It is a measure of how out of touch I am with popular culture that I often learn about a media phenomenon only long after it has been around or if it goes down in flames. Sometimes the names associated with the phenomenon (Honey Boo Boo, Miley Cyrus, the Kardashians) lurk in the fringes of my consciousness because the news headlines feature them but I know next to nothing about them. [Read more…]
… as measured by its repetition on local news channels. Conan O’Brien has the scoop. [Read more…]
It turns out that it is not just journalists like David Miranda and Laura Poitras who are detained and questioned at length when they arrive at airports in the US and the UK. Now comes a report that even reporters from establishment media like the New York Times have suffered the same fate. [Read more…]
So Time magazine has chosen Pope Francis as its Person of the Year. I can’t say that I am surprised. It is just the kind of choice they like, that will generate interest and perhaps hits and sells magazines, but not arouse any great controversy. [Read more…]
Bloomberg news has been having a conflict with the Chinese government after it ran a series of stories about the wealth of senior Chinese government officials. In seeming retaliation for this, a British reporter for Bloomberg was not allowed to attend a press conference with British prime minister David Cameron and his Chinese counterpart in Beijing yesterday. [Read more…]
British comedians John Bird and John Fortune discuss the new media landscape that seems to be passing them by and wonder what they should do about it. And in the process, deliver their usual insightful critiques about the nature of current society. [Read more…]
Back in 2008, I wrote a 12-part series titled The Propaganda Machine in which I laid out how the right-wing propaganda machine works in the US. Much of that machine became created because of what is now known as the Powell Memo. [Read more…]
It should come as no surprise that TV news shows are increasingly populated by attractive women as reporters, anchors, panelists, and hosts. They seem to be following the rule that People magazine uses for its covers based on what they think increases newsstand sales: young is better than old, rich is better than poor, pretty is better than ugly, and so on. [Read more…]
Bob Woodward, courtier journalist par excellence and faithful servant of the ruling political class, laments the fact that Edward Snowden didn’t come to him with his revelations, saying “I wish he had come to me instead of others, particularly The Guardian… I would have said to him ‘let’s not reveal who you are. Let’s make you a protected source and give me time with this data and let’s sort it out and present it in a coherent way.'” [Read more…]
David Miranda is Glenn Greenwald’s partner and became much better known when he was detained and interrogated at Heathrow airport for nearly nine hours and had his computer and other electronic equipment confiscated because the British authorities suspected that he was carrying Edward Snowden-related materials from Germany to Brazil. [Read more…]