DING: Bruno Latour's Concept Applied to NowPublic

by mbaumgartner | February 15, 2009 at 11:07 pm

1804 views | 26 Recommendations | 67 comments

This is not a news story in the strictest sense… though it is a story, and it relates to news.

A couple of months ago Glen Lowry asked me to consider presenting a lecture about NowPublic for a course at Emily Carr University in Vancouver based on sociologist Bruno Latour's concept of DING. The particular concept of DING (or “thing”) is drawn from an exhibition organized by Latour and Peter Weibel at ZKM (the centre for art and media technologies) in Karlsruhe. The exhibition in question is titled, aptly enough, Making Things Public. In the accompanying introduction DING is defined as the earliest word for parliament, considered to have originally held the meaning simultaneously of thing and assembly (or gathering space).

This is the story of how I have begun to think about positioning these two territories (Latour’s concept of DING and NowPublic) in respect to each other in preparation for the presentation. I’m not planning on giving everything away here, and even if I could it may be misleading since the comments I receive below may change the specifics of the talk I will be giving. This means that what follows is (as they say around here) a bit “meta”: it is an outline of the topic. What I will try to do is set the ground for students who may be less aware of the current debate about user-generated content as it relates to news.

For clarity I should probably admit that I am neither a journalist (though I seem to have found myself working amidst writers and journalists) nor am I, strictly speaking, an academic (though I teach occasionally and have been referred to recently as an “egghead”). I am first and foremost a designer, and that is how I earn my living. I spend my days concerned with usability, deadlines, production requirements, specifications, and of course, many compromises. In any case, in the boardrooms of a start-up venture, there is little room for the open discussion of theory so I usually give in to my “egghead” tendencies in secret. When I read a theoretical text (which is often) my lens is a fairly pragmatic one; I use what I read to generate ideas, break wrote thinking patterns and to create working models that are able to handle complex informational structures and communication challenges.

The approach:
What I have decided to do is to take some concepts that are common to a participatory news network (NowPublic, specifically) and to the “Making Things Public” introduction and pass them through what amounts to a Latour shaped sieve. Hopefully that will allow some of the more relevant concepts to become visible so that they can produce some lines of flight to explore.

By making that process of discovery available here on NowPublic I am also interested in exploring the inverse: re-purposing the tools we’ve developed to capture news events to initiate an academic discussion in a manner that displays the kind of agency and reflexivity embodied in the concept of DING – providing an assembly space and voice for things.

The good news is that Latour’s concepts seem to accommodate such messiness (which is further useful because whatever connections I'm able to present will be based by necessity on the first reading of a complex set of ideas, so they will be the product a certain amount of skimming and poetic license).

The topics:
Of the many terms that fall through my Latour-shaped filter I have selected five from which to begin exploring: Representation, Social Relations, Assembly, Mediation and Uncertainty. I will add to that a sixth term proper to NowPublic (one I use to explain internally some of the attributes of our network): the “news object” (things such as a photograph, video or a twitter "tweet" about a news event).

One of the things that Latour’s approach allows (in fact, requires) us to do is to flatten out (and essentially erase) the difference in scale of the topics we cover. I will try to explore whether some of the ideas that hold true at the scale of a “news object” in the ecosystem of a developing news story also hold true for NowPublic itself in a larger ecosystem, that of traditional media, and the debate that is ongoing about the relationship between user-generated content and traditional journalism.

Shifting ground:
Mainstream media, and the Press as we know it, is undergoing a quick and intense shift, which isn’t news to many of you, but may be to some. As Clay Shirky has pointed out, it’s not a small change:

NowPublic is by many accounts the world's largest participatory news network, and because of that it can be seen to act, at least in a peripheral way, as a critique of the traditional understanding of Journalism. We are therefore pulled not only into discussions surrounding "social media" and "web 2.0" but also, and perhaps most controversially, "citizen journalism". I have to say that "citizen journalism" is a misleading label for what happens on NowPublic. It has been suggested that it would be like labelling someone a "citizen dentist" (a saying we can attribute to either Michael Tippet or Leonard Brody – who, along with Michael E. Meyers are the founders of NowPublic). What that also recognizes is the difference between “as it’s seen, as it’s spoken” news, the packaging of that news and the analysis that follows.

As the institution of journalism adjusts to shifting ground both user-generated content and the work of professional journalists will each have a role to play, though there is substantial contested ground as to what those roles might be. In any case “Citizen Journalism” has become the recognized label in the debate so we’ll stick with that at times, as it’s easier. For a good introduction to some of the pressure that user-generated news puts on the Press see Jay Rosen’s piece: Audience Atomization Overcome: Why the Internet Weakens the Authority of the Press. In that post Mr. Rosen outlines that:

In the age of mass media, the press was able to define the sphere of legitimate debate with relative ease because the people on the receiving end were atomized-- connected "up" to Big Media but not across to each other. And now that authority is eroding.

And also:

[...] today one of the biggest factors changing our world is the falling cost for like-minded people to locate each other, share information, trade impressions and realize their number. Among the first things they may do is establish that the “sphere of legitimate debate” as defined by journalists doesn’t match up with their own definition.

In the past there was nowhere for this kind of sentiment to go. [...] But what’s really happening is that the authority of the press to assume consensus, define deviance and set the terms for legitimate debate is weaker when people can connect horizontally around and about the news.

So the debate around Citizen Journalism is not only the matter of the technologies of news gathering but also the fundamental question about what is and is not news, and who decides what is in the realm of “legitimate debate”. This leaves us to navigate between, in Latour's terms, matters of fact (things proposed as singularly True) and matters of concern (things important enough for legitimate debate).

Back to Latour, Back to Things:
The shift described above, as Mr. Rosen points out, is a result of the increased ease with which anyone can publish the accounts of news events (you don’t need to buy airtime or own a printing press). The obvious result has been a greater number of subjects (authors, producers, readers) and objects (photos, videos etc…) at play in the dissemination of those accounts. Sites based on user-generated content, like NowPublic, potentially provide a stage upon which we can trace the work done by the news objects produced in relation to a given event (as well as the subjects involved in the process). We can examine how news objects are produced and by whom, how they are subsequently viewed, shared and linked to other objects and how the resulting actions result in an interconnected process of developing trust and value. We can explore how the uncertainty around faithful representation of news events – brought about by the volume of contradictory news objects and points of view – can actually bring subjects and objects together again, as Latour would say, "to reconstitute the social bond".

AHIS 333: DING
In addition to this story I have set up a channel on NowPublic under the #DING tag. I have added more resource information there, including links to some good reading as well as the NowPublic Scan (real time twitter posts) tuned to some of the concepts above. You can contribute to the ideas here by commenting on this story or to the channel by posting to twitter with posts that include the words bruno latour or AHIS333.

