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| Net: Now Our Most Serious News Medium? |
Posted by
JonKatz
on Thursday October 11, @11:00AM
from the the-shooting-war-begins dept. Big stories change media. Radio's high-water mark was World War II, and TV news came of age after John F. Kennedy's assassination. Elvis and his death gave birth to modern mass-marketed tabloid media. Increasingly, it appears the attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon and the shooting war that began last night have made more distinct another evolutionary leap in information: the Net is emerging as our most serious communications medium and clearly the freest and most diverse.
Conventional journalists are still obsessed with hackers and pornographers; still fuss about whether the Net is safe or factual. But increasingly, they steer readers to their websites for more in-depth information and conversation. When I appeared on a public radio program recently, the interviewer asked me to comment on reports that the Net was the source of epidemic "misinformation" about the terrorist attacks.
The question was almost startlingly retro.
Even heads of state get the significance of the Net these days. So-called "serious" journalists had been dumping every imaginable rumor - that the State Department had blown up, that crop-dusting planes were about to shower us with anthrax live on the air without any filtering or substantiation. It seemed to me that, unlike any previous big story, the Net had become the place where people were going for more accurate information -- including all kinds of content unavailable in most traditional media.
Who would ever have thought that George W. Bush would do his primary fund-raising appeal before Congress and the public by announcing a url: libertyunite.org? Or that British Prime Minister Tony Blair would publish the evidence against Osama Bin-Laden on a government Web site? Bush's advisers grasped the fund-raising potential of the Net, and Blair realized it is a new way to reach the world, including remote, even hostile corners.
The Net was not only the source of heavy traffic to conventional news sites like Cnn.com, Usatoday.com or the Washington Post/New York Times sites. Literally thousands of new sites sprouted information -- there are way too many to list here -- offering information on the tragedy itself and its survivors, working for disaster relief, presenting discussions about the Taliban and Afghanistan, Islam, Arab resentment against the United States.These news sites were a source of clarity and accuracy for many millions of people, puzzled or frightened by alarmist reports on TV and elsewhere. People posted video online from the disaster site, and broke important news online of the plane attacks, the building's collapse, and the rescue. It were these accounts that reported for the first time that planes had had hit the tower, that the towers had fallen, that there there were likely to be few survivors in the rubble. Two sites I saw were devoted to airline passengers stranded in hotel rooms all over the country seeking information on alternative forms of travel. And it was on the Net, on the Onion's terrific site that the first witty, tasteful and necessary media and political spoofs of the response to the tragedy were pulled off.
Many more sites devoted themselves to personal testimony: from people who saw the disaster, who were sending e-mail news dispatches to friends, who sought to clarify rumors or post accounts, who needed to discuss how they felt about the new "war."
Transcripts of 911 calls from the World Trade Center are posted online, as are the transcripts of reports by Islamic and Arab TV news organizations. This new kind of personal reporting offers an invaluable archive of a global tragedy. In the understandable patriotic frenzy that followed the attacks, it was on the Net that dissenters, peace activists and privacy advocates first surfaced, not the mainstream media. The Net has thus become a bulwark against the one dimensional view of events and the world that characterize Big Media. All points of view appeared, and instantly.
This kind of in-depth discussion and information was rarely available in conventional media -- on CNN and other sites, activists in Arab nations directly debated and talked with Americans, for example, something never before possible in media, which has neither the air time, space, resources, or inclination. Newspapers publish much too infrequently to compete seriously for long on a breaking story like this, with either TV or the Net. (An exception: localized cases like New York or Washington, where coverage in daily papers, particularly the New York Times and The Washington Post, was important and thorough).
Big media, already fragmenting, appears to be dividing this way:
- Commercial TV is a medium of images and entertainment. Nobody, certainly not the Net at this point, can compete with TV's ability to present powerful imagery live, from the plane attacks to speeches before Congress to Ground Zero to the aftermath to global reaction and soon, military conflict. In fact, TV arguably transmits powerful images too often and for too long, creating an emotional, almost hysterical climate around big stories even when there?s no news to report.
- Cable TV is the medium of political argument and confrontation. Channels like Fox, CNN and MSNBC are institutional media, the place where politicians and lobbyists gather to press their viewpoints, talk indirectly with other leaders elsewhere, share insider information and float options and ideas. These media are striking in their overwhelming tilt towards officials, bureaucrats, lobbyists, politicians and academics. You can watch them for days and not hear from average people, beyond the silly handful of calls or e-mails they occasionally cite.
- The Net offers not only breaking news -- mainstream media companies all have sophisticated websites -- but is the medium of individual expression and additional, more in depth information. Instant message systems played a crucial role in transmitting information, both accurate and false, especially in and near the disaster sites. IM will almost surely become a dominant and significant information source in the future, especially as it moves beyond college campuses and networked companies.
But for all the mainstream media phobias about the dangerous or irresponsible Net, it's seemed increasingly clear in the weeks since the attacks that the Net has become our most serious medium, the only one that offers information consumers breaking news and discussions, alternative points of view. Sadly, the Net seems to be the favored medium of the terrorists who planned the attacks as well. (Countless sites sprung up to detail what Islam is really about, and how diverse opinions in the Arab world are at play in this disaster).
It's the medium of personal expression -- people e-mailed friends and relatives to tell them they were okay, to get relief information, to volunteer time and money. And, of course, unlike conventional media, which still give ordinary citizens little or no opportunity to participate, the Net is architecturally and viscerally interactive. Feedback and individual opinion are not ghettoized in op-ed pages or in a handful of "we-want-to-hear-from-you" (no, they don't) phone calls, but are an integral part of Net information dispersal, it's core.
The Net has had its ups and downs in recent months. It's still beset by intrusive regulators, eager law enforcement officials and greedy dot.com entrepreneurs and corporate interests who want its profits but not its values. It's still going through a shaky phase economically. But the WTC attacks remind us of the extraordinary openness, open distribution of information and sense of community-building that are the heart of the wired world's promise.
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The net was used on Sept 11... (Score:4, Interesting)
by FortKnox on Thursday October 11, @11:05AM (#2415724)
(User #169099 Info | http://slashdot.org/~FortKnox/journal/ | Last Journal: Monday March 04, @12:52PM)
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... because most people were stuck at their desks and had no radio nearby (or was disruptive to other employees). Once we got a a TV in a conference room, people dropped the net for TV. You see, the net can be hacked, and articles found on the net (unless they are from reliable news sources, a la cnn, ap, reuters) aren't very trusted. TV is still the most reliable and trusted media.
