Information control, or, How to get to Orwellian governance

I've just bumped into an incredible online resource I had no inkling of previously.

http://www.fora.tv/

One thing that is being missed in this discussion of whether or not there is a bias in media is a comparison of print and broadcast media in the manner in which they deal with "the truth." Newspapers put opinions on the "Op/Ed" page--the opinion and editorial page. One understands immediately that one is dealing not with what is alleged to be factual truth, but what is clearly labeled as opinion and editorial (and editorial is understood to be opinion by nearly everyone--i cannot imagine anyone who does not know that being sufficiently perceptive to understand an editorial if he or she read it).

Newspapers avoid making factual errors because they are subject to prosecution if a factual error which they make tends to bring someone into disrepute. The same, of course, applies to the broadcast media--with one important distinction. Newspapers operate on margin, and broadcast media are cash cows. Broadcast corporations have deep pockets, and are far less likely to be intimidated by the threat of legal action, given that few individuals possess the resources to pursue action against them in court. Newspapers can less afford such arrogance.

Newspapers traditionally print corrections of factual errors which they have made--it is rare that broadcast media make such admissions, unless an example is sufficiently notorious as to embarrass them. It is true that newspapers don't make corrections their front page material, but, for example, the New York Times has a dedicated corrections section on page 2. No such practice is common in broadcast media.

Additionally, broadcast media (and Fux "News" is notorious for this) don't emphasize a distinction between editorial comment and factual reportage. Even if print media were to include factual error in an editorial, or if factual error appeared in an opinion piece--letters to the editor provide a means for individuals to publicly dispute allegations factual content. No such device exists with broadcast media.

Sure many viewers who tune into Fux "News" know it is going to contain a good deal of biased opinion programming. But by no means is it reasonable to assume that everyone who tunes in does know that. Absent a "corrections" function, and absent a "letters to the editor" function, broadcast media (regardless of the bias alleged to any particular outlet) get a pass on that type of editorial honesty.

When i addressed the issue of the control of the internet, O'George jumped in to agree, and to go further to claim that there is no manipulation of media outlets. For this, he leaned on the age old and reasonable claim that every "news" outlet has an editorial bias. But it should not be construed that this was the intent of what i wrote about control of the internet.

There certainly can be manipulation of media, and savvy governments engage in it. The simplest example is the control of the information which is available to news media, as well as the control of the detail which is released to news media when a story cannot be killed.

It would be naive to fail to recognize editorial bias. It would be just as naive to fail to recognize that government can and routinely does attempt to manipulate public perception through the control of information. Comparing the print media to the broadcast, and either of those to the internet is an exercise in simplification--there are distinct differences which ought not to be ignored.

Specifically, the internet becomes significant because it is the medium which government, corporations and individuals are least likely to be able to manipulate. It is, at the same time, the medium which is the least trustworthy, and which calls the most upon us to exercise caution and discretion. I almost never read blogs--they're completely unreliable (they may contain factually correct material, but there's no reason to assume, and often little means to verify it), and they are almost always an exercise in ax grinding. My axes are sharp enough, thank you.

But why engage in non sequitors?

May apply? Have you joined the burgeoning naive club here at a2k?

First, while a person and a corporation are both legal entities, that does not mean that a corporation is a person.

Second, do you propose allowing corporations to continue to limit people's access to the truth? To continue to keep certain products off the market? To continue to threaten the humanity's -- and ever other beings -- continued existence. Consider our militantly naive host here who thinks it is criminal for a teacher to discuss globale warming but is either ignorant of or approving of the oil industry's funding of the national association of science teachers which puts pressure on science teachers not to mention global warming?

There are, of course, several different types of blogs, ranging from the personal and casual to the sponsored and promotional.

Some do. They will argue with you that those two are objective. What concerns me is the immigrants with imperfect understanding of English who listen to them.

Three answers immediately popped into my head.

1.)

2.) Considering one of those networks is owned by the Disney Corporation, yes, I can fully understand your paranoia about liberalism. Not!

3.) Don't go out alone after dark.

You entirely miss the fact that many, if not most, conservatives feel that only conservatives are "fair and balanced."

See what I mean? This guy is selling himself. Balance to the news? Considering how lame the news is, why does it need balance. The local news is about fires and cats in trees.

Setanta raises some good points. I might add that here in Boston, we have two daily papers, the Globe and the Herald. The Globe is the middle of the road to slightly left of center paper (the weekly paper, The Phoenix, is the liberal to very left paper), while the Herald is the right wing paper. Guess which one is known for its writing and which is tabloid, both in size and style?

The news magazines, like CBS' Sunday Morning, have regular editorials by people from both sides of the political divide and their comments are understood to be the product of the writer/presenters. BTW, these people are a pleasure to watch because of their sophisticated use of the language. What a relief after watching the local "eyewitless news."

The more we ask government to do, the more tyrannical it becomes.

It seems pretty evident to me that if people of your mind ever control government, we might as well all kiss freedom of speech goodbye. You could kiss corporations goodbye as well. I don't know exactly what the alternative would turn out to be, but I can only guess, perhaps it would be hello to somebody like Hugo Chavez or worse.

Fact or not -- of course I missed it! The feelings of conservatives had nothing to do with the question Cycloptichorn had asked me, and which I answered.

All we ask corporations to do is to supply use with goods and services and look how tyrannical they are.

Looks like you can not follow your own statements.

People of my mind? Scientific, literary and inquisitive? Hmmm. Now, you are the one who doesn't want kids to ever hear the words, "global warming is real." You are the one who quotes the Heritage Foundation and then accuses liberals --who you neither know nor understand -- of being single minded.

FYI -- I attended one of the few high schools in the 1960s that had economics as a required course. I majored in political science as an undergraduate, a course of study that is wed to economics. I went to business school in the 1980s. I think the person here who knows nothing about economics is you.

How tyrannical do you think corporations have become?
Have they mass murdered millions? thousands? or even hundreds? I think not! But governments asked by their people to relieve their people of much of the responsibility of supporting themselves, have mass murdered hundreds! thousands! or even millions!

Yes global warming is real. What is not real is that the cause of global warming is proven to be the 8-fold increase in CO2 in the atmosphere over the last 2 or 3 hundred years. Remember that the earth has gone through at least three major warming (tropical ages) and cooling (ice ages) cycles, each of which lasted about 20,000 years. While this time could be different, we need to reserve judgment until we determine why Mars is also warming.

Last time the earth hit a warming peak, the earth above the Arctic Circle became tropical. The discoveries of oil fields (caused by compression of vegetation) in the arctic are some of the evidence of that.

While CO2 reflects heat from below, it also reflects heat from above. We may need that CO2 up there. Plants seem to love the stuff, and we eat plants.