The News is very, very bad
07
July
Oz raised a great point in his post on 4/7/06 “Coolest Game On The Net Right Now!!!”. Good boy Oz.
Darfur has been a hot spot for years, but it’s just not front page news. Sub-Saharan Africa has hardly improved since Geldof and his mates attempted to bring the plight of the region to the attention of the Western World. It wasn’t a new plight then, nor is it the only one we ignore.
Oz mentioned that he read the paper properly recently, and saw the article on Darfur under “World News”.
This got me thinking. One of the problems with what news we are able to access each day (aside from complacency, ignorance, isolation etc…) is that our media outlets are constantly having their budgets cut, putting more and more strain on smaller newsrooms. The public simply absorb what they are told and consider that the end of the story. Little do most people know that newsroom can only follow up a fraction of the press releases and leads that arrive through various means at their offices each day.
Major newspapers are also over stretched, and often rely on news agencies such as AAP, Reuters, AFP, Bloombergs and often other newspapers and networks, to get a story. Take a look through your daily paper and note how many of the stories are credited to another news organisation.
The main job of a news agency is to chase down the marketable looking stories, break them and cover them thoroughly so that the Age or Herald Sun can ad no value by sending out a reporter. In these cases it is far easier for he papers to simply purchase the story. This is often done with little or no checking. We all know that to sell something, it often needs to be “sexed up”, and the news is no exception. You’ll notice a difference between bought news and photos and the stock standard staff newshound gathered material.
As consumers of news, Australians should be more discerning. For example, instead of relying on the Herald Sun for your opinion on events, take into account the obvious bias of all of the major dailies and read one from each camp. The Age and the Herald Sun should give two often different views here in Melbourne. Compliment that with the ABC online, and this should give you a broad overview of the opinions and events out there. Also, the Financial Review and The Bulletin are not just for stock reports and politics. They have more indepth information, and better photos, than the more widely read Age and Herald Sun.
If you are like me, and completely fed up with the mainstream media, become an educated news consumer and take a look at some of the following sites.
Some of these are unapologetically Leftist and others are a bit paranoid. The thing to remember is that one news source is not enough for you to form an educated opinion.
There is no difinitive list of news souces and each person you ask will have a different opinion, a different list and a different agenda.
Nevertheless here is a short list of sites that in turn have their own links and tangents:
Alternative News
Perspectives
African Societies - African perspectives
If American Knew - Alternative American perspectives
1. Oz | July 7th, 2006 at 21:56
Bravo! Breadth of information is a beautiful thing. For many years I read ‘The Age’ - perhaps it appealed to my right leaning. But over the last six months I have found ‘The Australian’ to be informative from a more centrist perspective. Of course, nothing beats a a good old search on the net to grab varying opinions.
But do you think the real problem stems more from reader apathy?