On a far more minor note, and one that falls firmly into the "First World Problem" category, has anyone bought Nobby's mixed nuts lately?
I hadn't had them for years, as I normally just buy a nut mix from the market but the other day, in a classic impulse buy, I bought a packet. And wow! Hasn't the word "mixed" been loosely used! There's nothing in these packets now but peanuts and maybe 3 or 4 other nuts - and I mean 3 or 4 other nuts in total - just the odd almond or a Brazil nut. You may as well just buy a packet of salted peanuts.
First world problem though it is, it's kind of depressing!
Thursday, December 18, 2014
24 Hour Fiction Cycle
The 24-hour news cycle and how politicians feel the need to pander to it is a much discussed topic.
What is not so often discussed is how the news networks manage to fill this void. Funnily enough, it often becomes more difficult when there's a single big story dominating the landscape because, usually, the story is unfolding relatively slowly. And so it was with the siege in Sydney this week. Having heard about it in the morning, I checked back after lunch to see what was happening. The last four updates on the "minute-by-minute" coverage started with the words "It is denied that..." In other words, the way these networks provide the content is to simply broadcast unverified information or even worse, simply make it up. If no more is known, that's all I need to know. I don't need to have a ream of fiction followed by a retraction. I can read a novel if I need entertainment.
We also had the unedifying spectacle of the news networks broadcasting details of other networks covering the same story. While the international interest in the story was undoubted, the glee with which this was being done was tantamount to a teenager crying out "Ooh! Look! We're on TV".
Lastly, we have the excessive, self-referential over-analysis of the event. The Guardian ran an article on how well news outlets had covered the story - i.e. a smug "How good were we!" story. Then the Telegraph runs a 23-page - 23 pages - of "Sydney's Day of Terror" coverage and that's before you get to the special "lift-out section", covering the same thing, in the centre of the paper.
Meanwhile over 130 people die in Pakistan in a terrorism attack. I can't wait for the souvenir edition covering that story.
What is not so often discussed is how the news networks manage to fill this void. Funnily enough, it often becomes more difficult when there's a single big story dominating the landscape because, usually, the story is unfolding relatively slowly. And so it was with the siege in Sydney this week. Having heard about it in the morning, I checked back after lunch to see what was happening. The last four updates on the "minute-by-minute" coverage started with the words "It is denied that..." In other words, the way these networks provide the content is to simply broadcast unverified information or even worse, simply make it up. If no more is known, that's all I need to know. I don't need to have a ream of fiction followed by a retraction. I can read a novel if I need entertainment.
We also had the unedifying spectacle of the news networks broadcasting details of other networks covering the same story. While the international interest in the story was undoubted, the glee with which this was being done was tantamount to a teenager crying out "Ooh! Look! We're on TV".
Lastly, we have the excessive, self-referential over-analysis of the event. The Guardian ran an article on how well news outlets had covered the story - i.e. a smug "How good were we!" story. Then the Telegraph runs a 23-page - 23 pages - of "Sydney's Day of Terror" coverage and that's before you get to the special "lift-out section", covering the same thing, in the centre of the paper.
Meanwhile over 130 people die in Pakistan in a terrorism attack. I can't wait for the souvenir edition covering that story.
Saturday, May 31, 2014
Out of Office
I can't really use it as an excuse for the very long period of inactivity but I am on holiday at the moment in Central and South America. And I'll be attempting (although I'm already well behind schedule) to keep track of things on this blog.
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