I've wondered before about the quality of kid's shows and movies from our generation compared to this one. Off the top of my head it seems like the cartoons I grew up with were way better than the shows of today, but it's possible 95% of them were garbage and I'm only remembering the good ones or looking at them through nostalgia goggles. I distinctly remember Transformers being awesome when I was a kid, but now, it's only entertaining because of how hilariously awful the writing, animation, and voice acting are.
That’s why I don't watch cartoons. I watch comedy news shows, like the Daily Show and Colbert Report, to stay current without the limited view of the general media. And they make me laugh:).
I don't think it's a good idea to watch Daily Show and Colbert Report as your primary news. That just seems so jaded and dangerous to me. It's probably better to watch them as a supplement to real news. BBC and the Economist are fairly good news organizations to go through. They're not perfect, but they're less biased than American based CNN, or god help you, Fox News. You should only read those sites and watch their news after developing a very fine bullshit detector, which I doubt you have the experience for yet.
The Wall Street Journal is fairly right oriented, but I don't read many of their international affair articles, I read anything business or career related. WSJ is an acquired taste though.
All media is unfortunately limited though, no matter where you are in the world. But goddamnit I'll take private enterprise media over state run media any time.
All media is unfortunately limited though, no matter where you are in the world. But goddamnit I'll take private enterprise media over state run media any time.
Well, if it's all crap, I'll take the funny crap, limited or otherwise. We get the Wall Street Journal all the time, but my dad tends to hoard it. I read our local news paper daily, if that atones for anything.
Sometimes I wish that we got other countries news here, like England.
BBC and the Economist are fairly good news organizations to go through. They're not perfect, but they're less biased than American based CNN, or god help you, Fox News.
But goddamnit I'll take private enterprise media over state run media any time.
The simple fact is that the news has changed dramatically over the last 30 years and it's incredibly difficult to find accurate "objective" information. There's a good reason too - when news shows were first started, they were actually produced at a loss in profit. Stations would lose money on news shows because they were a public service by law. Essentially, the idea is that the airwaves around us belong to the country, and thereby its citizens. Since the government was leasing public airwaves to private entities, they were, as part of that lease, required by the FCC to dedicate a certain percentage to "public service." This was generally done through a news program. As media grew more sophisticated about profitability over the years, they realized that news was reaching a desirable demographic for marketing, and sensationalizing it could keep people's attention. (i.e. the now popularized "magazine" format.) Combine that with the advent of cable, which circumvents FCC regulations, and an ever growing leniency on the part of those same regulations. (i.e. the percentage of the population that any one overarching media organization could reach. I'm a bit fuzzy on the numbers, but I seem to remember it started out somewhere around 30%. yea. 30%. Now think Newscorp, Fox's parent company.)
Anyways, point is that news in the US is created with a profit in mind now instead of a service, and that's a big difference in both the information provided and the way that information is provided.
Touché, Mario, but I have a plan!
*eats a pancake*
:takethat:
In other news, we have an exchange group with a city in Japan, and we had an anime party. At said anime party, we watched Princess Mononoke and the while making jokes about those things in the forest that look like Pillsbury Dough Boys. It was a fun party
Sorry DI, I should have been more specific. I'm more against state run medias that purposely shelter its people from any kind of derogatory information towards the state, and against medias that have to get permission from the government before publishing any kind of economic or political data about the country.
Comments
The Wall Street Journal is fairly right oriented, but I don't read many of their international affair articles, I read anything business or career related. WSJ is an acquired taste though.
All media is unfortunately limited though, no matter where you are in the world. But goddamnit I'll take private enterprise media over state run media any time.
Sometimes I wish that we got other countries news here, like England.
Bwahaha! A topic I'm overeducated on!
The simple fact is that the news has changed dramatically over the last 30 years and it's incredibly difficult to find accurate "objective" information. There's a good reason too - when news shows were first started, they were actually produced at a loss in profit. Stations would lose money on news shows because they were a public service by law. Essentially, the idea is that the airwaves around us belong to the country, and thereby its citizens. Since the government was leasing public airwaves to private entities, they were, as part of that lease, required by the FCC to dedicate a certain percentage to "public service." This was generally done through a news program. As media grew more sophisticated about profitability over the years, they realized that news was reaching a desirable demographic for marketing, and sensationalizing it could keep people's attention. (i.e. the now popularized "magazine" format.) Combine that with the advent of cable, which circumvents FCC regulations, and an ever growing leniency on the part of those same regulations. (i.e. the percentage of the population that any one overarching media organization could reach. I'm a bit fuzzy on the numbers, but I seem to remember it started out somewhere around 30%. yea. 30%. Now think Newscorp, Fox's parent company.)
Anyways, point is that news in the US is created with a profit in mind now instead of a service, and that's a big difference in both the information provided and the way that information is provided.
:takethat:, off-topicness!
*eats a pancake*
:takethat:
In other news, we have an exchange group with a city in Japan, and we had an anime party. At said anime party, we watched Princess Mononoke and the while making jokes about those things in the forest that look like Pillsbury Dough Boys. It was a fun party