations for Headline News and is responsible for the look of the channel that they have today... She then moved on to CNN domestic... but has since been replaced. As far as the ticker that is at the bottom of the screen...... CNN was the last to adopt this. BTW, the ticker happened only because of 9/11 (on 9/11).
I *do* however, expect simple, basic fact checking from my news sources. When those simple basic facts are ones that any high school graduate should have in their belt, it really makes you wonder how badly they're screwing up the rest of the stuff they report, even when they're trying to be fair.
They're not biased, just amazingly incompetent. :P
Not that I really ever thought of CNN as a serious news source, but still.
Now the Economist, that's a good news source.
Off the top of my head, the only good news sources I know of are The News Hour and World News (on SBS, the Australian equivelent of PBS). The Fin is pretty good.
All of that is about 0.1% of the news sources I know of. Sad. But it reflects the fact that 99.9% of the world are idiots.
Barto
If *THAT* doesn't keep you up at night...
350-pound man who died after being beaten by police when they tried to subdue him had an enlarged heart, and cocaine and PCP in his system, the Hamilton County coroner's office said Monday.
Look at that sentence! Normally you don't make such sentences, do you? I mean, a first grader, yes, but cnn, yes, they too.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/Midwest/1...ody/index.html
Originally posted by Kickaha
Remember boys and girls, the average IQ is 100 by definition.
If *THAT* doesn't keep you up at night...
IQ is an overblown concept. It's 100 by definition because it doesn't mean a damn thing. Standardized scales mean absolutely nothing out of context and they're only good to tell you where something falls relative to everything else in that sample.
Some people are smarter than others and that's all something like IQ tells us.
You know, at the turn of the 20th century, the average IQ was 100, too. But by today's measures everyone would have scored one standard deviation lower than they did back then (that's about 16 IQ points. IOW, the average IQ would be 84 on today's scale). Are we getting smarter? Nope. Not in the sense that everyone thinks of when they think "smart." The construct of IQ just sucks...
Originally posted by pensieve
The construct of IQ just sucks...
*LAUGH*
I knew someone was going to take umbrage at that... heh.
IQ is irrelevant. It's an idiotic 'standard'. Totally agree with you there.
But still, stop and think for a second on what you expect a 100 IQ individual to be like... then realize that that's *AVERAGE*. A large chunk of the population will be below that.
Them's some stupid people out there, folks. :P
(And here we see the failing point of a democracy - mediocrity, unless the voting populace is kept educated and motivated. We're doomed.)
Originally posted by Kickaha
*LAUGH*
I knew someone was going to take umbrage at that... heh.
IQ is irrelevant. It's an idiotic 'standard'. Totally agree with you there.
But still, stop and think for a second on what you expect a 100 IQ individual to be like... then realize that that's *AVERAGE*. A large chunk of the population will be below that.
Them's some stupid people out there, folks. :P
(And here we see the failing point of a democracy - mediocrity, unless the voting populace is kept educated and motivated. We're doomed.)
Sorry, I'm a psychologist... I can't help it.
But you're right. I think of some pretty dim-witted people when I think of people with IQs of 100. That *is* a scary thought.
http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/newscorp.asp
The rules were changed by congress to accommodate NewsCorp... bumped from 35% to 39%... coincidentally Newscorp already owns a 39% share in many markets.
Newscorp had already acquired more than their 35% share in anticipation of FCC rule changes... so the republican's accommodated them after the president threatened a veto.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2003Nov25.html
Liberal media my ass.
Originally posted by Kickaha
For the record, I think FOX is even worse. CNN at least doesn't have a rabid slant reputation, in my mind.
I *do* however, expect simple, basic fact checking from my news sources. When those simple basic facts are ones that any high school graduate should have in their belt, it really makes you wonder how badly they're screwing up the rest of the stuff they report, even when they're trying to be fair.
They're not biased, just amazingly incompetent.
Absolutely. The problem with CNN is that currently (really since the war) they are only willing to report on what comes out of the mouths of bush admin officials. It might be that they are reacting to being labeled as 'left' rather than 'center.' They want to be the news source for everyone and with all of the loonies that follow the fox/coulter/limbaugh hallucinations about lefty media bias (which is really just their ideology reflecting off objects in the real world), CNN is trying to fill the imaginary 'center' position.
This is combined with rewards for extreme journalistic laziness gives us a source that is rapidly becoming just a bunch of headlines made up of Bush admin quotes.