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Re:The net was used on Sept 11... (Score:5, Insightful)
by SirSlud on Thursday October 11, @11:16AM (#2415799)
(User #67381 Info | http://www.besonic.com/nufunq | Last Journal: Wednesday February 13, @02:58PM)
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Ironically, thats why its not as good as the Net.
People may believe its 'trusted', but that doesn't change the simple fact that TV News is BIG BIG business, and totally controlled .. you're not getting the news, you're getting a product. And its no wonder people 'trust' or 'like' it more than the Net, for the most part. It's packaged carefully, and full of the emotional hyperbole that totally renders any attempt to deal with events in an objective manner. Milk is better for you than Coke, but which one sells more?
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| - Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by TrollMan 5000 (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:22AM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by FortKnox (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @11:24AM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by Stonehand (Score:3) Thursday October 11, @11:35AM
Big business Valid stories (Score:5, Interesting)
by brassrat77 (brassrat77 AT yahoo DOT com) on Thursday October 11, @11:58AM (#2416028)
(User #9533 Info)
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Wash DC TV reported for several hours rumours of bombings at State Dept and other sites that were FALSE.
National TV showed virtually NO pictures of the "celebrations" in Gaza, West Bank, and other locations. And since there were no pictures, they didn't discuss WHY videos had been supressed. (Or why they're being surpressed again by the Palestinian Authority)
Consider this: How many times have you watched TV coverage of a subject you know and understand and you find yourself thinking "they're getting it wrong, that's false, they're missing it,..."?
Now think about their coverage of things you know little to nothing about.
Mass Market TV exists to sell airtime to advertisers based on estimates of the number viewers and their demographics. The news departments are under great pressure to attract viewers and their coverage reflects this. (Even small things like leaving the weather until almost the end of the 10:00 or 11:00 PM news shows.)
IF you are prepared to do your own digging and think about what you read, the Net is FAR superior to TV news. Especially for stories that require some background, require thinking about details, or lack captivating images.
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| - Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by Zurk (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @11:58AM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by Dufffader (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:02PM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by SilentChris (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @12:15PM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by KnightStalker (Score:3) Thursday October 11, @12:30PM
- pervasive big business, even dairy by stego (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @12:52PM
- Doesn't milk outsell Coke? by KosovoYankee (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:55PM
Milk is NOT better for 70% of the world... (Score:5, Interesting)
by corky6921 on Thursday October 11, @01:26PM (#2416496)
(User #240602 Info | http://slashdot.org/)
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Did you know that 70% of the world's population is lactose intolerant [azcentral.com]?
Milk is not better for you than Coke, because, from an evolutionary standpoint, mammals have internal mechanisms that prevent them from properly digesting lactose after they are a certain age. It's a natural weaning process. This is discussed in most evolution/natural science college classes. The reason 30% of our population is able to digest milk is that that percentage of the population had ancestors in northern Europe who were goat herders -- those ancestors needed to be able to digest milk at any time. Yes, almost all of the people who are able to digest lots of milk at any age are white and originally from Europe.
The milk commercials, however, neglect to tell people this, and instead label the vast majority of our population "lactose intolerant", like it's some kind of disease or something. (They even sell a "cure" in the form of Lactaid and other pills!) Americans/Europeans also don't often realize that sending milk in CARE packages to other countries makes people sick more often than not.
I know this is a little offtopic, but it's an important fact that most people don't realize, and the brainwashing of those damned milk commercials doesn't help. I would also like to state that I agree with the poster's main point. The commercials for milk even prove it: TV sells you what you want to hear and not necessarily what is the truth.
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| - Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by dasheiff (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @08:10PM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by CaseyB (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @01:10PM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by SirSlud (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @04:00PM
- 3 replies
beneath your current threshold.
- Totally Agree by dimer0 (Score:3) Thursday October 11, @11:18AM
- Re:Totally Agree by bribecka (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:33AM
- Re:Totally Agree by msaavedra (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @05:04PM
- Static by dimer0 (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:16PM
- 1 reply
beneath your current threshold.
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by Anonymous Coward (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:19AM
Re:The net was used on Sept 11... (Score:5, Insightful)
by Znork on Thursday October 11, @11:23AM (#2415846)
(User #31774 Info)
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You trust TV?
Personally, I dont think I've ever seen a TV newscast (or general newspaper article) about anything where I have knowledge about the subject where they get it right. I suspect the same is true about the subjects where I do not have knowledge, which means they likely dont get anything right. At best there is massive omissions, at worst there are huge amounts of factual errors.
Apart from that most mainstream media is rather biased (of course, if we get our news only from the mainstream media we dont realize this and we start believing that they are reporting the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth, which is the whole idea behind propaganda). Bias means it isnt reliable or trustworthy, since you get only the parts of the story that promote the media interests point of view.
Streamlining ala cnn, ap, reuters is also bad, since the mainstream media is just spewing the same thing (usually with the same wording!) a large number of times. Biased unreliable news with factual errors repeated on many channels many times makes it _appear_ more true, but it doesnt make it more true.
The net has one large advantage. You can find many different viewpoints, all of which may range from idiotic to completely kooky, but here at least you _know_ you are dealing with unreliable newssources and you can sift through them with that in mind.
TV appears to be more anchored in reality than the average slashdot comment. But that's what you get when you present put money and control behind the presentation. And the appearance is just appearance.
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| - TV news is great... If you like fluff. by misleb (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:39AM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by Fakir (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:50AM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by sammy baby (Score:3) Thursday October 11, @12:06PM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by Jaysyn (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:49PM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by Scrameustache (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:56PM
- Don't trust your television by puma_duh (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @01:12PM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by incompetent_bitch (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @02:22PM
- Re:The net was used on Sept 11... by itachi (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @02:53PM
Re:The net was used on Sept 11... (Score:4, Insightful)
by saridder (saridder@@@yahoo...com) on Thursday October 11, @11:40AM (#2415930)
(User #103936 Info | http://slashdot.org/)
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The net is not the most reliable source of news, not the quickest to break a story, not the most stable, nor the most accessible.
