Tag Archives: Bill O’Reilly

AP to Credit Bloggers: The Headlong Rush Into Media Overload


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah
The New Media

NEW MEDIA? - Bloggers can't get no respect, except at the AP.

The Associated Press is starting to credit bloggers as sources. On the surface, this seems like an uncontroversial idea. There are some damn good blogs out there and their reportage is the equal of any traditional media outlet. On the other hand, not all traditional media outlets are as good as they used to be, so that’s a pretty low bar. And for every good, well-run blog, there are 10 million hacks like me.

The nut of this usually centers on the notion of credibility. No doubt that’s important, but the issue is as much about technology and a rapidly changing society as it is about credibility.

“The News” – with a capital “N” – is being pulled every which way by dozens of brand new technologies becoming obsolete as we speak. Sadly, newspapers and magazines are in their death throes. Uncle Walter’s nightly news has been supplanted by the Giant Screaming Heads on cable. As they shout into the ether, their day is coming to an end too – even if they don’t know it yet. Heck, even blogs, despite AP’s big leap into the future, are on the way to the dust bin. The abomination that is Twitter – operated by drunken Hollywood starlets or pinned-down insurgents in 140 character bursts – is the new wave of media. I expect news via telepathy in 10 years … no, let’s make that 6 months.

Oops, there it is now.

Oooo, I Gotta Have That
Our society has a great affinity for the new and the splashier and faster, the better. This is what drives cable companies to tout Internet service that saves milliseconds over DSL. Heaven forbid we have to wait another second to see which jail LiLo has checked into now. The rapid pace of technology has far outpaced the human ability to use it wisely.

There’s no longer anyone that isn’t part of the media – not withstanding Rush Limbaugh‘s and Sean Hannity‘s claims they aren’t. The impact of an Anderson Cooper, Brian Williams, Gene Robinson, or even (Dear God) Bill O’Reilly is big, but at a fire or flood or in a war zone, a scared kid Twittering and sending live video from his iPhone can be bigger.

It seems we’ve lost sight of the nature of news and failed to realize that a little time delay is sometimes a good thing. It gives humans time to digest information at a comfortable pace, rather than being distracted by their perpetually attached Bluetooths (Blueteeth?) It gives reporters time to collect their information and thoughts and news consumers time to actually understand what they’re absorbing.

Pffft, What Does the AP Know?
I don’t know if AP’s decision is a good or a bad thing – and I don’t think they do either. Their journalistic bell is being beat silly with a hi-tech, six-axis, robotically-controlled hammer … installed in a cellphone. Lost in all that God-awful racket is the other dimension of the issue – credibility.

What the hell constitutes as good blog? How reliable is reliable? Are they credible because some government official tells them so or does the AP reporter have to run a fancy checklist to see if the blog owner is on the up and up. Does he have to find at least 5 blogs that all say the same thing to before he can cite them?

Those are pretty tall orders for a reporter in search of news that’s spread around dozens of blogs at the speed of light, each with a particular ax to grind, and that change in real time to the “facts” on the ground.  By the time the fact checking is done, the story is already over and we’ve all moved onto the next catastrophe du jour or Hollywood breakup.

Credibility? Yeah, we have an app for that.

A Tip of the Hat A big tip of the hat to Jr. Poobah Ari Cohn for the idea for this post.

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Good Night and Good Luck…You’ll Need It


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah
Infotainment Rules

WHAT'S THE DIFF? - With today's oversaturated media market and constant demands for more and more entertainment, the news has become just one more Big Show.

Americans are an easily bored lot. We demand everything be ripe with entertainment possibilities. We’re a nation addicted to 24X7, 500-channel television – which we nevertheless claim has nothing worth watching – on which we gorge ourselves on a never-ending supply of reality shows promoting the most fame-crazed and mentally defective of us to open their lives in the most voyeuristic fashion. Real life made unreal by the millions of gawking rubberneckers tuning in.

And, the most unrealistic reality shows are the news shows.

Television news was once a place where networks expected to lose money on the public service of covering the news. Now ratings make newsrooms just like any other Disneyesque entertainment outlet. The Edward R. Murrow/Walter Cronkite newsroom was a place where serious people investigated serious topics, regardless of their inherent profitability. Today, there’s little distinction between the Daily Show bullpen and the CNN newsroom.

Once profit became the news’ primary MO focus-grouped, ratings-pregnant drivel stepped in as a sort of news lite where interviews are ‘booked’ and ‘talent’ eggs on the most disgraceful, but oh so entertaining, shout-fests. As much as everyone likes to complain about the ‘mainstream media’ – which is curiously deemed both too liberal and too conservative at the same time – we’ve got no one to blame except our infamously Nielsen-rated selves.

Because of our national, self-absorbed entertainment obsession, we’re killing the geese that laid our golden First Amendment eggs. We’ve abandoned print media altogether. Once-vibrant publications like Newsweek are going the way of the dodo because of the printed page’s inability to adapt to our real-time, excitingly manufactured, multimedia entertainment extravaganza demands.