The assignment:
Glen and Simon have asked me to put together a bit of an assignment to go along with this talk. In addition to reading the piece by Jay Rosen noted above I thought it might be interesting to have you share briefly (via comments on this story) what information you consider "newsworthy" and what sources you are most likely to trust. You may want to discuss whether the most reliable news is brought to you by your friends and family, by a favorite blog, a newspaper, or a network such as Fox News or PBS. In other words consider the "brand" of truth you are most likely to subscribe to and the apparatus through which you extend yourself into the news ecology. Consider how these sources attempt to present a faithful representation of news events, and how they assemble the available "news objects".

2 See all footage | View Slideshow

Share: email story | add to any | | facebook | stumbleupon

recommend Sign In or Join to post comments

emmafrance

at 20:36 on March 18th, 2009

I have a friend who often exaggerates. His stories are interesting, funny, and for the most part true. I don’t doubt that the events in his story actually happened or wether or not he believes what he is saying; I am skeptical about how his experience is being translated for me. Much like the fisherman with his arms fully extended in opposite directions demonstrating the the size of the fish that got away; I think stories sometimes get perverted in between the event the memory and the delivery. I think the fisherman probably came close to catching a big fish but maybe not as big as he says. No one can recount an incident with absolute objectivity and untainted memory.

I approach most news sources with the same skepticism that I would a story from a consistently exaggerating friend. I am happy to read/listen/watch the news but at the same time I feel aware of the fact that it is coming from someone or something’s(corporation) point of view. I tend to get most of my news from CBC radio and various online news sites. Depending on the day I may be on the New York Times website, CBC news, The Guardian, or a blog looking for information on current events. When I am looking at news online I look for items that I consider “newsworthy”. I think for something to be “newsworthy” it has to be about something that will affect my life (North American politics, Vancouver transit, etc) or talks about something important in someone or some peoples lives elsewhere.

Despite looking at or hearing the news at some point everyday I still feel very much in the dark. I love watching documentaries and frequently find myself shocked and horrified when I realize how little I actually knew about an event that may have happened in the recent past. I feel like it’s very difficult to get any news about current events taking place outside the West and when stories are covered they seem sensationalized and offer no context to the events.

submitted by - Emma Campbell

Jenn Skillen

at 21:07 on March 18th, 2009

In August of 2003 there was a power outage that blacked out pretty much the entire Eastern Seabord. I was living in Toronto at the time, and having left work early that day to go West of the city, I had no idea that anything was wrong until I exited the highway and the traffic lights were out. And my car radio had stopped working about two minutes before. And then small drops of information started to trickle in. When I reached my friend of the phone, she told me to be careful getting to her house because the power was out in all of Mississauga. Soon we heard that it was bigger than that, possibly the whole city. Soon we learned that it was much, much bigger than this. And we learned this all from a portable radio that I just happened to have in my car from a camping trip, with fresh batteries in it. We turned the radio on every hour for a few minutes to get updates. Cell phone networks were jammed up and it was impossible to get in touch with people to find out if they were okay, or tell them that we were. The next day, the power was still out at the hospital where i worked and I heard horror stories of people’s 6 hour walks home while I cared for children dependent on ventilators powered by a generator, not knowing when the power was going to come back on and wondering if the gas was going to run out.

I think what I’m trying to say is that we have such ready access to news in all forms that we take it for granted, and it consumes us to the point that we’re so concerned with what’s happening everywhere else, that we lose our own world.

That day there were no lights, no microwaves, no traffic and, really, no news to speak of. People were forced to focus one hundred per cent on their own worlds. Children in the city of Toronto saw real stars for the first time in their lives. And I’m not talking about the few little pinpoints of the Big Dipper, Venus and Mars. I’m talking about stars, millions and millions of starts with the Milky Way splashed across the middle of the sky. Now that’s what I call news.

Now, you can look it up on Wikipedia and read all about it. But at the time, all we had to rely on were a few radio stations, and the news at the time was that no one really knew what had happened until late in the evening. Initially panic was started because someone speculated that it could have been caused by an act of terrorism. To me this was just bad news reporting because all it did was create fear in people who had no electricity and no access to gas for cars to leave the city. In effect, we were trapped. I trust the sources that tell you what they can and don’t “speculate” as a form of news reporting. Speculation only gets misinterpreted by certain people, and then fear ensues, creating chaos and potentially dangerous situations. In this case, all we could do was sit and wait, and so we did.

Maziar (not verified)

at 21:32 on March 18th, 2009

Receiving now is easy, but considering which is credible or believable is difficult. Different medium different result e.g google news, this site, the province, Jon Stewart etc... just to name a few. I am sure they all cover for most the most part the same subjects. But the information you receive could be the same, or the complete opposite.

It is important to keep in mind, depending where we are, we will result to what medium we would reach to for the news. E.g at home you might turn on the tv, at work the internet or cellphone, and on the skytrain newspaper. If a breaking news is reported in, we instantly would search google, a sitution like "breaking news" makes the newspapers obsolete, because they have to wait tell the next day to get there information out.

It is important to always be aware of the different news outlets, the type of stories they cover, and based on everytihng you see, read or hear make your own judgment

Kirsten Way (not verified)

at 22:41 on March 18th, 2009

Most reliable news? There isn't any, everyone has their own opinions, their own unreliable sources (including their spin offs) of the newspaper, the latest blog or 5 o'clock news. So how do I get my news? I guess by factoring all of these things, and taking them with a grain of salt knowing that that's not the whole story.
"When the debate is closer to the sphere of consensus (or 'unquestioned core of consensus'), the more plausible it is to present a single view as the only view."

Journalism plays off peoples emotions alot of the time, by blaming them like the whole global warming, car emissions thing; or by getting people to sympathize for one side of the story while the other remains unseen.

Not only that but what about all the 'facts' that are omitted from an article but still create this notion of realism that people fall for.
"notions of what is realistic is one of the most potent powers press and political elites have." Glenn Greenwald.
Like the coverage of the World Trade Centres versus Zeitgeist. Who do we put our faith in, as telling the truth? Or like was quoted from the reading 'in examining George W. Bush's case for war on Iraq, treated the plan as part of the sphere of consensus and placing the war's opponents in the sphere of deviance' was a bad move. This brainwashed alot of people into thinking that this was ok, and the discrimination began.

However, journalism needless to say makes events around the world known, not all of them (caused by their censorship) but alot of important ones. Although the press's authority should not always be 'to assume consensus, define deviance and/or set the terms for legitimate debate'.

Michelle Fu (not verified)

at 23:00 on March 18th, 2009

As a few on here have already referred to, I tend to get my 'newsworthy' bits of information from the radio, podcasts and online blogs. While I grew up reading the paper news, I tend to turn towards digital inlets now, for economical and ecological reasons (more the latter).