I remember Sept. 11th and when I heard Howard Stern on the radio announce the attacks, I immediately tried to go to several major news organizations' web site only to find them down almost all morning. The sites couldn't handle the traffic. CNN.com failed me. The radio kept me informed when the internet failed, and, unlike CNN, Howard Stern is not a journalist.
Not only that, if I was on the subway or bus, I wouldn't have even have had a chance to check the net, because it is very inaccessible. On the other hand, radio and TV waves are broadcast all over the air, accessible wherever you have a device to pick up the signal. And a walkman or a small portable TV is cheap. The argument for wireless internet may be brought up, but try to find a wireless provider in your area, an affordable phone to get that signal, and a speed decent enough to get info.
Also, the news content on most of the non-major news organizations web sites are unreliable, can be extremely biased and have no standards of excellence like news organizations at CBS, CNN, ABC, FOX, NBC, etc. I have seen some of the most conservative and liberal opinions ever on the net, truly hammering away at their agenda’s under the pretext o news. I have even read some radical Islam papers on the net (very interesting).
Yeah it's easy to point and laugh at the "standards" of the big 5 networks, but they so have some journalistic integrity and the journalists do take their jobs seriously. It's the parent company's that are all about the $$, not the journalism departments.
The only good thing I can say about the net is the vast choice of news outlets available. Where other than the CIA HQ, major book store, or Christian Science Reading Room can you get such a variety of opinions and points of view. Just use judgment when reading and don’t let the info be spoon-fed to you. Create your own opinions
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Net weakness (Score:2, Informative)
by jilbert on Thursday October 11, @11:05AM (#2415725)
(User #520628 Info)
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I'd say the crisis showed a weakness in the
current web server model. If the whole world
wants to connect to CNN, there's no way it
can handle the load.
How do we get round this?
Better caching?
Broadcast protocols?
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Disinformation as well (Score:2, Insightful)
by gorillasoft on Thursday October 11, @11:06AM (#2415734)
(User #463718 Info)
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While the net is a great source for information, it can also be a great source for disinformation.
Bert and Osama, anyone?
(yes, that photo was a joke, but other stories and photos that purport to be authentic may not always be so)
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market segmentation (Score:2)
by swinge (swinge_2000@yahoo.com) on Thursday October 11, @11:08AM (#2415744)
(User #176850 Info)
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Conventional journalists ... steer readers to their websites for more in-depth information and conversation. they steer you to their websites not because they think the web is the be-all that you do, it's so that they can segment their market in a way that's similar to price-discrimination. They want to keep the broadcast feed general interest to maintain the largest number of eyeballs, and yet they don't want to lose the special interest junkies. So they direct the special interest junkies to the website (better than having them change channels) and the main-show can move on before the average viewer gets bored.
BTW, it was at this point that I got bored with the Katz-feed and didn't read any further.
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What about ... (Score:5, Interesting)
by s20451 on Thursday October 11, @11:08AM (#2415747)
(User #410424 Info | http://www.utoronto.ca/ | Last Journal: Wednesday February 20, @12:42AM)
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What about the fact that every major news site in the U.S. and Canada collapsed under the load of Sept. 11? It was several hours before CNN was back up, and then in a bandwidth-limited form. I got most of my info from the BBC and Australian sites, and even those were very heavily loaded. Meanwhile, anywhere that there was a TV on Sept. 11 was tuned to CNN, which provided the breaking news as it happened -- and since that date, the principals have all appeared on television to describe their positions, not the internet.
It seems premature to proclaim a new era of Internet news reporting.
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| - Re:What about ... by Stonehand (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:14AM
- Re:What about ... by btellier (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @11:26AM
- News Between the Cracks by Alien54 (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:44AM
- Re:What about ... by h0rus (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @11:48AM
- Re:What about ... by Dynamoo (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @11:54AM
- Not all sites bottlenecked - Drudge, Slashdot, ... by Ungrounded Lightning (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @12:40PM
- Re:What about ... by bob_jenkins (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:47PM
- Re:What about ... by ackthpt (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @12:50PM
- Re:What about ... by mi_cuenta (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:56PM
- 1 reply
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Blair and the evidence (Score:4, Informative)
by PinkStainlessTail on Thursday October 11, @11:09AM (#2415748)
(User #469560 Info | http://www.thereisnohomepagethereisonlyzool.com/)
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Here's the link to the evidence [pm.gov.uk] that Katz mentioned. Not exactly as earth shattering as it sounded. I think I've heard most of this in non-net media.
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Now what? (Score:2)
by Jim Madison on Thursday October 11, @11:10AM (#2415758)
(User #133196 Info | http://www.quorum.org/)
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You get a lot of heat around here, but this article is spot on. Given the roles of commercial and cable TV, what does it mean that the Net is the outlet for public opinion? Does it imply power to the people? What's the rub?
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Email, not WWW news (Score:5, Interesting)
by dirtyhippie on Thursday October 11, @11:12AM (#2415770)
(User #259852 Info)
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As a "cyber-journalist" I suppose it is understandable that you laud the WWW as the great new thing (TM)... But mainstream WWW sites were totally unreachable (Slashdot was an exception, but most people don't know slashdot, they know msnbc.com and abcnews.com). I would argue that the real landmark was email, which came through and proved its worth that day. When the phone systems collapsed thousands, if not millions of people frantically got in touch with loved ones to inform them of their safety via email (after 4 hours of "circuit not available" messages, I eventually contacted both my sister and my cousin this way).
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Ummm. No. (Score:5, Insightful)
by zpengo on Thursday October 11, @11:13AM (#2415775)
(User #99887 Info | http://james.archerweb.org/)
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Am I the only person who finds it incredibly ironic that an article like this would appear on one of the most random, poorly-researched, redundant, late and haphazard news sites on the net?
Don't get me wrong, I love Slashdot, but as an example of the independent news the Net has to offer, one can't help but come to the conclusion that CNN and its TV-based family will continue to be the norm for a long, long time.
September 11th was a great example of this. When the fit really hit the shan, all the major news sites got slammed, failed, and people went back to watching CNN, MSNBC, or whatever.
Yes, there are plenty of inspirational stories of independent websites helping to feed the public's quest for more information, but these are in the minority. Joe Sixpack and his grandmother still relied on good ol' television to find out what happened.
Is the net a serious news source. Certainly not. Not yet anyway.
