Tuesday, August 16, 2005



Spin, spin, spin. It's everywhere, all the time, and unfortunately no-one has yet invented a machine to detect it. You just have to be constantly alert (and sometimes alarmed), as evidenced by Crikey stories

The Blog, The Press, The Media: Journalism's fear and loathing of blogs
Mainstream journalism is running scared. Who You Calling A Journalist?

It's watching its audience numbers decline and its public trust numbers drop. Newspapers, magazines, and network television news have been shaken by major scandals. The media have seen the future and it is blogging


Can't beat that [Is journalism a profession, or more a craft or trade? The occupational status of journalists in this democratic society ; Web is finally becoming as fun and flexible as your favorite software. The next Web revolution ; Scientists say they have been able to monitor people's thoughts via scans of their brains 'Thoughts read' via brain scans ]
• · Phillip Knightley It spent money like water on investigative journalism ... The editor, Harold Evans, was unhappy if a libel writ had not arrived by Tuesday, because he felt that the paper had not been doing its job - defending people without power from those who wielded it unfairly, exposing corruption, making a difference to the lives of ordinary citizens Restoring citizen's respect for journalism: we are not without power ; You always know what's on the cards with an internet search ; The great part about the Internet of all the existing mediums from before is that it's the first one that is truly global, and its impact is massive ... The likes of Google and Yahoo draw to us more information in seconds than our ancestors had access to during their lifetimes - but with too few surprises. Were always making discoveries, by accident and sagacity, of things they were not in quest of Google AdSense
• · · For better or worse, the Internet is playing a larger role in editorial decisions about books Crossing weblines ; When Weblog Watch did an initial round-up of British bloggers' reactions to the London bomb attacks, we noted how Tim Worstall's words had generally been heeded in the immediate aftermath: Back to the fray
• · · · In August 1991, Sir Tim Berners-Lee created the first website. Fourteen years on, he tells BBC Newsnight's Mark Lawson how blogging is closer to his original idea about a read/write web Berners-Lee on the read/write web ; Slate's Jack Shafer on why he doesn't trust readers: Their credibility has fallen to an all-time low. Dear Slate reader ; Few scientists have caught on to the Internet's power of posting, commenting, and debating – where are the rest? The Power of the Blog
• · · · · Google profits from organising information on the web. If it does so, then it can't prevent those who use the web from doing the same Google must search within itself; Should we all be using this GoogleAnon bookmarklet to set our Google GUID to all zeros, in order to anonymize our searches? Is that a paranoid thing to do? Anonymizing Google's Cookie
• · · · · · Jenna Freedman of RR exclaims: ‘Hooray for Chicago Radical Reference volunteer Laura Crossett! Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) ; And The Overall Awards Go To The ramblings of Laura Crossett, The Medium is Not the Message