I still prefer reading the paper news though, when I am reading mainstream or local news, since there is something active in the physical experience of a newspaper. But since it's been awhile since having a daily paper delivery, turning to the internet means subscribing to a different stream of newsworthy information. Since I can't manage to be interested in reading mainstream news in digital format, I've since tended to read news more specific to my areas of interest - art, design, food, travel, etc, to name a few. These come mostly in blogs (personal or community-based), which come through my feed reader. I guess this is sort of like my personalized daily newsfile. I'll also note that the majority of these newsfeeds have a strong aesthetic element to them, and that most of these specific blogs also will randomly cover large, influential mainstream news items.

I'm also addicted to podcasts, but most specifically the ones that focus on news items embedded in narrative. In other words, I like to listen to weird-but-true stories which aren't necessarily recent or relevant. The purpose of these newstories for me is to constantly remind myself that people are strange and amazing, and most of the time everyone else in the world has no idea. I'm currently obsessing over This American Life (of course, forever now) and Radiolab. I'm now on my way to check out the ones Zain mentioned in his comment.

I guess I also get the mainstream news from CBC radio though I still tend to prefer the CBC radio programs with more personality, like The Current, Q, or As it Happens.

So...what's newswrothy? For me, it's really anything that makes a good story. So - anything can be newsworthy, as long as the delivery gives it a stage for my narrative-wired enjoyment.

Kyla Plewes (not verified)

at 00:32 on March 19th, 2009

As I rarely turn on the TV to see anything other than a DVD menu, I access most news related information via the Internet. In one way it's much like a more convenient newspaper, I can easily click to the sections and topics that interest me most. That being said I do not know if it's possible for me to say what is “newsworthy” or not as it comes down to the personal interest of the reader. Thus the Internet is, at least for myself, the optimal place to seek news as I can select what to read and avoid what I deem “un-newsworthy” on the day. I tend to gravitate to the more social mediums, blogs for example, as the individuality of the author is most often apparent through the writing or the actual format of the website page. Similarly I enjoy listening to the rants of news savvy friends as I am familiar with their views and can immediately pick up on their biases. I believe that the individual relaying news relieves the wary suspect whether we are aware of it or not.

After the lecture and talking with friends on open news, it seems that Internet based sites such as Open News are favored over television. While I think it is important to receive a person by person account which is unabashedly individualistic, I wonder about our tendencies to assemble that way, communities of individuals. I am not apart from this. I stated above that I enjoy considering the biased views of others but I wonder, especially online, why we still consider and weigh authorship so heavily. Have we just broke the newscaster into a million people? Why do we not gravitate towards group assembly such as wikis where anybody within that community can build or alter any information contributed? Am I always going to be in a comment box?

anick gosselin (not verified)

at 08:58 on March 19th, 2009

Normal 0

News as framed windows, considering the space outside the news. What as not been mention, the subaltern news, how thing have been frame in, out and around it, things that never emerge of the vernacular chaos. Now public seem to be considering those kind of space, as the awareness around a subject is directed by the viewer and social interplay becomes a sources of interest. The content is then subject to be quite specific to certain set of values attributable to a specific time and cultural circumstance. The same news, same time., same event in many different country are certainly not represented the same way to the world view. The notion of authoring/ producing news is quite intriguing. Listening to CBC, they were discussing the end of a printed San Francisco paper, moving into the cyber. This implies a reduce access to the news, for some people not having internet access systematically. An ongoing debate about the form of the news is also a matters of generation.

For the point of view of a life long traditional journalist, the public space of the internet just appear as a invalid and unverified source which you can’t rely on. The question I guess is if many voices that are working in dialogue in the idea of forming some sort of consensus is more valid than an the unique voice of the directed editorial space.

Yelena - Glen's Group (not verified)

at 10:37 on March 19th, 2009

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}

Many news sources these days revolve around specific people or personalities in the media. This may be convenient for viewers, because they know where these people stand on the issues. At the same time, this can have polarizing effect on the audience, because they may automatically dismiss what a certain personality is saying based on their reputation. I prefer reading the news instead of watching it, because I think that written journalism leaves some of the personality aspect behind in favor of focusing on the issue or news story itself.

For me, the most significant aspect of online news blogging and citizen journalism is it’s participatory and discursive nature. Rather than being a passive experience of being told what the news is, such as in traditional media, people are actively engaged in a discussion about the events. This is beneficial, because as people engage in a debate, the perception of events is constantly changing, because they are not being presented in a static way.

Yelena - Glen's Group (not verified)

at 10:41 on March 19th, 2009

It seems like the idea of neutrality in the news has been abandoned for the sake of partisan politics. Issues are presented as being black or white. There is no ideological middle ground left on which to stand. The media is divided into left and right within the sphere of consensus. People choose sources of news that best reflect their opinions. They are expected to choose one side at the exclusion of the other. This is problematic, because I don’t believe that most people’s viewpoints can be categorized so easily.

Many news sources these days revolve around specific people or personalities in the media. This may be convenient for viewers, because they know where these people stand on the issues. At the same time, this can have polarizing effect on the audience, because they may automatically dismiss what a certain personality is saying based on their reputation. I prefer reading the news instead of watching it, because I think that written journalism leaves some of the personality aspect behind in favor of focusing on the issue or news story itself.

For me, the most significant aspect of online news blogging and citizen journalism is it’s participatory and discursive nature. Rather than being a passive experience of being told what the news is, such as in traditional media, people are actively engaged in a discussion about the events. This is beneficial, because as people engage in a debate, the perception of events is constantly changing, because they are not being presented in a static way.

FransiscaCandra

at 11:34 on March 19th, 2009

Back when I lived in Indonesia (until six years ago that is), I used to always pick up information from these second-person standpoints: a dad who re-told the today's highlights to his daughters after he watched news on TV, a mom who read newspaper out loud every morning, and friends who could also gather their bits of info from their own second-person sources.

When I moved to Canada, these people are no longer around and I found myself making desperate attempts to remain being the well-informed person I thought I have always been. In my first years here, I took the free and convenient Metronews every morning and strictly commanded myself to read every column -no skipping- including ones which I have little to no interest on.

Nowadays, I have to admit that I tend to go on to the internet to check on updates. The variety in the news coverage is what makes the search for 'truth' most exciting. I found that the section for posting comments to be helpful and informative. Sometimes the comments and debates between the internet users give more than the report in which the argument is based on, although also involving junks and swear words. Personal blogs do the same. Their news may not always be true, but at least it provides a space of many possibilities. At least they don't sell stories and call it a fact. We as readers will at a certain point determine ourselves which among the many stories one that speaks the most truth.