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| - Re:Ummm. No. by FortKnox (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @11:21AM
- Re:Ummm. No. by poincaraux (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:31AM
- 1 reply
beneath your current threshold.
- Irony by roystgnr (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:32AM
- Re:Ummm. No. by update() (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @11:53AM
- Re:Ummm. No. by aallan (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @11:56AM
- Re:Ummm. No. by bogado (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:28PM
- Re:Ummm. No. by pogen (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:37PM
- Re: Slashdot, CNN .. Slashdot News Network? by ackthpt (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @01:12PM
- Re:Ummm. No. by tmark (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @01:25PM
- Re:Ummm. No. by Drizzten (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @02:16PM
- Re:Ummm. No. by Boiled Frog (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @02:03PM
- cyber journalists still link-phobic by Technodummy (Score:2) Saturday October 13, @08:48PM
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How the Net was won - revisionist history (Score:3, Insightful)
by WillSeattle on Thursday October 11, @11:13AM (#2415776)
(User #239206 Info | http://www.gonetolunch.com/)
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The reality is not as you describe it, Jon.
[disregarding the flashing banner from Planet Hard Drive - who will never get my business now ...]
The reality is that we still depend on the radio for news in cars and when we wake up. We still look to TV for full coverage. We use the Net because we're not allowed to have the other two at work.
But we do use the Net to spread misinformation, rumors, and to get all paranoid. When we're not using call-in talk shows on the radio and TV. It looks more beleivable on the PC monitor than when we phone up and people can tell by our rushed voices that we're loonies.
There are always nutsos out there. Most of the time they're not dangerous, so long as you keep them away from sharp things.
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Most Serious, No. (Score:2)
by 4of12 on Thursday October 11, @11:13AM (#2415777)
(User #97621 Info | http://slashdot.org/)
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The net is little more than the buzz of a large virtual crowd, with louder presences being occupied by well-funded organizations, the same well-funded organizations that promulgate traditional media.
The real problem is extracting signal from crowd noise.
It requires a great deal of diligence and effort to extract the rational and the truthful from the crowd noise.
Plus, once it's done, it's not sufficiently appealing from a marketing perspective to justify placing it in a louder volume forum. Let's all just go wallow in the infotainment just like peasants everywhere!
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A contrarian advantage (Score:3, Interesting)
by MarkusQ on Thursday October 11, @11:13AM (#2415779)
(User #450076 Info)
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One advantage of the net you forgot to mention: the very fact that many people harbor suspicion of the content increases its value.
If something is printed in the New York Times, or broadcast on CNN, it is much more likely to pass without critical evaluation than something that is posted on the web. "I saw it on the web" is almost a synonym for "it may be true; I want to get more data, cross check some facts." To my mind, that is a very valuable for new media in a free society, especially one that intends to stay free.
-- MarkusQ
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Don't forget print media (Score:5, Insightful)
by Daniel Dvorkin on Thursday October 11, @11:14AM (#2415782)
(User #106857 Info | http://www.sff.net/people/Daniel.Dvorkin)
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It's true that the Net offers better immediate news than TV and radio (with the possible exception of NPR) these days. But for long-term, in-depth analysis, I still rely on that oh-so-retro source, the newspaper, for three reasons:
1. There's a level of fact-checking in print journalism that doesn't exist in any other news source. I'm not claiming that newspaper reporters never make mistakes, by any means, but I get the strong feeling that the information they provide is more accurate by an order of magnitude than anything that comes out of my TV, radio, or computer.
2. Generally, when we commit words to paper, we feel that they have more import than if we speak them or type them on a computer, and thus we are more careful about what we say. Newspaper articles in the wake of the 11 September attacks were much less overheated and emotional than reporting from any other source.
3. Similarly, reading something on paper is a fundamentally different experience from hearing it on the radio, watching it on TV, or reading it on screen. I can read and reread at my own pace, thinking carefully about the information I'm taking in, which I can't do with CNN. And newspapers hold my attention, unlike the Net where something different is only a mouse click away.
Don't get me wrong here -- I very much like the instant access to information I get on the Net, and I do get an increasing amount of my information there. But until both Net journalism and the experience of receiving it are up to print standards -- and they aren't, by a long shot -- the newspaper will remain my primary source for the information I use to shape my views on world events.
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um. (Score:1)
by Jucius Maximus (j13mohNO@SPAMnetscape.net) on Thursday October 11, @11:14AM (#2415783)
(User #229128 Info | http://slashdot.org/ | Last Journal: Friday January 04, @01:41AM)
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"Conventional journalists are still obsessed with hackers and pornographers; still fuss about whether the Net is safe or factual."
And this is being stated on slashdot? I don't know whether to laugh or nod sagely...
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News sources in order of usefulness: (Score:4, Insightful)
by Ars-Fartsica on Thursday October 11, @11:14AM (#2415784)
(User #166957 Info | http://slashdot.org/~Ars-Fartsica/journal/ | Last Journal: Tuesday March 05, @10:57PM)
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1: Internet - everything print can do, but faster and more featureful.
2: Print - the best researched and most respected news is still carried out by folks like the WSJ, Washington Post, etc.
3: Radio - radio continues to feature in-depth reporting, although much more dumbed down than in print sources.
DEAD LAST: TV - the boob tube continues to be the news source for the illiterate, with the maximum amount of information transmitted to be contained in a two minute blurb. Everything Chomsky says about TV news is true. This is the gutter of information and news.
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Most serious? (Score:3, Insightful)
by Zen Mastuh on Thursday October 11, @11:14AM (#2415787)
(User #456254 Info)
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Definitely most abundant. Net users at least have the opportunity to see multiple sides of every issue or event. It's a matter of diligence though--the lazy will be force fed a re-hash of the Big Five censored-and-ready-to-eat television "news"; but the curious and driven can become more enlightened as time goes on.
I am startled by not only the diversity of opinion--an endangered species in meatspace--but the growing animosity against the "other" side, much like what is going on in meatspace (try standing on a busy streetcorner with a sign that says "Make love, not war"). The willingness of Americans to waive their Civil Rights for a continued false feeling of security presents quite a danger to the diversity of the 'Net. Maybe the combination of general delusion and hostility will bring in the notion that minority points of view are terrorist expression and should be hastily punished in a most hostile fashion.
If this happens, the terrorists will rejoice in their victory.
