Originally Posted By gurgitoy2 "Like ≠ Watch" I know, but what I'm saying is that do you think moderates would finally see Fox as being fairly biased and far from "fair and balanced" when Palin joins the team? Do you think they might stop watching the channel if they see it continue to pander to the hard right?
Originally Posted By dshyates The only people who believe FOX News is "fair and balanced" are far right wingers anyway. Most moderates know it's biased, but want to get their news from a variety of sources and then make up their own mind as to what the truth is. moderates also realize MSNBC is biased, but they still watch. They believe that both channels CAN present factual info along with their biases, but watching both is a good way to keep a critical eye on both sides. The question is are they getting frustrated with FOX, not just being biased, but flat out lying.
Originally Posted By wahooskipper Yes, Fox is biased. And, I would argue that CNN, MSNBC and others are also biased. The news does not come without a slant in today's world...at least here in the States. (PBS is about as close as it gets.) "Fair and Balanced" is a slogan. I've got news for you, Maxwell House is not always "Good to the Last Drop." I CAN eat just one Lay's potato chip. Avis does not always "Try Harder". And, here is one, Disneyland is not always the "Happiest Place on Earth".
Originally Posted By Sport Goofy << Yes, Fox is biased. And, I would argue that CNN, MSNBC and others are also biased. >> All news organizations SHOULD be biased -- biased towards the facts. Fox creates its own facts, eliminates facts, and reports half-truths to forward the agenda of its corporate owner. There is a big difference in that sort of bias. << "Fair and Balanced" is a slogan. >> It's also a deception tactic. Fox can claim to be fair and balanced as long as they present both "sides" to a story, even if one side is patently false. In this way, Fox reports a story on the earth being round and balances that out with commentary that the earth is flat. Does opposing commentary make the earth any less round? No. But they plant the seeds of doubt against any number of facts with this "balanced" approach to news reporting.
Originally Posted By gurgitoy2 I just find it annoying that the same story that should be reported the same way by different news organizations...isn't. If I watch a story on MSNBC it's spun one way, and if I flip to FOX to see the same story, it's spun in the opposite direction. That's ridiculous that a story that should just the facts, is twisted for one side or the other. No wonder people are confused.
Originally Posted By wahooskipper Facts? Facts? Wasn't it the early 90s when NBC Dateline got caught rigging trucks to explode to make their story a little more juicy? It isn't about the facts anymore. It is about the ratings.
Originally Posted By Sport Goofy << It isn't about the facts anymore. It is about the ratings. >> I'd argue that ratings don't even matter anymore. Even if you combine the ratings of all the news channels, the audience doesn't even compare to an evening broadcast by Walter Cronkite in his heyday.
Originally Posted By DAR <<"Fair and Balanced" is a slogan. I've got news for you, Maxwell House is not always "Good to the Last Drop." I CAN eat just one Lay's potato chip. Avis does not always "Try Harder". And, here is one, Disneyland is not always the "Happiest Place on Earth".>> Or Taco Bell advertising that cute friendly girls work behind the counter at their resturaunts.
Originally Posted By wahooskipper Goofy, I liked Cronkite...a LOT...but he had two other competitors on television and the print media. You can't compare ratings from the 60s to today with cable/satellite television and internet news coverage.
Originally Posted By Sport Goofy << You can't compare ratings from the 60s to today with cable/satellite television and internet news coverage. >> Sure you can. You can always compare total audience. News organizations like to claim that the audience is fractured -- but the truth is that the audience is tuning out altogether. How many people, with all of those wonderful choices out there, are choosing not to partake of news altogether? Journalists need to wake up. They are in a race to the bottom and the audience has already figured it out and left the room for the most part.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>Journalists need to wake up. They are in a race to the bottom and the audience has already figured it out and left the room for the most part.<< I don't think you can blame that on the journalists. The audience has spoken with their remotes and their browsers, and they want crap.
Originally Posted By Sport Goofy << The audience has spoken with their remotes and their browsers, and they want crap. >> The audience is tuning out. The audience that's left might be choosing crap, but others have just given up. The total audience for news isn't even half what it was 15 years ago -- and that is when you considered all media combined.
Originally Posted By WorldDisney ^^Almost everyone I know basically get their news off the internet these days. Only hardcore news junkies, like me, even bother to watch CNN, BBC, network TV like days of the past on a daily basis. And I'm guessing a lot of news websites like CNN, FOX news, etc gets lots of views from audiences who prefer to just go there instead of flicking on the TV to watch them as well. There is simply an abudance of news out there EVERYWHERE these days. Hell, my own brother has an MSNBC app on his blackberry and just read any blips that comes up and never bothers with anything else unless he wants something more in-depth (yes, hes a huge Keith Olbermann fan like me ). So I agree, audiences have left mainstream news. Part of is the news fault, news acess in general being so easy to get it 100 different ways and part of it is society itself that pay waaay more attention to sensationalism, celebrity gossip than actual news. Look at this board for example. I rarely come to W.E. anymore and I only came here today because I wanted to see postings on the Haiti earthquake. So far there are 7 posts about it and there is over 30 talking about Palin moving over to FOX news, which is not exactly hard hitting news, just more sensationalism and another reason to talk about Palin. Meanwhile people will want to talk about Leno-O'Brien for weeks on end vs what is happening in Haiti, or whatever is the next big sensational news headliner next week. I guarantee you whenever Tiger Woods come out of hiding or Charlie Sheen has a news conference and both of them are on the same day as the State of the Union address, guess which one will get the better ratings . So yeah, its our fault as well as journalism in general.