I have an example of having witnessed a stabbing in Metrotown, acknowledged what did happen, and found a completely twisted coverage in the media. It may have been due to the 'filtering stage', whereas in personal blogs we don't have to worry about it because money plays no role here and lawsuits are not at the back of our minds. Bloggers and people like us are free to convey our opinion in its purest form if we intend to do so. I'm not implying that we should trust more in this or that, but I guess it just does not hurt to have an extra information to keep in mind (and which we can filter for ourselves) while indulging news from the so-called more reliable news sources a.k.a the Vancouver Sun, CBC news, et cetera.

I guess up to this day I still cannot quite define the word 'news' myself. My mom used to say that at least I can read the headline if I am to lazy to read the whole paragraphs, and that would already be considered as the act of taking news in. I did not occur to me that more often than not these captions tend to lead us to buying into their media biases; they have the power to attract and mislead consumers. It is often frustrating to follow a series of news covering a plane crash, for instance, (as a result from being allured by these attracting titles or opening words) only to find just a tiny bit of unimportant new info with the rest of the paragraphs consisting of the same old news being repeated over again. I just don't get it.

kitty blandy davies

at 12:10 on March 19th, 2009

I guess it depends how far back and where you come from but I think most people have a dawning of enlightenment/disappointment when they discover that the world is not what it was made out to be; that adults are not always right, that truth is subjective and that the news is often political here-say. I was always under the illusion that the “media” were informed by “experts”, scholars in their field. With communications available to the finger tips of practically every human being anyone can be an expert, have an (un)informed opinion, influence a generation.

I find Rosen’s article provocative and urgent, but also very generalised – he doesn’t seem to identify the corporations who run the presses, media outlets but rather slams journalists en masse. It is absolutely up to the reader, listener to choose who and what to believe and the advent of the Internet “echo chamber” audiences amplifies that choice. How far do we as an audience have to accept that we are not out in the field of all world events, ecological and political, to trust the news? Like religion – we have to have faith but we have to choose which denomination.

For me my news sources range from print media; Globe and Mail, New York Times, Vancouver Sun, Courier; to television; CBC to BBC online and specific cultural sites. Always with a view of the advertising mandate behind print and television (and to some extent the web) the “news” has to be filtered through our own willingness to believe. As anyone who has had an inside view of a “news” story knows, there are usually so many mistruths and mistakes, omissions and embellishments that we know not to believe them, unless they are about someone or some other event…

bkokoska

at 12:50 on March 19th, 2009

I try to avoid most authoritative agents of news distributing and rather stick to an assortment of less dictatorial sources in order to further challenge and assemble some notion of truth in my own mind. Obviously it’s nice to have a general understanding of what is going on in the world and to be well informed on current events from a wide variety of sources but realizing the many opposing myths and biases of these sources and inputting a necessary level of individual inquiry to further investigate the wiliness of everyday news is essential. Local news is often the most problematic and unmistakably corrupted as it caters to the public of a very specific territory regarding issues (and neglecting issues) that are inherently crucial to that place. Expectations of certain Vancouver-constructed figures and spaces become representations of previous representations seen in the daily news, subjecting any non-judgmental documentations or real life encounters with such individuals or regions to the same objectivity that has popularized and consumed the ways in which Vancouverites see. These treacherous associations germinate from the natural persuasion and tendency to lose sight of viewing reality as delicate. This lack or common fasting of specific knowabilty creates a reliance to devour any reachable arbitrary record of subject as a means to gain corpulence in familiarity, consequently resulting in a fabricated, inaccurate bloatedness of myth. Superstition is then frequently unraveled and dispersed amongst a demographic of citizens and a common displacement of reality is formed, paying no attention to its fragileness – slowly shattering the very reputation of that ignored of legitimacy. A certain governing is present at all times within local news and you will only ever see and hear the stories that have to do with vicinities and bodies that are of a specific class and deal with situations located within a certain proximity of city space.

J. Neenan

at 12:53 on March 19th, 2009

A lot of what is presented as news by television stations, newspapers, and radio can be considered "news," but is not significant to the average listener. It is important to remember that the news objects assembled are selected not just based on significance, but also by how interesting they are. This means that a lot of murders, shootings and car chases are reported, and while they might be important if someone you know is involved, chances are that these things don't affect you anymore than the local paperboy quitting his job.

Another problem when receiving this information is that it is often spiced up, or presented from a particular vantage point. Journalists have bosses to please, who in turn have their own bosses, who might be right wing or left wing, or have specific interests in this company or that organization, etc. The result is a lot of information that is filtered and censored, which is why most of what we see is so similar. Personally, I don't invest a lot of time watching the news or reading about it. I find that I am not interested in hearing about deaths, and that I don't believe anything I hear that has to do with politics. Rather hypocritically, I get this kind of news through discussion with well informed friends, who probably get their information from the news sources I just claimed not to trust. In any case, I feel better about it.

I do find that I am intrigued by documentary films, but I also take them with a grain of salt. These sources can also be considered news objects, because even though they aren’t usually breaking news, they are informative about the current world. I remember watching An Inconvenient Truth for the first time, and being shocked at the state of the world. Shortly after, I found another film, The Great Global Warming Swindle, which seemed to collapse the arguments of the first film. Both of these films included a lot of “facts” being presented by important, “trustworthy” people, but completely contradicted one another. It would seem impossible then to know the truth, without investigating the situation personally.

To conclude I would say that the only way to become more in touch with the reality of things around us is to saturate ourselves with news from a variety of sources. Every source pursues its own agenda, so when considering each, these things should be kept in mind, and a better understanding of the world will follow. I think this is something that most of us could do better.

Ying Shuen Wu (Simon's Seminar Group) (not verified)

at 13:45 on March 19th, 2009

The first half of the article is kind of shocking for me, but at the same time, I'm quite pleased to get to know the detailed analysis and description of “the underground truth” in the traditional journalist culture. It seemed like the whole diagram of the practice of journalism was some sort of inside job. Every piece of information we received was filtered by the hidden politics. And I also think that the most interesting part is the “sphere of deviance.”

I secretly wonder if this happens to most of the people here in Emily Carr. Not that everyone is atomized to be out of the diagram; it is just that the way people in this school view this world might be a bit different from the masses. I guess that's why and how we are here. It also reminds me of how many people from the past had told me how different I am. It was always a mystery to me. I came from a country (Taiwan) where the whole journalism culture is bit into creating drama. I always got scared and felt hopeless after watching or reading the news, so I decided to be distant to it, and left myself some freedom to choose what I would like to know, or what I considered as something interesting. Maybe it just happened to be that the majority didn’t favor my selected information, I accidentally became some weird girl whose thinking was a bit hard to follow. However, it was when I got into this school, I found out it wasn't my problem. I guess I would call this experience as a little reflection to the “sphere of deviance.”