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BBC Radio 4 (Score:1)
by Ella the Cat on Thursday October 11, @11:15AM (#2415789)
(User #133841 Info | http://www.shevek.f9.co.uk)
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... is really good for serious news, and all the good stuff you grow to appreciate.
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internet is not just the web... (Score:2)
by -razor- on Thursday October 11, @11:16AM (#2415795)
(User #69324 Info)
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I was at work when i first heard, as were most people...unfortunately, it meant the major news sites all crumbled under the load, so I ended up on #cnn on EFNET IRC, where some of the ops were providing the latest news updates (with the source quoted, like if it came from CNN etc).
lots of people also spread mpeg/divx/rm files, taken from various tv channels (mainly from CNN, but also european channels too) which showed the attacks & tons of related footage. and not only that, but some people even broadcast the CNN audio via shoutcast servers so people without access to the tv news could at least listen, which helped to keep ppl up to date on happenings.
maybe it should be noted that at it's peak, there were about 3600 people in the #cnn irc channel before the servers started buckling from the load (plus some irc clients crashed simply because they couldn't handle so many people in a single channel).
thanks should go to all the people who helped spread the news.
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Tabloids (Score:1)
by tinrobot on Thursday October 11, @11:16AM (#2415798)
(User #314936 Info)
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"Elvis and his death gave birth to modern mass-marketed tabloid media."
I thought that happened when Lindberg's baby was kidnapped.
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| - Re:Tabloids by wholesomegrits (Score:3) Thursday October 11, @11:27AM
- To be fair... by overunderunderdone (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:58PM
- Re:Tabloids by wholesomegrits (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @03:02PM
- 1 reply
beneath your current threshold.
- Re:Tabloids by cyclist1200 (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @11:37AM
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Net vs TV (Score:2)
by Anml4ixoye on Thursday October 11, @11:17AM (#2415811)
(User #264762 Info | http://www.cornetdesign.com/)
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I agree with Katz on a lot of the points above. I don't own a TV, I got most of my information that day from the Net(mostly Slashdot, and then CNN). I still get almost all of my news from CNN.com [cnn.com], Baynews 9.com [baynews9.com], our local newspapers online, etc.
I think as long as you realize that there are some things you have to take with a grain of salt on the net, and you don't ever rely on one strict source for everything (but instead substantiate it with other sources), the Net can be pretty reliable.
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Hold On A Minute... (Score:5, Insightful)
by PRickard (pr@ms-[ ]om ['bc.c' in gap]) on Thursday October 11, @11:18AM (#2415818)
(User #16563 Info | http://www.msboycott.com/)
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Increasingly, it appears the attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon and the shooting war that began last night have made more distinct another evolutionary leap in information: the Net is emerging as our most serious communications medium and clearly the freest and most diverse.
Ok, are we going to read the same thing after every US tragedy? Oklahoma City was the Internet's "proving ground," Columbine was the Internet's "proof of usefulness," Monica Lewinsky was evidence of the Internet's "advantages of traditional media." Every tragedy produces comments like this, but the Web is 10 years old now - the Internet became mainstream 4 or 5 years ago, at the latest. People know what the 'net offers, it doesn't take a disaster to "prove" it again.
Conventional journalists are still obsessed with hackers and pornographers; still fuss about whether the Net is safe or factual. But increasingly, they steer readers to their websites for more in-depth information and conversation.
Unfortunately, the mainstream news sites are almost all that remain. ABCNews.com and cnn.com are our most important sources of information online, but does that change anything? It leaves information in the hands of the monopolistic communications behemoths and gives them an excuse to provide less coverage through their traditional print and broadcast outlets.
"Freest and most diverse" my ass. Independent sites like The Industry Standard and Wired News (they need Jon there more than Slashdot, obviously) are being shut down or cut to the bone as funding and advertising dry up, leaving only the major media outlets to continue shoveling out the same crap they've always produced. Yahoo and the rest all rely on triple-filtered newswire trash like Reuters or Bloomberg news, which provide only the basest of information that seems to be typed up by robots.
The Internet had potential, but more and more we see the mass media outlets choking that off and turning it into just another way for the same old companies to reach people with the same information they've always provided.
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2 points (Score:1)
by ohzero on Thursday October 11, @11:19AM (#2415824)
(User #525786 Info)
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point 1
If TDM based phone networks (LEC/LD carriers)
which are the underlaying technology that
largely drove the net before people started building their own ip backbones, operated
in any redundant fashion, with any capacity planning, then I wouldn't have had to
IM my employees in NYC on sep 11th to insure
their safety. So thank you level3, GC, Sprint Ip Services, MCI UUnet, etc..
point 2
Real News [theonion.com]
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| - Re:2 points by Qbans (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @06:49PM
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hardly! (Score:1)
by spoofnet on Thursday October 11, @11:20AM (#2415828)
(User #162878 Info | http://www.mvtools.net)
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I can't see how it can be a serious news source.
anytime anything major happens most news sites and the internet in general almost stops working.
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Net: most serious mediium for flamewars (Score:2, Funny)
by Maskirovka (tobyspamsam@aspamk.net) on Thursday October 11, @11:20AM (#2415830)
(User #255712 Info | http://slashdot.org/)
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Net: Now Our Most Serious News Medium? Yes, it's getting harder and harder to find a good flamewar on TV, so we resort to the Net.
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Net reports were not better than TV & radio (Score:3, Interesting)
by Junks Jerzey on Thursday October 11, @11:23AM (#2415848)
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First, there were the obvious technical problems. Yahoo was dead in the water for the entire morning of September 11. Ditto for CNN and MSNBC. There were smaller sites reporting on things--mostly weblogs--but they were reporting by watching TV, listening to the radio, and typing what they saw and heard. So the net was a secondary news source in this case. People were only using the web because they were at work and didn't have access to other media.
Second, the independent sites were not doing any better than TV in general. We make fun of TV for jumping the gun too quickly and reporting unconfirmed information, but the weblogs were much worse about this. Dave Winer started beating the war drum right away at scripting.com, putting up scare-tactic surverys like "Will America go to war?" within hours of the attacks. Metafilter.com ran a whole bunch of really dumb stories that never would have made it to TV, like the Nostradamus nonsense, and the headline about a small, unmarked plane circling Manhattan. Were they trying to get people to think it was another terrorist-controlled plane? In reality, it was a FEMA plane surveying the damage.
