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Archives
Only two teams ever have had better start than M's
Owning the Future: I am reminded of that missing sewer grate by an all-out battle brewing here in the United States—only the gaping hole we're threatened with is in the stacks of our public libraries. And in this case it's the publishing industry doing the looting. As we plunge into the digital realm, the nation's 16,000 public libraries are striving to uphold their tradition as protectors of public access to new books and articles. But publishers, in an increasingly bald, frontal assault on the library's mission, have something very different in mind: a pay-per-use model for information content that will largely shut libraries out. thanks to BookNotes
Two excellent articles on blogging and journalism by J.D. Lasica at OJR. Blogging as a Form of Journalism (Part1)
Weblogs: A New Source of News (Part 2)
Cameron - check this one out. You need to know who you are fighting. Or, you need to know how those you are fighting are fighting. Or,...just read it!
WAR ON TRUTH
Stauber: The key is invisibility. Once propaganda becomes visible, it's less effective. Public relations is effective in manipulating opinion - and thus public policy - only if people believe that the message covertly delivered by the PR campaign is not propaganda at all but simply common sense or accepted reality. For instance, there is a con--sensus within the scientific community that global warming is real and that the burning of fossil fuels is a major cause of the problem. But to the petroleum industry, the automobile industry, the coal industry, and other industries that profit from fossil-fuel consumption, this is merely an inconvenient message that needs to be "debunked" because it could lead to public policies that reduce their profits. So, with the help of PR firms, these vested interests create and fund industry front groups such as the Global Climate Coalition. The coalition then selects, promotes, and publicizes scientists who proclaim global warming a myth and characterize hard evidence of global climate change as "junk science" being pushed by self-serving environmental groups out to scare the public for fund-raising purposes. Another industry front group is the Hudson Institute, a prominent far-right think tank espousing the view that global climate change will be beneficial! The Hudson Institute is funded by the American Trucking Association, the Ford Motor Company, Allison Engine Company, Bombardier, and McDonnell Douglas, among others. The Global Climate Coalition and the Hudson Institute are routinely quoted in the news media, where they promote their message of "Don't worry, burn lots of oil, gas, and coal." In order to confuse the public and manipulate opinion and policy to their advantage, corporations spend billions of dollars a year hiring PR firms to cultivate the press, discredit their critics, spy on and co-opt citizens' groups, and use polls to find out what images and messages will resonate with target audiences. ... Stauber: The propaganda-for-hire industry perverts democracy. We try to help citizens and journalists learn about how they're being lied to, manipulated, and too often defeated by sophisticated PR campaigns. The public-relations industry is a little like the invisible man in that old Claude Rains movie: crimes are committed, but no one can see the perpetrator. At PR Watch, we try to paint the invisible manipulators with bright orange paint. Citizens in a democracy need to know who and what interests are manipulating public opinion and policy, and how. Democracies work best without invisible men. thanks to wood s lot
Tina Lear, a TestingTesting alumus, gets some recognition! Christine Lavin really likes Tina's new CD. I spent today putting Tina on WhidbeyStore.com where you can buy her CDs at a place that actually lets her keep most of the money. It's been over a year since Tina has been on TestingTesting and her show is no longer archived. If we can find an 88 key keyboard she will be on TT June 11. Tina's keyboard is suspended 10 feet in the air at Wica for her musical Cathy's Creek which opens next Friday, June 8.
Monday's TestingTesting was only possible because our new mixing board thanks to the contributions of our TT listeners. We had Shiver, a 3 piece rock band from the north end of the Island, who showed up with an extra keyboard player. No problem with this mixing board. The sound is much better now and it's so much easier to mix than using the mic mixers we had.
Rich America, Unfair America From the late 1980s to the late 1990s, the average income of the lowest-income families grew by less than 1 percent, while that of middle-income families grew by less than 2 percent. But for high-income families, the growth was 15 percent, according to an analysis of Census Bureau data by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the Economic Policy Institute. One of the economists who helped write that report calls the unequal distribution of wealth from the recent prosperity "our nation's most serious economic problem," pointing to evidence that societies with higher levels of inequality grow more slowly. Our government's only response has been to push massive tax cuts that mostly benefit the rich. The economy that produces the grotesque level of inequality is dominated by huge corporations that internally are structured like tyrannies-power concentrated at the top, hierarchal management systems, and no freedom for employees at the bottom, except the "freedom" to leave to find a job in some equally tyrannical competitor. Too many people equate Capatilism with Democracy. They are not the same. Capitalism, creating large corporations, is destroying democracy. thanks to BUSHWACKER
The Face on Mars finally unmasked! thanks to robot wisdom
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