The example I can think of would be Michael Moore's documentary films that reveal many public issues that were considered as the consensus truth being filtered by the politics before it got published or spread among the masses. His work may not be as the so-called news format, but his approach delivers the quality of “telling the truth.” However, there are still rooms for discussions that – is he really doing a good job to objectively presenting the facts, or is he just using other ways to put out his subjective opinions with the form of documentary?

I believe that the truth or the fact will come naturally as time goes by. Time will tell what is the real truth. My attitude towards the massive amount of news out there is usually skeptical. I would join the conversation or the discussion for the sake of being participating the world as a form of building social relationship. However, to fully accept what people tell me with a total trust is hard. Seeing is believing, but not within the scene others create, transform, or translate. Any form of transcending information will lose bits of messages. So no matter how hard people trying to tell the fact, I would rather treat it as a social lesson or education. News would never be something that I would consider as trust”worthy.”

alraK yremmuM (not verified)

at 14:33 on March 19th, 2009

I'm out of the loop. If there's a shooting or a weather warning for Vancouver, I'll hear about it first from family out of town who watches the news, and then I am playfully scolded for not being in touch with the news and what's going on in the world. The truth is, I just don't have enough faith in most news sources to bother myself with following them.

Obviously the news is useful for finding out what, where, and how something happens. And I don't think that many people believe every single word they hear or read. People are smarter than that. Traditional news media is doubtlessly valuable in its basic service of providing a general overview of what is going on. But the omissions and engineering of information deemed news-worthy along with the inescapable inclusion of bias tend to devalue the rest of the information included. Maybe the limitations of the English language and its inherent dualisms and subsequent simplification of concepts lead to the dumbing-down of the stories. Or maybe it really is the information pertinent to the majority of the population; the sphere of consensus and legitimate debate. "The News" is information about the world from a capitalist, industry point of view with a few human interest stories thrown in there to show news consumers that the everyday Joe/Jane DO matter. It is 'reporting on facts' competing in the world of entertainment and escapism.

A good overview of which corporations own which newspapers and channels is available at http://www.cbc.ca/news/interactives/map-canada-media/

The internet phenomenon of regular folks having a say in what is news-worthy and engaging in debate is an exciting development worth paying attention to. I think it is definitely a positive change, because any change to the the didactic and consumerist nature prevalent in most news media sructures has to be a good change, right? Now people are actually talking to eachother and debating and engaging around the issues in the news... creating the news, as it were. The very transparency of the sources of the opinions and the processes by which things are deemed to be worthy of legitimate debate is refreshing and pretty straightforward. Of course, there are things to be mindful of: in these forums, such as objectivity, quality, and ethics. Any media source is manipulatable. Access to the internet along with the luxury of time to engage in participatory news activities are privelages not everyone enjoys. And not everyone likes to participate in things like this. This point was brought up in our class forums on the subject; many prefer to be the silent participant.

My brand of news-gathering:

I tend to get my news from a variety of sources: Because they're everywhere, I usually read the free daily papers for a brief overview of what the news industry has on the hotsheet for that day (which I usually immediately dismiss as junky entertainment versions of the news).
The Georgia Straight seems committed to responsible reporting (taking into consideration it's got a leftish bent to it).
TED talks are a great source of news about positive people doing positive things; a great antidote to the doom and gloom of conventional news media.

If something learned within these sources sparks my interest, I'll usually follow up with searching for the origins of the stories on the internet . Up until now I hadn't been aware of nowpublic, but I might have to start checking it out.

KaylaMcColl

at 14:45 on March 19th, 2009

I feel that pretty much anything has the potential to be newsworthy. Of
course, some things are more newsworthy to me than others. This could be due
to reasons of its relevance- whether I feel it pertains to me, the locale-
whether it reflects my region and culture, and history- if I understand the
background of where it’s coming from and what it is connected to. Within
all these, I’ll be drawn to how they relate to my own subjectivities and
personal interests. If I can connect to the stories, I’m much more inclined
to tune into news stations. There are many ways a story pique my interest-
If it’s about a certain region, maybe I’ve been there, or know people who
live there. If it’s about a person perhaps their story is one I can relate
to, or similar to experiences I’ve had. If it’s about some new
technology, I may see how I could benefit from its use in my life.

Mostly, I turn to sources that I find reflect my personal interests. I enjoy
watching Breakfast Television, as it is quite relaxed, varied but within
certain borders of expectations and keeps me up-to-date on Vancouver news. I
find it trustworthy and for the most part believe its stories. I guess I am
pretty trusting of most of the reports I see in newspapers and on news
stations. I don’t really question their validity as actual stories or doubt
their existence as an event that did occur. I do take into consideration bias
or suggestive opinion, and do try to go with my own judgments. However,
I’ll admit that it would be difficult to maintain that I am not in some way
influenced by what I’m shown.

My peers, family members and people who make up my social network are
probably the most influential to me on how I perceive what I’ve seen in the
news, as well as what is most “buzz worthy”. I tend to be more inclined to
feel a certain way if I’ve discussed it with people I respect and understood
their reasons for also feeling that way. I guess this means I am more apt to
follow something similar to citizen journalism, or perhaps it would be more
fitting to call it social journalism, as I’m more likely to be swayed by an
individual rather than a network, and mostly the individuals that make up my
social network.

salvador_nunez (not verified)

at 17:38 on March 19th, 2009

My thoughts on the reading by Jay Rosen are that the author has an interesting theory. I think that journalism is much more complicated then he can even imagine but I will give credit where credit is due. I enjoyed his theory of “The Uncensored War” that he obtained from Daniel C. Hallin’s book concerning American politics in Vietnam. I think it was intelligent of the author to connect the Vietnam War to the war in Iraq because war will continue and there are always forces opposing the war. There was one quote that struck me concerning the journalist’s ability to see truth, News and reality, “I don’t know if they really can see it or if it’s their interest to pretend not to see it” (Rosen). I think this relates to all forms of media and our inability to see things we do not experience firsthand. There are many events, injustices and celebrations that occur daily that are not reported in the news. I think it’s the human need to document everything to give us a sense of power and fit the universe into its alphabets, theories or self-acclaimed truths. For example how can i write about homelessness if I am not homeless, what the fuck do I know? I would be giving an opinion based off of nothing but my vision and feelings.