In general, the weblogs and independent web sites have been too quick to pat themselves on the back about September 11.
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"Freest?" (Score:1)
by Guppy06 on Thursday October 11, @11:26AM (#2415859)
(User #410832 Info | Last Journal: Sunday February 03, @11:14PM)
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"Most free." Shame on you.
At any rate, I find it sad/pathetic/what have you that news.bbc.co.uk seems to have more and better updates than www.cnn.com
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beneath your current threshold.
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community, communication (Score:2, Insightful)
by OpenSourceSlut on Thursday October 11, @11:26AM (#2415860)
(User #515830 Info | http://www.nobodysdoll.com/)
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The major thing the Net has that other news sources lack is a real sort of community. You can't interact with the talking heads on T.V., you can't hunt for the specific information you want, you can't add information of your own or dispel rumors or investigate myths. That probably explains why George Dubya went straight for the Internet (libertyunites.com) in his efforts to rally us together. There is already a live and responsive community here. In the hours immediately after the attacks, places like slashdot and google were mirroring vital news sources for readers, and community bulletin boards like craigslist were hopping with people organizing victims' relief and sharing their own news and responses and coming together for rallies and prayer meetings and things. You can't get that kind of instant popular reaction from NBC.
I heard some amazing misinformation on television the day of the attacks, incredible rumors and tall tales (police officer who "surfed" rubble down 86 floors in the collapse?), and it was when I went to the Net that I found people who had followed up on these stories, who knew what was right and what wasn't, and who had real information of their own as news broke. T.V. and radio aren't diverse enough media; there are only a handful of networks and major news stations. On the Internet, any idiot with a modem can put his two cents in, and sometimes that's not so great and sometimes it's amazing.
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Is there really a debate? (Score:1)
by an_mo on Thursday October 11, @11:26AM (#2415863)
(User #175299 Info | Last Journal: Monday October 22, @11:55PM)
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Has anyone noticed how one-sided tv debates really are and how it fails to stimulate public debate over (1) the failure of the administration to prevent the terroristic attacks (2) the support previously given to the same terrorists that are now hunted (3) The failure to support poor economies that provide fertile grounds for terrorists.
Make no mistake, I am not trying to justify the attacks or start a flame war on this. It is the electorate who should be able to judge whether or not mistakes were made by previous administrations, and without debate there is no informed choice.
It seems to me that tv networks and cable channels are failing to stimulate even a remote debate. The press is doing a little better. The net of course contains all sorts of opinions but how to sort them out is really the big questions.
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U.S. Media Coverage was very poor (Score:1)
by wundermean on Thursday October 11, @11:27AM (#2415868)
(User #181723 Info | http://slashdot.org/)
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I've been scouring some news sites to get a better understanding about what's going on and it's startling how 'censored' our media is. And self-censoring at that!
The most damning analysis of this comes from the old Russian paper Pravda ('The Truth') at http://english.pravda.ru/main/2001/10/11/17799.htm l
The AP and Reuters wires are great for domestic issues but by far the best I've seen especially on providing (more) balanced reporting has been ( http://sg.news.yahoo.com/world/afp.html )
Jon has a point... I saw the images on TV but I wasn't getting any real information... just senseless replay after senseless replay so I went to the net.
Because the net isn't a 'single source' I trust it more as a source.
You could say that all those channels on cable TV are not a single source... READ THE PRAVDA article and you will get a second opinion.
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Emerging vs. Established (Score:5, Insightful)
by under_score (mishkin.mymind@net) on Thursday October 11, @11:28AM (#2415870)
(User #65824 Info | http://www.oomind.com/)
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One of the things the the so-far highly moderated posts have missed is the concept of TV as an established mechanism which provides a certain kind of information, vs. the net as an emerging mechanism which provides a different kind of information.
Television is not and can never be truly interactive.
The net (email, web, IM, etc.) is primarily interactive. Even if you are primarily a consumer, your consumption statistics are fed back into the system. But that is just the lowest level, of course. Many people have personal home pages, many people can contribute to weblogs, discussion groups, usenet news, email lists, etc. and their contributions are archived, responded to, and have a real impact on the future direction of information exchange.
Although Katz does not state it explicitly, this interactivity is what distinguishes the net from the old forms of media, and is one of the really cool aspects of the information flow following Sept. 11th. Slashdot, for example, experienced record levels of comments for the several articles about the distaster that were posted - often well in excess of 1000 comments!!! That just isn't possible with any other media.
And because it is still an emerging media, yes - the signal to noise ratio isn't the greatest. But mechanisms are being developed and tested to improve this.
For truly interactive education, check out Oomind:
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net most important (Score:1)
by mattscape on Thursday October 11, @11:29AM (#2415874)
(User #264484 Info)
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OK the net might not be ready (or it will never be) but the weeks after the attack I couldn't start a day to read through my favourid news site.
I'm in the states right now but I come from germany and I have to read german news like spiegel.de. Some news seemed to be there before I heard theme here.
Still most of the news sites I read are orininated from some old media. But I would get a totally different view from this whole scene with just watching us tv.
For me net is the most important news media.
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Net better than traditional media - Example (Score:1, Interesting)
by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 11, @11:32AM (#2415886)
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Today's Fox News [foxnews.com]: "The Internet, they tell us, is a domain of hype and hoaxes, while traditional media can be trusted to check things out and get them right. Yet if one looks at Amazon.Com’s reviews of Arming America, it is immediately evident that Amazon reviewers found the problems with Bellesiles’ book a year ago, while the establishment was still smitten."
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Re: Internet news (Score:2, Insightful)
by blibbleblobble on Thursday October 11, @11:32AM (#2415888)
(User #526872 Info | http://www.blibbleblobble.co.uk/)
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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 [blibbleblobble.co.uk]
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Net info less reliable than TV? (Score:2, Informative)
by EulerX07 on Thursday October 11, @11:32AM (#2415892)
(User #314098 Info)
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This is interesting because last night I was watching an interview with Pierre Berton on canadian tv. He mentionned one thing that really struck me. In the second world war there was a british attack(don't remember which one, I wasn't taking notes) that was one of the bloodiest ever. They lost 65 000 soldier in one day. But back home the "traditionnal" media were claiming that it was an astounding success with minimal losses. Some would say it was to keep morale up back home, but I say nay to apologists and think it's just pure deception.