But even e-media is slipping away. We’ve begun sucking the marrow from infotainment’s bones and it’s not long on this Earth because of it. Real TV news has been supplanted by screaming mimis like Glenn Beck. Even the ‘serious’ Sunday news programs are pale imitations of professional wrestling – all faux drama and glittery costumes bumptiously pontificating on the national debt or latest job numbers. We’ve molded the news to our ravenous need for entertainment and are in a rapidly quickening race to put it out of business too. It seems that as we’ve consumed reality shows like Big Brother we’ve unwittingly given ourselves over to Orwell’s Big Brother…

…and become a nation of scandal junkie couch potatoes minus the skills to tell the difference between Bill O’Reilly and Jon Stewart.

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Randomness: Olympic Gold Style


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah
TRIPPING ALL OVER HIMSELF - Russian Alexander Tretyakov finds out there's a reason they call his event "skeleton"

TRIPPING ALL OVER HIMSELF - Russian Alexander Tretyakov finds out the hard way that there's a reason they call his event the "skeleton".

The Thrill of Victory, the Agony of Da Feet

Robots in Search of a Reason

Consumerism: The Oil for Humanity’s Third Wheels

What the Hell is Wrong With People?

COPS! Live with the Men and Women of Law Enforcement

Nowhere Else to Go

Japan, Land of the Weirdly Rising Sun

OLYMPIC BLOW JOB - The thanks of a greatful nation are bestowed upon bronze medal-winner Scotty Lago

OLYMPIC BLOW JOB - The thanks of a greatful nation are bestowed upon bronze medal-winner Scotty Lago.

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Pagans, Wiccans, and Druids…Oh My!


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah
RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE? - Many Christians are mightily agrieved when their rights to practice religion as they see fit is questioned. From the looks of the Air Force Academy's newly installed "earth-centered religious prayer circle" some of them missed Sunday school when they covered "do unto others as you would have them do unto you".

RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE? - Many Christians are mightily agrieved when their right to practice religion as they see fit is questioned. From the looks of the Air Force Academy's newly installed "earth-centered religious prayer circle" some of them missed Sunday school when they covered "do unto others as you would have them do unto you".

Self Disclosure: I am an atheist and neither condemn nor support the Air Force Academy‘s action. I just find it interesting.

The  Air Force Academy recently provided a worship area for Pagans, Wiccans, Druids, and other Earth-centered religions and the event passed surprisingly quietly given the religious culture wars of our times. Atheists didn’t denounce it as a dagger to the heart of separation of church and state. Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly didn’t say that allowing Druids to celebrate evergreens was an assault on Christmas. Heck, even Pat Robertson hasn’t claimed blizzards in Colorado Springs are a punishment from God…yet.

Still, there’s always one in the crowd.

Robert Jeffress, pastor of Dallas’ First Baptist Church,  said, “to construct an outdoor space for the worship of pagan deities is an open invitation for God to send His harshest judgments against our nation.”

Jeffress’s main beef seems to be that the alternative worship area is a clear and present danger to “our nation” because it promotes idolatry.

“God has judged idolatry in the past through military invasions, earthquakes, a flood, and a mixture of fire and brimstone,” Jeffress warns. I partially agree. Different beliefs in different Gods has been a major burr in humanity’s backside for eons. Jeffress goes on, “The book of Revelation prophesies that God will employ the same agents of His wrath during the final seven years of earth’s history. There is no reason to think God is on hiatus during this present age.”

He’s quite right that the first commandment from (his Christian) God is, “You shall have no other gods before Me.” But, the Pastor’s biblical references may have more holes that the theory of Creationism.

Using biblical quotes to support his argument is about as useful to people who don’t believe the bible as saying “thou shalt not sin because the phone book says so.” Whether he thinks so or not, many people deeply believe there are other Gods, no Gods, or just don’t care about it one way or another and would appreciate it if he not diss their beliefs just as others shalt not diss his.

Jeffress argues the Constitution says nothing about all religions being treated equally, but notions of equality have been benchmarks of the courts’ interpretations in recent history (not withstanding his citing of judicial opinions from the early 1800s). His contention is that if the Bible says it and the Constitution doesn’t, then the Academy is under no obligation to provide a place of worship. He’d be right, although others might argue they don’t have to provide a Christian church either and if the Constitution isn’t about fostering equality, what is it about?

Although Jeffress denounced Pat Robertson’s claim that the Haitian earthquake was God’s punishment for alleged voodoo incidents in their past, he changes logical horses in mid-stream to believe, “…without hesitation that any nation that officially embraces idolatry is openly inviting God’s wrath.”

Ow! Mental whiplash!

The well-meaning Jeffress seems to fear another terrorist attack and advises, “this would be a good time to seek God’s protection rather than kindle His anger.”

So, does that mean Jeffress will refuse the protection of a Pagan Air Force Academy-trained pilot fighting off a terrorist attack because the pilot had angered Jeffress’s God?

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Randomness: Randomly Random Style


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah
CAUTION, OBVIOUS SIGHT GAG - "Would you look at the rack on her!"

CAUTION, OBVIOUS SIGHT GAG - "Would you look at the rack on her!"

Random Randomness Randomly Randomized

Domo Arigato

Proof the American Consumer is Batshit Crazy

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