For me media and News is very much tailored to the corporation, government, or wealthy people who own it. These people are the same ones that own mass amounts of land, they control the journalists and they are the ones that control the destruction of our Canadian forests just so they can print their lies and get it mass distributed to the sheep that follow blindly and construct their daily lives around it. The journalist writes what he or she is told to write by their boss. How can we see true News? News such as the genocide in Darfur, the inability for humans to move past spontaneous combustion pollution to solar-power, the genocide of the homeless by the street sweep in Vancouver for the 2010 Olympics, the 1 billion dollars Canada student loan debt, Prime minister Harper’s cuts to the arts, the American dependency on Canada and Mexico for natural resources – as well as many other things- to survive. But what is not spoken about is what is missing from the news. That is why Nowpulbic.com is a good starting point to discuss the left out details eventually to become a power itself. I think here are many spheres of groups who fall into the spheres of Consensus (majority), Legitimate Controversy (laws, rules, principals) and Deviance (away from norm) but I think there are more groups then mentioned and dreamed about. Therefore it is necessary to be open to many sources of news internet, television, etc. the advantage that I have, for example, is the ability to communicate in other languages I do my best to read other sources(other than English) that relate to topics that concern me. I don’t believe any of the news reported but I can see the news in my neighbourhood and on the streets that I live on, so I do not concern myself with what is going on in American soap operas Politics, which seems to be more fiction than truth. It means nothing to me.

Sibel D (not verified)

at 19:35 on March 19th, 2009

The sources of news that I consider reliable are local television news programming CBC more so than others, only because I've grown up on it, documentary programs , radio and newspaper news, when I say reliable I mean that I believe and trust that the news provided by these sources is usually true, having said this I don't always find the news to be relevant, useful or unbiased, it is however still information. I trust these sources because I grew up in a family and culture that did so, and because I have never found myself led completely astray by any of them. I don't believe that it's a matter of news being true or false because the way it is packaged and presented often blurs those lines, it is rather a matter of wether or not the news is relevant and applicable to our functions in society. News certainly has a function, it's function is not only to inform us of the goings on around us but of which goings on are most important, it establishes heirarchies of knowledge, for example it seems, based one what I see on television, that it is more important to know that an anonymous person has died in an accident or that a criminal has been caught than it is to know how the school systems have changed, how government funding is being divided, these things are usually covered but the way in which they are begs much more of the viewer, these topics aren't covered in depth on television programming, and when they are it is usually in the form of a separate documentary which is much more involved and informative, it is this type of information and not "news" that I consider not only reliable but effective, independant and specific research into "newsworthy" topics, whether it be in the form of a documentary film or simply a book available at the library. The modern version of news media seems to want to impart the idea of vast knowledge without actually providing it. It is up to the consumer to act on this premise and choose which of the tidbits of information they would like elaborated upon, and seems to also be our responsibility to make it available, I don't believe that sites such as now public offer a larger breadth of knowledge, it only offers a larger breadth of headline type knowledge and offers the ability for instantaneous conversation about said headlines, which does incite more activity than television or newspapers alone do, and activity in my opinion activates thought which is always important when considering news.

nturnquest

at 01:26 on March 20th, 2009

Ahis 333 (natasha turnquest)

From Jay Rosens article I enjoyed how he went about critiquing the use of U.S mainstream media vs. bloggers and online journalism. The reference to the model, external links, breakdown and comments underlines the dynamic capabilities of an online forum space. Yet, I stray from the “blogg-o-sphere,” as my roommates affectionately call this form of media, turning to conversations (gossip), BBC world or Nassau Guardian online for “News”. Maybe the blogg-o-sphere can be a hatched area between the sphere of legitimate debate and the sphere of defiance with some hatch space in the sphere of consensus to represent DIY crafts and the Youtube cat phenomena.

Increasingly, I find myself apprehensive to the idea of blogs as a centering device, so I rarely utilize them as a discussion space. Although I drift through blogs because of images, the cathartic pounding at keys to manifest a warm feeling of “public” expression remains problematic for me. Yet, I can appreciate the notion of shifting the “informative” and hyper edited aspect of the major media cooperation’s flashing lights to anyone with computer access, thus Rosen’s sign-off, “audience atomization overcome.” But…what are we overcoming if we are centered around the screen- with ear-buds in their upright and locked position? Should that question be my facebook/twitter status?

In terms of news as a verb pertaining to what is important to me, politically I am very concerned with issues within my home country. As someone who has been away from “home” for years family phone calls remain a key facilitator for my news experience; thus I’ve long ago accepted the storytelling aspect of news as “truth.” Overtly biased (like FOX or CNN), my parents lovingly clip articles, pass the phone around at dinner parties, or hold the mouthpiece to the ZNS evening news to keep me within their information/discussion circle of citizen/voter engagement. In this way time is a component to the news/history soup I imbibe, though not a crucial factor, with technology to buffer isolation. Also, seemingly, the colonial hand unshakably plays largely into my concept of truth- BBC World is my homepage.

I would like to thank Matt for his presentation and this follow up Ding-ing. He was a very interesting/engaging speaker (especially for a topic so in flux).

Mishka Heimowski (not verified)

at 09:12 on March 20th, 2009

To be quite frank, I don't really care too much about "the news". I don't watch the news on T.V or listen to it on the radio. It is rare that I go online and look up what has been happening in the world. Sometimes I ask myself if it is my responsibility to do so or not...but then I see something shinny and forget about it. I receive my news usually from word of mouth, and half the time the information has been funneled through so many brains and mouths, that it's completely distorted (unintentionally and/or intentionally)

I have recently joined Twitter.com and have been interested in the amount of information one can get through following people. It's sort of the online-word-of-mouth scenario. The site isn't necessarily a blogging site, but more of a status update site. Perhaps this is the only kind of "journalism" that I subscribe to.

There was a time when I did watch the news quite frequently, but found myself being spoon fed information that was supposed to be talked about. Maybe I find myself in the "sphere of deviance" I don't feel as though the right news is being talked about or investigated. I'm sick of hearing about people dying/money/car crashes/etc. The news is over exaggerated and dramatized. It's like watching Entertainment Tonight and considering it smart and as valuable information.

I'm not quite sure where I'm going with this... So I'll just leave it at that.

salvador_nunez (not verified)

at 18:36 on March 20th, 2009

oops! i lied its 13 billion dollar canada student loan debt

Klaus (not verified)

at 22:22 on March 20th, 2009

For sheer curiosity: on Latour's and Sloterdijk's lecture at the GSD:

Jennifer Norquist

at 15:42 on March 22nd, 2009

I have been re-examining the way I consume news media and what stories have really impacted me, both ‘real news’ and fiction. The root of the word ‘media’ means down the middle, so theoretically it should be unbiased, which is simply not the case. The people and groups who assign news and ‘make things public’ are in the position to edit and assemble information in such a way that it affects our judgment. In international news this is especially the case because powerful people with very convoluted agendas create world conflict. With the advent of the Internet and citizen journalism we have the possibility of comparing diverse positions on the same story. Sometimes the journalist gets misinformation, making it impossible to know what to believe.