Were this to happen nowadays, a government couldn't hide the truth to the masses because somewhere else in the world someone would post the truth on the net. And don't forget kids, don't be too quick to trust was you see on tv, they're excellent at showing only one side of the coin. To the medias defense, sometimes they're just being used without knowing it.
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Credit where credit is due (Score:3, Informative)
by M_Talon on Thursday October 11, @11:34AM (#2415900)
(User #135587 Info | http://slashdot.org/index.pl?section=yro)
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It were these accounts that reported for the first time that planes had had hit the tower, that the towers had fallen, that there there were likely to be few survivors in the rubble.
Um, the news that the towers had fallen wasn't a first on the net. The TV stations had their cameras trained on the towers and broadcast it live for everyone to see. Same with the second plane hitting. Let's keep the credit where it's due, ok?
What the net did provide was eyewitness accounts and various viewpoints. It was a more personal kind of reporting, but it didn't "scoop" the news networks that much. Yes, the Internet did prove itself useful for disseminating that kind of information. The rest was merely recycled stuff from the majors.
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Deja vu? (Score:5, Interesting)
by FortKnox on Thursday October 11, @11:38AM (#2415921)
(User #169099 Info | http://slashdot.org/~FortKnox/journal/ | Last Journal: Monday March 04, @12:52PM)
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I think I'm experiencing Deja Vu, because I coulda [slashdot.org] sworn [slashdot.org] I've [slashdot.org] read [slashdot.org] this [slashdot.org] article [slashdot.org] before [slashdot.org] (Ok, bored with searching, but there is more).
We get it, Jon. The net is evolving to the next stage of media. Can we talk about something else?
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| - Re:Deja vu? by cd_Csc (Score:2) Thursday October 11, @03:18PM
- 1 reply
beneath your current threshold.
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Fox != cable (Score:1)
by (startx) (whocares@/dev/null) on Thursday October 11, @11:41AM (#2415937)
(User #37027 Info | http://smartguy.ontheweb.cx)
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Since when is fox a cable channel? I've never had cable, and yet I've had a fox station all my life.
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| - Re:Fox != cable by TheShadow (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:24PM
- Fox == cable by Catbeller (Score:1) Thursday October 11, @12:28PM
- 1 reply
beneath your current threshold.
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Communications yes, news no. (Score:4, Interesting)
by Phaid (in_a_coma_dial_999@yahoo.com) on Thursday October 11, @11:42AM (#2415950)
(User #938 Info | http://debecker.tripod.com)
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This is just more hype about how the Net and everything appearing on it is cool and hip and important, while the dinosaur of old media is dying. It's still not true.
My main use for the Internet on September 11 was communications. I don't have a television or a radio in my office at work, so what I did was SSH into my tv-card-equipped machine at home and fire up XawTV and view screen grabs from ABC and CNN. I was on the CNN.com IRC server reading their closed-captioning server so I had a basically real time transcript to go with the pictures. I was also on EFNet talking to people. The Net allowed me to circumvent the physical barriers blocking my access to non-Net-based information, but I was still getting my news from traditional sources. Most Web-based news sites were terribly behind the curve; those that weren't were overloaded and unreachable.
As for reporting since September 11, the Net isn't that great. The only sites that are terribly informative are ones run by big media outlets. It's true that the Net allows you a much wider perspective, since you can get news from all over the world. But it's not the chaotic rumor mongering and pontification of most independent web sites which is interesting; it's the well researched and disciplined reporting that happens at major media organizations.
You argue that old media is monolithic and overly consolidated. But the Web allows you to get around that easily. It's not the independent news sites that allow this; it's the fact that every major news organization on the planet has a presence on the Web. Don't believe the New York Times? See what the South China Morning Post has to say instead.
The problem, Jon, is that you seem to believe that just because something is on the Net, it's automatically great. But most people who write on the Web aren't particularly skillful or talented or well informed; they're just people. You still need money and resources to gather news effectively. CNN and ABC News and whatnot may not be as hip and cool as LeetNews.com, but they have the resources to do the "serious" reporting. The Net is great because it makes more of this sort of information available, more quickly. But it doesn't empower anyone to suddenly become well informed and interesting.
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c'mon Jon (Score:2)
by geekoid (notities@yahoo.com) on Thursday October 11, @11:43AM (#2415955)
(User #135745 Info | http://slashdot.org/ | Last Journal: Thursday February 21, @04:37PM)
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You write an article on slashdot about how we can get accurate news on the net?
I think I speak for all slashdot reader when I say "Well, D'uh".
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Big News Agencies (Score:2, Insightful)
by themurray on Thursday October 11, @11:44AM (#2415958)
(User #78325 Info)
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Profits and bias-reporting (towards the left) seem to drive the news this days, even with the 9-11 incident. Worldnetdaily and newsmax offers many stories that would not be caught dead on a leftist editor's ABC or NBC show, since they support guns, people's rights, etc. Drudge is a little better, then major news, but not everything is researched properly at times.
I can't stand most major talking heads on the news like Dan Rather and his kin. The way they skew news stories with personal like or dislike is horrible.
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Where does Bert fit into this? (Score:1)
by FSK on Thursday October 11, @11:48AM (#2415977)
(User #123170 Info | http://www.zenarcade.net)
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Don?t beat up on Katz that much, he?s obviously living in a different dimension then the rest of us. I just find it funny that his article is posted at the same time that /. is running another story about the Bert Osama conection [nu.nl].
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Changing the way history is seen (Score:1)
by SpongeLikePickle on Thursday October 11, @11:50AM (#2415984)
(User #153914 Info)
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The Net could very well be a change in the way history can be reviewed in the future.
Imagine your in High School and the teacher is talking about the WTC attacks of 2001. When I was in school you could get a few books on history but not real life accounts of things.
I would love to be able to move back in time on the net and really read what people were saying and doing during the historic events. Take the plague, you could read peoples accounts of the death of loved ones, or the pain of there own disease. Sounds macabre but it would really bring the issue to life. That's where it should be studied, at the moment it happens. Not after it's been cut, chewed, and spit up into little bite sized pieces.
Of course our current Net does not work this way. This time next year all of those pages will be removed because of space issues and will be replaced with the current world problems.
Sad really.
