Just Ask
StumbleUpon has brought me many novel and new things, but I think by far my favourite has been AskQuestions.
The idea is the community votes on questions they want to know about, and independant journalists are hired to research the topic. Everything that is wrong in the world of CNN is corrected by this site.
It looks like my fellow peak oilers are really quite worried about important issues.
I spent a large portion of last night watching Cutting Edge: Enemy Image. It was a startling and eye opening insight into how TV has changed since the reporting of the vietnam war.
When you look at the first Gulf War's TV coverage, it's a general and a smart bomb. You never see US soldiers. You only see "surgical strikes".
I think that's why I thought it was boring when it interrupted my viewing as a small child.
The second gulf war was different - it was stagemanaged. It was practically a movie. For example: the image of Saddam's statue being pulled down was organised entirely by the US army, rather than a riot of civilians tearing down an idol of an oppressor. They swarmed around with megaphones and called people out of their houses, as well as collecting foreign journalists. There was no mob until the US soldiers arrived and made one.
I don't want to be lied to. I want my news to be a truthful and insightful view of the world. This is why I trust bloggers more than I trust TV anchorpeople. They might not have all of the facts right, but you know that: it's expected. There's also an idea of reputation: if you make a fool of yourself in the blogosphere, people can step right up and comment. I don't know if I could ever get that kind of access to "real" news people.
The idea is the community votes on questions they want to know about, and independant journalists are hired to research the topic. Everything that is wrong in the world of CNN is corrected by this site.
It looks like my fellow peak oilers are really quite worried about important issues.
I spent a large portion of last night watching Cutting Edge: Enemy Image. It was a startling and eye opening insight into how TV has changed since the reporting of the vietnam war.
When you look at the first Gulf War's TV coverage, it's a general and a smart bomb. You never see US soldiers. You only see "surgical strikes".
I think that's why I thought it was boring when it interrupted my viewing as a small child.
The second gulf war was different - it was stagemanaged. It was practically a movie. For example: the image of Saddam's statue being pulled down was organised entirely by the US army, rather than a riot of civilians tearing down an idol of an oppressor. They swarmed around with megaphones and called people out of their houses, as well as collecting foreign journalists. There was no mob until the US soldiers arrived and made one.
I don't want to be lied to. I want my news to be a truthful and insightful view of the world. This is why I trust bloggers more than I trust TV anchorpeople. They might not have all of the facts right, but you know that: it's expected. There's also an idea of reputation: if you make a fool of yourself in the blogosphere, people can step right up and comment. I don't know if I could ever get that kind of access to "real" news people.
posted by Dan at 6:47 PM
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