The most newsworthy subject over this decade, in my opinion, has been over wars in the Middle East. The US Government claimed in the 1990’s and into 2003 that they had evidence that Iraq was making ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’ and imposing brutalities on its people and neighbouring countries. This gave them reason to declare war and they attacked the Iraqi people and destroyed parts of their infrastructure in order oust Saddam Hussein. After the fact there were no ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’ but now Iraq is in disrepair and the fighting and suicide bombing continues, American soldiers are also still dying and having experiences that scar them emotionally and physically for life. The next part of the plan is for the US to help restore their country and set up a democracy in a time where terrorism is the new guerrilla warfare. I know that we are not being told the entire truth as well as being completely lied to, and it breaks my heart. The half-truths and blatant lies are assembled around statistics, eyewitness photography and experts with reputable reporting sources backing them.

It is up to us to ‘read between the lines’, and one the most powerful tools to learn to do this is through fiction and story telling. In George Orwell’s ‘Nineteen eighty-four’, written 1949, the concepts of ‘Big Brother’ watching and ‘double speak’ forever changed the way I saw media production, distribution and the overarching powers that control it. It raised my awareness to the fact that we are given an enemy that we need to be protected from, and this keeps us from being free and connecting with others.

Our myths reflect the stories of our lives, our truths and fallacies, often with more honesty than is possible with a news report. We now have the tools that allow us to create and share news and stories directly to each other, bypassing a central distribution site. Today we can assume influential roles because we have freedoms and opportunities beyond what any of our ancestors had, allowing us to bring ideas and feelings into form. This is a very exciting time to be an artist because we can actualize our ability to affect many. At Emily Carr University we come from peoples across the planet and we sit together, in person, discussing ideas and theories that affect the entire world. That is good news!

A few of the websites referenced
http://www.ccmep.org (Website citing bombings in Iraq)
http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/1984/context.html (George Orwell info)
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB80/ (National Security archive)
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3340723/ (no direct evidence of WMD)
http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2009/01/12/atomization.html
Blog by Jay Rosen

enichols

at 10:51 on March 23rd, 2009

News to Rule

I like reading a newspaper with my morning coffee, the act of sleepily going to the front door, getting the paper, with my coffee... sets off my my day nicely, gives me something to talk to people about. I don't really mind what the paper is, could be the nieghbourhood rag, or the city rag. Sometimes I'll read the post, globe and mail, or New Yorker if I'm at the library and have time. The news in the newspapers are more then information, it can be a viewpoint, you ma get to know the writing styles of the journalists, their likes, dislikes, fetishes and thrills. You can either avoid those columns or they can complement one's day. Would I trust these writers to give the facts? No way. I would only trust my reaction to the effects of these facts, should they be accurate and of relevance. We should be wary because any media driven vehicle is motivated by mass participation, paper and ad sales, and what drives this mass participation is sensationalism and feel-good propaganda, often this is social manipulation - much like a religion.

We exist in a world that is by no means inclusive, in terms of politics or social theory, as a result we receive a lot of information from the lift, right, top and bottom; and no perspective is particularly correct, nor is it particularly wrong. Although news may be tweaked to respond to the censorship, flavour of the day or social leanings. Here is a scary thought: CanWest Global owns 14 major metropolitan dailies, including The Province, The Sun, Metro etc. And can you believe it - owns the Jerusalem Post, Global tv, radio stations in Turkey and all those affiliate internet sites. CanWest potentially has the power to censor or direct the papers to promote any personal agendas the might have. Here is a website to further understand the scope of large companies such as CanWest. http://www.yourmedia.ca/modules/canwest/overview.shtml

Because of this power of the massive companies, the content control of our news by a handful of ceo's that feel they represent the country's ideals, internet news projects such as NowPublic put the news back in the hands of the people, allowing society to respond to the older form of interactive storytelling. However the writers of these sites may be those with an invested interest and knowledge to share, but they may not be bona fide journalists. The writes of these internet sites are not bound to the same degree of truth seeking as journalists for, say, CanWest. Those that write in magazines and newspapers have a responsibility to their personal, political and professional reputations to get it right. Plus they are getting big bucks to have an accurate analysis on what they are talking about - or they could bet sued, fired and/or ostracized - whereas those of NowPublic just don't have those kinds of repercussions.

Mike Stupin! (not verified)

at 09:33 on March 24th, 2009

On the subject of what is worth news and what is worth trusting I’m afraid I cant participate. I don’t and have and never have had a television, I rarely read the Internet daily post and only read the paper when the paper happens upon me.

I would like to comment on a few points that seem to surface in these postings. The first is I don’t believe we give ourselves enough credit. I believe there is skepticism present in my generation that endows us with a rightful questioning of the source, origin and intent of our information. Most people I know don’t really watch the news as they watch for codes, and this isn’t only the post-structuralist cultural-study savvy types either, it is generally everyone. When we analyze this skepticism it appears to fall short to end just past fox news, that we the representation of say the war in Iraq is highly suspect but the left return is not. I would disagree, for example the daily show and the Colbert report are very popular right now, but the mandate is not immediately swallowed. The audience in conscience that what these programs do is cherry pick though media to surface contradictions and highlight ironies and oxymorons for their own means. The left is obviously better suited to sharpen their swords with parody and humor but still held suspect for their deeds.

I have expressed this opinion before to be met with the criticism that I am being overly optimistic of the potential of the people. This might be true. There is allot of evidence that begs to differ, the lack of voter turnout, the popularity of reality TV, the unfortunate situation of consumerism, all indicates there is an unquestioning subservient public. I think in this case we need to be more acute in our observations of the subservience of the people. Examine the modes of inception, consumerism and activism in culture, and re-assess processes to utilize them. A tendency of the academy is elitism; this isn’t all bad (I am on team) but with this elitism is the assumption we are the divine light on the people to intervene and liberate. I think with should examine these modes of culture and adapt our systems to them. It does seem that it is culture that’s immediate and theory that is archaic. So when we condemn the reality TV audiences to morons, I think it is a flaw on our part to assume the role of reality TV as soma and not approach it from a perspective of academics (students).

I don’t think I made any clear thesis here. Scrutinize my words and hold me responsible for my lose ends and my misleading.

-Mike Stupin! (leaning left)

Megan Mattock (not verified)

at 13:34 on March 24th, 2009

When reading or watching the news you have to be aware that the information that you are receiving is in fact subjective, even though the media portrays it as being objective. It does not matter where you hear the news from (journalists, family, friends or networks), it will always be from that individual’s point of view. So if I am interested in a news-story I will tend to look it up in multiple sources. Also one has to be aware of what is being spoken about and question what is not spoken about or what is written in between the lines. The media may tell a part of a story but not all of it. Facts missing from the news may change the way one views the news and helps to form and perpetuate a bias.

I agree that the Internet has allowed the voices of the "Sphere of Deviance" to be heard. This can make one realize that what is considered consensus in the media may not be that at all. By reading other peoples views that one would not hear in the media it allows one to think in a different way, even if you may not agree with those views.