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Control (Score:2)
by sien on Thursday October 11, @11:51AM (#2415995)
(User #35268 Info | http://slashdot.org/)
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I think that the true value of the net is yet to come. The reason I say this is government media management. The Gulf War will be, I think, the high water mark of government media management. In the Gulf War the US military brilliantly controlled the media, and denied it the ability to provide good images that they did not wish people to see. That is now impossible. The fact that it costs almost nothing to provide news to millions of people means that more views and more images can get across. This has been best outlined by the current debate on whether it is ethical to show Osama's videos. Who cares ? The US government can no longer deny people access to this information. When the Taliban get smart and start shooting videos of dieng civilians and send them out it will not be possible to remove those images from mass distribution.
Honestly, for the first time in a long time I'm feeling like the internet does do a neat new thing. Media and information freed are being freed from financial constraints.
Another cool thing about this is the range of expression you get. You can go beyond US media in the US easily, and check not what US media says that Arabs say but what Arabs actually say. That is great.
Finally, it will be really interesting to see how the anti-war movement uses the net to organize and inform. If the war is long and nasty it may enable the anti-war movement to be much better organised and informed than ever before.
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because the standards are lower (Score:2)
by gelfling on Thursday October 11, @11:55AM (#2416017)
(User #6534 Info | http://slashdot.org/)
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There are fewer and less restrictive editorial conventions on the net compared to other media. In it's thirst to be first, every agency from the government to the RNC to CNN to your local al-Wazir website pretty much pushes whatever they want without verification, vetting, substantiation of sources or accurate quoting. We accept that there is a higher probability that anything we read on the web even if it's from The Washington Post, may be pure bullshit or at best, inaccurate or uninformed. We're traded signal to noise for speed. But then again the standards for mass media are pretty low anyhow since there is little or no distinction among news, editorial, political advertising and commercial advertising.
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Misinformation Epidemic? With JohnKats Around? (Score:2)
by Lethyos on Thursday October 11, @11:58AM (#2416030)
(User #408045 Info | http://slashdot.org/ | Last Journal: Tuesday February 26, @10:30AM)
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Certainly the Net is not a place of misinformation, full misleading journalism, with writers like JohnKats around. How could you not trust JK's medium of choice?
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McLuhan: Net is a "warm" medium (Score:2)
by peter303 on Thursday October 11, @12:02PM (#2416047)
(User #12292 Info)
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The early media pundit Marshall McLuhan divided media into "hot" and "cold" depending on how actively the audience participates. Video games are at one end- very hot- while daytime TV is very cold- TV is mainly a background noise.
Net news is "warmer" than TV news. You pretty much take TV news as they dish it out. While the web you can hunt for detail and diverse opinion.
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It's not so much the news on the net that is good. (Score:1, Insightful)
by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 11, @12:04PM (#2416055)
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It's that you are able to get massive variations of the same news depending on culture bias.
So if something happens in the US I go look at an online paper for Europe to get thier view, and then one in China to get another view or Korea or Pakistan, etc, etc. Then you have "on the ground" type posts. Slashdot as an example you find that a lot of news stories posted here are covered in more detail by the readers then the actual reporter.
Yes all of them have bias and proproganda to some level but it certainly helps to trim out the BS.
In the end you have to make your own choices on what you believe to be true. Better to here the story from everyone then just one person.
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"Old Media" just using new medium (Score:1)
by El_Smack on Thursday October 11, @12:04PM (#2416058)
(User #267329 Info)
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When people flood onto the net for info after a big news story hits, where do most of them go? To CNN.com, ABCnews.com, FoxNews.com, etc. Did my homepage go down from millions of hits by people who wanted my take on it all? No.
The net is growing in popularity as a way for Old Media to distribute it's content, but it's the same content as what's on TV.
You do get more choices, though. At least I can choose to go to www.SomeDudesNews.com. But I didn't, not when I really wanted to know what was going on. I went to CNN, just like everyone else. That's why the nets' impact on all this is minimal at best.
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Considering TV Media yeilds to Gov't wants... (Score:2)
by Ghoser777 (f[ ]nba@uiuc.edu ['ahre' in gap]) on Thursday October 11, @12:06PM (#2416068)
(User #113623 Info | http://fahrenbacher.com)
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I'll stick with online media. It was either today ot yesterday that major news media agreed to stop airing video tapes of bin Laden. Sure, I don't agree with the guy, but we defintely should hear both sides of the story. Oh wait, then maybe American's won't feel so great about what their government has done in the past. Sure we should support our system, but that doesn't mean do it blindly.
Give me options or give me death. If I don't have options, I don't have freedom. Therefore, this is equivalent to give me liberty or give me death. This should be our new battle cry against those who oppose freedom of speech and liberty (although someone can probably think of a better way to put it).
Even when the "net" is wrong, because there is a decentralization of news coverage, you ae assured to give multiple angles on a piece, and only when you have evaluated an issue from all side can you form a reasonable opinion about what's going on. The first thing to go during war is the Truth, but we really needed is the arguments, so we can come to our own Truths.
F-bacher
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News and disintermediation (Score:2)
by dgroskind on Thursday October 11, @12:06PM (#2416069)
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The traditional news media--the TV networks and newspapers -- have colonized the Web and turned it into another channel for their content. The Web offers plenty of new sources for rumour and opinion but authoritative news comes from the same sources as it always has with all the benefits and drawbacks they entail.
As a result, the Web is less immediate than television and a more immediate than the daily newspaper but the content is fundamentally the same.
The future of the Web as a news medium is almost certainly not in broadcasting but in narrowcasting. Information can be selected, packaged and distributed to niche markets and special interest groups more quickly and cheaply than other media.
Here the Web is not fulfilling its potential for breaking news. For instance, groups involved in the Sept. 11 disaster such as the NYPD, the N.Y. Fire Dept., the companies in the WTC, the airlines, etc., could have begun posting information as it became available for interested parties. They would have provided authoritative information not available from the broadcast media that have a wider mandate.
Existing broadcast news media could turn over part of their Web sites for this type of information so that users would have a portal rather than having to go to numerous separate sites.
Given such a platform, companies, government agencies and non-profit groups that normally slant their press releases so that they will be picked up by conventional broadcast news media could instead provide detailed information for the specific groups that need it.
Add a "what's new" page and a search engine to such a site, and you have the news site of the future.
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