The news is annoying me…

I’ve been watching/reading the media and can’t really find anything to get my teeth into.  Maybe I’m just jet lagged still.

I am about over Charlie Sheen’s antics (isn’t everyone?).  Northwestern University’s Professor J. Michael Bailey arranged for the demonstration of a sex toy in a tutorial, causing quite a stir: in fact far too much of a stir when there are far more important things to worry about.  Too many police have searched through the details of the St Kilda young lady saga, so we are told.  This is surprising why?  Kevin Rudd is trying to rule the world or at least make sure he leaves a sizeable carbon footprint.

The unrest in the middle east continues and while this situation is of global importance and the loss of life terrible sad, it is not an issue I really want to delve into.  I was a little to close for comfort recently when protests started in Oman while I was in Qatar.  Seems I missed meeting up with Kevin in Abu Dhabi by a day.

I see an article about the Victorian Government allegedly blackmailing Melbourne University and decide I really do not want to know – someone else can take that on board.

Lady Gaga has, thankfully, taken legal action against the makers of breast milk ice cream, but only for the name – the ice cream will probably stay.

Will the media PLEASE stop referring to Julia’s partner as First Bloke?  I don’t care what side of politics any of us are on, this is our NATION we are talking about here and frankly I think we can come up with a better title that doesn’t make US all look like country yokels on the world stage. 

I’ll almost be glad when the real footy season starts – at least the front pages will be predictable, if nothing else.

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False world of sports professionals

Poor St Kilda.  As a club it has certainly been through the media mill off field lately.  It hopefully is a lesson to all sporting professionals, not just the players of the St Kilda football club (who themselves do not seem to be learning any lessons).

The above linked article says “These young men live in a false world. Too much adoration, money and spare time.”  That statement doesn’t just apply to St Kilda’s young men, but to all sports professionals.  It is indeed a false world.  Some sports do not seem to be as bad as others:  tennis, for example, is not generally rocked by such scandals.  Cricket has the odd loose cannon such as Shane Warne, but generally, not so bad.  Cricket’s dramas usually revolve more around match fixing, it seems, that sex, alcohol and drugs.  Golf?  Well there was Tiger, of course, and even The Shark has had some colourful moments.

Footballers seem to take the cake every time.  Is it the pack mentality?  Get a group of young, irresponsible, overpaid men together with way too much time on their hands and perhaps a lack of rigorous education and look what happens.  The adoration aspect is clear: yet other sports professionals have a similar fan base and don’t get into the same scraps.

Too many bumps on the head?  After all, it does seem as if footballers, irrespective of code, end up in more trouble.  AFL takes the cake locally, but worldwide anecdotal evidence would suggest footballers end up in the media the most.

I think I’ll be steering my sons in the direction of tennis.

What sport do you encourage your sons to play, and why?

 

Digital media versus the broadsheet

The Age carries a very interesting article today by Brigid Delaney on the digital media and what we get.  Brigid is right: most of the web versions of the papers don’t tend to offer the same depth (unless you look for it) as the paper version.

More worrying, as the article points out, is the “snippet” approach to reading the news by those of the digital age.  For my age group, I am probably not the norm.  I too read the news on the web most of the time.  Every now and then I will actually go and buy the real thing.

I remember being at a workshop on some professional development topic or other with a variety of people.  One of the other attendees was in charge of web site content and gave a short presentation about her work.  The way of writing for grabbing attention on the web is quite interesting (I would fail miserably) for there is a need to grab the attention in that first headline or sentence.  Writers know they have a very limited attention span to work with, so must get the message across in a matter of seconds.

Are we becoming a world that knows very little about a lot?  Is what we know even remotely accurate?  Are we, as the article suggests, concentrating only on the banalities around us?  Paris Hilton gets more attention than asylum seekers for example.  How much do people REALLY know about the whole asylum seeker debate, which let’s be fair, is far more important than Paris or LiLo.  Look at how much screen space was devoted to the St Kilda nude photo issue lately (which yes, I agree, I commented on myself), or how Fevola only has to sneeze to capture the digital front page – of even the broadsheets!  Yet are either of those local stories really front page news when compared with much else that is happening in the world?  Are the floods in Queensland less important that Fev?  I think not.

I often click on a headline or “breaking news” only to find the article is in fact five lines that tell me nothing.  OK, so I now know some guy was arrested somewhere, but I don’t know the details and will probably never find out.

Are Twitter and Facebook becoming almost our defacto news feeds?  After all, what do you have on Facebook? A page titled “News Feed” – but it isn’t.  How many people say they learned of something on Twitter?  How much can you learn from 140 characters?  Twitter is a great way to spread misinformation, though.  Retweet something often enough and it almost becomes accepted fact.  Look at the celebrities using Twitter to deny transgressions!

There is nothing truer than we get what we ask for.  As a population, it seems, we are asking for banality.  That is what we will keep getting, unless we ask for something else. 

Julia must decide!

All I can say today is Julia Gillard must love Nick Riewoldt and the St Kilda FC this week.  Will she change her allegiance from the Bulldogs to St Kilda? After all, the media focus in Victoria (the Labor heartland, so we are told) has been shifted from such minor events as the Christmas Island tragedy to the saga of footballers having group sex.

This is news?  We didn’t actually know this already?  The Bombers might have finished down the ladder this year, but at least you always knew James Hird was never going to attract this kind of publicity.

Like an innumerable number of Victorians (if not Australians) I’ve seen the photo of Nick.  I can understand him demanding it be deleted at the time it was taken.  A) His facial expression is just plain weird; B) He “just got out of bed”, but in a very “unmanly” state as many men laughingly indicated within my hearing today and yesterday; C) Am I the only one who noticed he seems to be shaved in the nether regions?  I do agree most people sleep naked – who doesn’t?

There is much todo about where and when the photo was taken.  Should be simple enough to prove.  If I download a photo from my camera or my phone to my computer, a wealth of information is also transferred and easily accessed.  Here is a snip from my own computer.

Look at that – even records the aperture and focal length.  Surprise, surprise.

And the date taken:

A photo from a phone?  Not a problem!  Yes, I do indeed have a Nokia N97.

Let me make it very clear that if the young lady in question is telling the truth, I applaud her fortitude for fighting back.  I may well have questions about what a 16 year-old was doing cavorting with professional footballers, but I also know without a shadow of a doubt those footballers also have a responsibility to behave in a manner befitting their privileged status.  Group sex involving 16 year-olds is not responsible in any way, shape or form.

The fact this state, or this country, thinks this story is worthy of so much news coverage astounds me.    Let’s our politicians off the hook, doesn’t it?  Very convenient.

I read the AFL is “angry” with Channel 7.  The AFL may do well to remember the media is supposed to report openly and independently, not at the behest of a sporting fraternity.

There is so much about this whole thing that is so wrong.  From the actual events, the “he said, she said” aspect with no documented proof from either camp, the “pressure” supposedly being brought to bear on a media outlet for rights to televising games, to the totally unwarranted degree of media coverage when there are way more important things the media should be paying attention to.  Such as the treatment by the USA of an Australian citizen or the treatment of asylum seekers by Australians to name just two items of current importance.

Must be a slow news day.

I expect an annoucement any day that Julia has become St Kilda’s No. 1 ticket holder.

By the way – when exactly did Australia adopt American spelling?  Labour is Labour, not Labor, in Australia!