If I do watch the news I tend to watch CBC news or BBC, I find that I tend to be more skeptical of American news networks. I feel that the news on the American networks tends to be more sensationalized, that the news is not just to inform you but also be a form of entertainment. I find that I prefer to read the news in a newspaper as apposed to watching it on television. I find that one may find more information in the written word in comparison to a quick news flash on television.

Even though all the news that I read or hear is biased I still think it is important to stay informed and know what is happening around the world.

Mitchell Van Duzer (not verified)

at 19:54 on March 25th, 2009

I believe I’m fairly cynical about the structure of traditional journalistic institutions as they exist today. Just recently I acquired a copy of the movie Network (1976) on DVD, and as wonderful as it is, I find it terrifying how true the premise has become 33 years later. For those not familiar with the movie, it is a black comedy whose basic premise is about an old newscaster who finds renewed success by remaking his news program into a sensationalistic entertainment show centered around his angry apocalyptic rantings. At the time, I’m sure the exaggeration of news as circus sideshow must have given the material all its humour; in light of the current situation, however, it seems more like prophecy than comedy. I don’t watch news programs expecting subjectivity; when I turn on CNN or MSNBC, I know what I’m watching is at least 50% for its entertainment value.

It may sound odd and contradictory to the preceding statement, but if I really want news, I trust The Daily Show and The Colbert Report—probably because they, at least, make no effort to hide their entertainment value behind a phony veneer of authority. I believe the institution of news greatly underestimates Stewart and Colbert, because they are comedians; what they don’t see is that both of them are educated and perfectly capable of making intelligent, reasoned arguments. And this is exactly why they have such power. For example, when Jon Stewart went on CNN’s debate show Crossfire, he was expected to tell jokes; instead, he used the opportunity to legitimately expose the fundamentally flawed structure of a show devoted to two-sided debates, when so many modern issues just aren’t that black-and-white. Stewart’s appearance on the show was enough of a catalyst to get CNN to cancel it.

Chloe LIu (not verified)

at 20:28 on March 25th, 2009

Normal 0 MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman";}

When I try to think of the brand that I trust for news, it is not very easy for me to come up one within my sources. Usually I read news from the internet, the Taiwanese Yahoo news section. It contains articles from most of the big newspaper presses in Taiwan. Sometimes the same event could have three to five similar articles writing about it. The interesting fact is even the same event could have different facts and descriptions. Even it is about the number of people dying or injuring in the earthquake, the numbers could be way off from one press to another. Personally I hope it is because the nature disaster slows down the speed of receiving the information rather than the lack of profession from the journalists and reporters. Besides that, most citizens in Taiwan know that every press has their own political opinion. Therefore sometimes it is pretty easy to tell that which press is debating about the thing that one particular party is doing and another press is defending it. There are always dramas and opposite opinions in our media. As a Taiwanese reader, I guess I have to think twice before I could one hundred percent believe the news or journals that I receive. The interesting to me is because our media is very political, when it comes to news that is from outside of Taiwan such as: ABC, CBC, BBC, it is easier for us to believe that the news from them are more neutral and truthful. However, since I’ve been studying in Canada for sometimes, I knew that every news from every country has their own politics. There is not really neutral news; there is always from one’s perspective to report the news. But I do think I tend to agree the opinion and perspective of news from outside the main stream Taiwanese media.

Alison Taylor (not verified)

at 22:19 on March 25th, 2009

I don't spend a lot of time reading or watching the news, as there is too much coverage of random acts of violence for my taste. But when it does matter to me to find out about something, I will typically try to find multiple sources of information from venues with competing viewpoints (e.g. conservative vs liberal, religious vs aetheist) and try to draw my own conclusions. I'm aware that my left-of-centre leaning biases my judgments, so I try to look at more right-wing publications to challenge my conclusions. But if I had to choose between Fox News 24 hours a day and Jon Stewart's Daily Show for a half hour, I'd take the latter.

In regards to Rosen's article: Audience Atomization Overcome

Although using different language, this article concerned itself with the “post-political” concept from the second half of Swyngedouw’s chapter "Impossible Sustainability and the Post-Political Condition". The press play a huge role in the process of restricting the subjects of dialog. As Swyngedouw states, “Although disagreement and debate are of course still possible, they operate within an overall model of consensus and agreement… There is hegemonic consensus that no alternative to liberal-global hegemony is possible.” Rosen might say that the neo-liberal capitalist structure of our society and economy falls within the “hole of the donut” where things are assumed to be agreed upon, and that those who try to entertain notions of an alternative societal structure would be excluded by the press, relegated to the outside of the donut, with no coverage.

Rosen raises the issue of what I think of as “preaching to the converted”. The people who are engaged in the process of generating the news are largely Washington insiders, who already have a great deal of consensus, just as the participants of the London “Interview Marathon” (discussed in Markus Meissen’s paper "The violence of Participation") had. What I love about the Internet is that it allows those outside of the donut a venue to share their knowledge and opinions widely, so that a greater variety of ideas are heard.

Personally, I’m not too upset about the deterioration in the “authority” of the news media. There are many examples where news has been shown to be biased in favour of one view or another, with a resultant distortion or omission of facts. (Back in the 70’s or 80’s there was a pretty shocking - to me - expose of how the American news media covered events in Latin America, called “The World is Watching”.) I’m not inclined to trust the media much, and appreciate that I can use the internet to find opposing viewpoints and craft my own judgment from varied sources of information.

What upsets me is the deterioration in the quality of the news. A great read on this subject is Tom Fenton’s book Bad News: The Decline of Reporting, the Business of News, and the Danger to Us All. He demonstrates how the quality of the news has deteriorated as it has become a commodity designed to produce profit, and news media have reduced their costs to increase profit, closing down international bureaus and reducing the levels of reporting staff on the ground. As a result, most news is obtained from international wire, where one viewpoint can prevail.

sarahmorin (not verified)

at 22:48 on March 25th, 2009

okay, so this *newsworthy* thing.

to tell the truth, i stopped watching tv two or three years ago, and the brief glimpses i get of the news are of the edmonton channel *global news* when i'm home at christmastime. i don't find it to be even remotely relevant in terms of news. they seem to only cover stories if they can put an *edmonton* spin on it. as an example, they covered the death, investigation, and trial of a woman murdered in north carolina last summer, because she had once lived in edmonton, years ago. it seems strange to me, like they are being subjective with what gains airtime, instead of being completely objective, like most news claims to be.

i'd have to say i usually just take any news at face value. just as a flaw of societal structure, everything in news is going to be subjective. the only actual *news* that i regularly keep up with is www.boingboing.net , which is not really news in itself. they do post news stories from time to time, but it's mixed in with a plethora of other things. i suppose that's why i trust it more, as it's independent blogging, and presents many other things than simply being a news channel.