Originally Posted By mawnck >>I only came here today because I wanted to see postings on the Haiti earthquake. So far there are 7 posts about it and there is over 30 talking about Palin moving over to FOX news<< What would you like for us to talk about in regards to the Haiti earthquake? It isn't controversial. We can't vote it out of office. Complaining about it doesn't help. It hasn't directly affected anyone in the LP community or their families or friends AFAIK. We certainly wouldn't make jokes about it. And WE-ers aren't exactly the types to interject the typical content-free "oh how awful" post. Of course this tragedy is far more important than Palin, Leno-O'Brien, Balloon Boy etc., but that isn't going to drive up its post count. Which you have already discovered, since apparently you had nothing to add either. Which raises in my mind a question ... Is the desire to hash these things out on the internet/with coworkers/etc. driving the type of story We the People tend to concentrate on? Has the news become merely a source of discussion fodder?
Originally Posted By WorldDisney ^^My POINT is we can commentate FOEVER on basically not much of anything when they are interested in a topic vs something they are not that interested on. Its done allll the time lol. CNN has been reporting the Haiti earthquake for hours on end. There IS lots to discuss and speculate on if people wanted to. There could be lots of questions raised over what the U.S. should do, other neighboring countries, should 3rd world countries that suffer severe damages from what would be a lot less damages in first world countries get support to build better infracsture to prevent less damage in the future and so on. You can EASILY turn it into a real discussion. On the other end, all we heard that Palin is moving to FOX news to be a commentator and nothing more than that and YET we have no problem generating discussion on it . Look, I wasnt trying to attack anyone here over it, I was simply using this as an example that hard news is RARELY as interesting to society as sensational headlines, period and PART of the reason media isnt doing as great of a job is becasue people are turning away from hard news and toward the tabloid stuff, period. There is a reason why Tiger Woods was the number one headline in every newspaper and news channel worldwide a few weeks ago, because media knows where their bread is buttered. I'm not saying it isnt news and it shouldnt be covered, my only point is Tiger Woods push off the MORE important news off the front page because the majority of society simply wants to read about Tiger Woods and not another earthquake somewhere or the latest crisis in Zimbabwe somewhere. Politics only interest the majority of people when a politician has been caught with his pants down...but since thats happens quite a bit, there are no problems of constant coverage. On that end, when we have a terrorist attack, even a failed one, it gets coverage like no end because it naturally interest people and in many peoples mind, idiots blowing up planes across the Atlantic directly affects them. Some Senate hearing about ethical violations doesnt grab anyone these days, especially since most people are cynical about such things. So if the question is it media guiding society interests or society guiding media interest, thats a question that seems to be asked constantly. Many would argue its the latter. Others would say maybe thats what it SHOULD be. Whose to say we should let media decide on what is important and not important to cover? I dont know, its a biiig question lol, but the point is THIS is why so many people turn to internet for news VS TV these days anyway...because they can pick and choose the news they simply want to read about. We no longer have to wait 20 minutes into local news to see who won the Laker game IF thats all you care to hear about OR have to wait until they get through with some breaking news story to hear about the latest corporate merger if someone decides a celebrities death is more important to cover. They may not even get to the corporate merger at all if breaking news is that that big. On the internt, it will be covered though, SOMEWHERE! Now we got so many bloggers, amateur jornalist and places like Huffington Post to the Drudgereport now all considered just as credible as network news on the net covering everything under the sun, from Obamas latest speech on climate control, to the latest on John and Kate, you can go about anywhere now.
Originally Posted By WorldDisney <<Which you have already discovered, since apparently you had nothing to add either.>> No, I lurk about 90% of the time, I rarely comment on anything here. I'm not a 'regular' here anymore, havent been for years now. I simply wanted to read what others were saying who ARE regulars here, thats all. I only commented here because of Dabob said and had a point to make. I saw this thread yesterday as well and there was nothing said here at the time we havent heard a dozen times already, so I didnt feel like I had to add anything. But Sport Goofy said something that interest me, so I did. I'm not ATTACKING you for posting this and I understand why you did it. I'm only saying at the end of the day, this will probably get 100+ postings while I'm guessing Haiti will be lucky to get about 30 and then fall off the top page in a weeks time. That says something about us, ALL of us, thats the only point I'm making here and if you noticed I have put MYSELF in there as well if you look at the last sentence of my first post here you responded to .
Originally Posted By wahooskipper My update on Facebook last night was completely about Haiti. I suppose I am "closer" than many since I live in an area with tons of Haitian immigrants and we are relatively "close" to the country compared to most Americans. Our church raised quite a bit of money for hurricane relief after the series of storms that hit Haiti in '08 and I'm sure we will be collecting again. Going back to audience, ratings, etc for news. Back in the 50s, 60s and 70s the total audience for news was larger than now, of course. But, what were the alternatives back then? I mean, let's be honest. There were three networks I could get on my tv growing up plus, maybe, a couple of other choices. Now there are hundreds of channels to choose from outside of the major networks, not to mention TIVO, home movies, internet, video games, etc. I mean, when our family sat down after dinner it was the news, the news or the news. That said, I agree the news is not what it used to be. Back when I was in college in the late 80s I saw that coming and had some professors that were honest with me...which drove me to change my major. I'm glad I did. I don't know if I could do 2 minutes of John and Kate on a 20 minute news show given the state of the World today.
Originally Posted By Mr X Your major was journalism, I'm guessing? I realize there is tons of "white noise" out there now, but I still don't consider it an excuse for propagandizing or, perhaps even worse, shoddy or lazy journalism. There are a few out there who shine a light on things, but they are few and far between these days I'd say.
