What’s up with media reform? Free Press is active on many fronts. Click on this video to hear Josh Silver’s two-minute message regarding many of the most pressing issues.
I’ve found Free Press to be a terrific organization providing numerous ways for thousands of journalists, citizens and citizen-journalists to exchange ideas for improvement of our news-gathering and publishing. I’ve attended the past three Free Press national conferences, each of which drew several thousand people. I highly recommend that you visit the Free Press website and get involved.
This was the third year I attended the National Conference for Media Reform sponsored by Free Press. This year’s conference was held in Minneapolis. As in previous media reform conferences, I was reminded about many of the hurdles faced by those American citizens who are attempting to get serious and coherent coverage of the news. By “news,” I mean the type of information that is critically important in order to prepare us to make good decisions as citizens (i.e., voting). One of the most distressing things one learns from attending the conference is that very little news is available to those watch local TV “news” and read their local “news”papers.
One of the fundamental principles of Free Press is that there cannot be a healthy democracy without a vigorous news media. The problem is that our news media is sickly, poisoned by rampant commercialism. The modern corporate media is over-consolidated to such an extent that it reflexively kowtows to political power and repeatedly refuses to challenge abuses of that power.
McChesney/Nichols - Part I
Topics covered in Part I:
Is the media reform movement paying too much attention to Bill O’Reilly and FOX?
The basic aims of the media reform movement.
More on Free Press and the reason for the media reform movement.
The problem with over-consolidation of the media.
Free Press stands for the proposition that there is no stark divide between journalists and citizens.
In 1964, Rudolph Dreikurs wrote a child psychology book that is still considered a classic by child psychologist: Children: the Challenge. Dreikurs argued that using punishments to change behavior is inefficient.
No amount of punishment will bring about lasting submission. Confused and bewildered parents mistakenly hope that punishment will eventually bring results, without realizing [...]
Salon’s Michael Grieve reports on Michael Copp’s address to the YearlyKos Convention. Copps, an FCC commissioner, addressed the YearlyKos Convention in Chicago:
a three-day gathering of about 1,500 bloggers and liberal activists. But his address was less a lecture than a call to action. “The country needs you, it needs a free press, it needs the [...]
I was recently provided with a copy of Tragedy and Farce: How the American Media Sells Wars, Spend Election’s, and Destroy Democracy, by John Nichols and Robert W. McChesney. Written in 2005, this book is a great way to get an historical perspective on the state of journalism in America. “How bad have things gotten?” [...]
The Guardian calls the military occupation in Afghanistan "Groundhog Day," indicating that "Afghanistan is a political failure, a fact over which the international community continue to be in denial." http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/04/afghanistan-political-failure-kim-howells »
I've never read any of Hubbard's books, but I have seen the movie version of "Battlefield Earth" with John Travolta as the lead villain. If the film was anywhere true to the story, (and I suspect is was), it wasn't bad in the beginning. It started off by setting up mankind being treated as semi-intelligent beasts of burden by an occupying alien ar... »
Dan,This is probably a matter of taste, but that Hubbard was "engaging page turners, light burners, wage earners. They show a keen grasp of storytelling" is hardly the same as saying he was a good writer---the same can be said of Dan Brown and I think he's little better than a hack.Hubbard was, however, popular in the 30s and part of the 40s, at on... »
I disagree with Mark about L Ron Hubbard's quality of writing. His stories are all engaging page turners, light burners, wage earners. They show a keen grasp of storytelling. They also show a near total ignorance of science and math, and only the faintest grasp of the distinction between magic and technology.In fact, his instinct for storytelling i... »
Rev. Claude needs to read some actual history. The diameter of the Earth was known (within a few percent) hundreds of years before Jesus. This knowledge was not lost to navigators or intellectuals, even if the uneducated public might have missed it. After all, the Bible itself misleads on this point: Inerrant Biblical Geology Falls FlatThe Bible is... »
Rev,Just because Atlanta is depicted in "Gone With The Wind" and there was something called the Civil War, does that change that book from fiction to history?Also, people in ancient Greece knew the world is round, hundreds of years B.C.E. People here and there, from time to time, have lost that knowledge and regained it, usually because someone in... »
Paul: If Congress had given Elizabeth Warren the power to issue subpoenas and enforce them, I might agree with you that she is "partially culpable." But they've tied her hands. Further, it has become increasingly clear that there was not any accounting method in place when the money was doled out. None of this is Ms. Warren's fault. Give her ... »
Mark...Just because you don't believe or understand the good book, doesn't mean it's fiction. A couple of 100 years ago people believed the world was flat, and to say the world was round was considered fiction.Every cities or civilizations mentioned in the good book have been documented to have existed exactly where it said it did. But also, artifa... »
Ms. Warren has been an entertaining figure to see interviewed, and she appears very competent. When, though, will be begin accepting responsibility for her job? It is great to go around the country talking about how you don't know where the money is, and getting a good laugh from the crowd. But... umm..... isn't it her job to figure this stuff o... »
Erich, Much recognition software employs an artificial intelligence programming technique known as a neural net simulation. Neural net simulations run many parallel sub-programs, called nodes, that independently analyze the input and produce a list of possible results. Each node starts with a different list of possible results. Each node votes ... »
one thing I found scary was the mega-dosing on niacin. B vitamins have long been used in detoxification programs for drug and alcohol abuse. Niacin has several effects in moderate to high doses. It temporarily increased blood flow throughout the body, has an anti-inflammatory effect, and in many people causes a "flush", a prickly heat sensation t... »
Erich, there is a basic difference between what any software does, and what it shows a user. Internally, Dragon knows its own confidence level, the sound levels, the sound distinction levels, the frequency distributions of each sound, and the frequency distribution and volume of the background noise.For a consumer dictation program, all it displays... »
On DemocracyNow, Amy Goodman speaks to McClatchy reporter Greg Gordon:In 2006 and 2007, the bank reportedly peddled more than $40 billion in securities backed by at least 200,000 risky home mortgages, but never told the buyers it was secretly betting that a sharp drop in US housing prices would send the value of those securities plummeting. See, Go... »
Dan: That is often not my experience. When I use Dragon, it spits out the closest fit to the words I utter, and they can sometimes be dramatically different than what I utter. It doesn't display any sort of confidence level--Dragon is ALWAYS confident! The exception would be if I were to cough, at which point Dragon doesn't recognize any te... »
Dragon may not yet be perfect in transcription, but it could easily tell when it is having trouble, as in mumbling, indistinct word separations, and overall volume (the causes of "speak up"). »
