Buried leads, media consolidation, and "news"

The recent debate about concentration in media ownership in the USA (here, here, here, and lots of other places) -- mostly because of anticipation of the recent Federal Communications Commission decision to ease ownership rules -- raised a few interesting questions. For me, some of the most interesting questions are those I stumble over; those for which I don't have a confident answer even after a lot of pondering. One of those related to the media ownership issue is this: "does it really matter who owns the big media outlets now that there is such a variety of independent media, including the world wide web/internet, which make it easy and inexpensive to report to a potentially large audience?"

I feel that it is still very important that we ensure diversity in media ownership. But that was always only a feeling. I wasn't sure why I felt that way. The internet makes it seem like George Orwell's nightmare vision of "Big Brother" is impossible. Is media as diverse as it should be?

Reading the first few paragraphs of this story made me think of Harry Shearer's repeated references (in his "Le Show" podcasts) to "buried leads." Maybe the question of diversity isn't so much about how diverse the voices in media are. The question is really about who controls the majority of the power to influence that the various media enjoy. Does it really matter if there is vast diversity of ownership and voices in small and un-influential media? The value, and necessity, of a free press in a democracy is not a goal in itself. A free press in needed so that facts about important issues are easily and widely available to the public. A mostly anonymous network of diverse voices chattering amongst themselves does not fulfill this goal.

Here is the basic logic behind the argument:

• Political and policy discussion is not driven by, nor is it probably even strongly influenced by, small, inexpensive media outlets like blogs, handbills, e-mail distribution, etc. (And in the few cases that a small, independent media outlet is able to get its message out effectively, it takes great investment of time, effort, and money. The same is not true of large media organizations that wish to have a particular story widely recognized.)
  
• Headlines and the first few paragraphs of stories in major newspapers, along with the lead stories on mainstream television news have a strong influence on the public's perception of reality.
  
• Publishers of media tailor (sometimes gently, sometimes less so) their stories to political conditions. They choose which stories they cover, and of those they cover, they choose which get the front page (or the lead), and which parts of the story are mentioned, and where.
• The "buried lead" is an easy way for media to pretend to report unpopular or critical news, but ensure that some facts aren't picked up by the general public, and do not inform debate. For a recent example, see the story I referred to above, and this paragraph in particular: "Neither paper has (as far as I know) returned to the subject [buried many paragraphs into the story], though this is undoubtedly the most extensive use of air power in Iraq since the Bush administration's invasion of 2003 and probably represents a genuine shifting of American military strategy in that country. Despite a few humdrum wire service pieces, no place else in the mainstream has bothered to cover the story adequately either." The story goes on to describe why this part of the story is so significant and constitutes the buried lead.
• If we accept that news outlets bring a particular colour to their journalism (and the evidence is difficult to ignore), and we agree that the goal of a free press is important and one we should as a society pursue, then we must agree that it is important to ensure a diversity of political sympathies in media outlets.
• Media outlets tend to shadow the political sympathies of their owners. The large media conglomerates tend to report conservatively, without resistance to political, economic, or other powers (one need not look far to find examples of this: the lead up to the latest war in Iraq is only one glaring example, and there are several book-length studies of this instance.) Non-corporate, smaller media outlets tend to have a greater variety of political sympathies, are more likely to report unpopular news, and can show resistance to power.
• In order to enhance the possibility of responsible reporting, we must encourage independent media to remain so, and not be bought up by the large media conglomerates.
  

A Christmas Tree: How Lovely!

"...the idea of a [Christmas] tree in itself is somewhat warped; that as a way of celebrating nature we cut down this beautiful, virile tree and bring it indoors and slowly look at it while it dies." - Fiona Banner (Banner is British artist. Here she comments on her recent installation at the Tate in London, a Christmas tree decorated with models of fighter planes currently active in the world. I transcribed this quotation from the December 20, 2007 podcast of "Tateshots." This link will take you to the Tate page dedicated to the video podcast.)

It isn't a very sophisticated or esoteric idea that cutting down a healthy tree, setting it up indoors, festooning it with plastic, glass, and (sometimes) natural decorations, only to watch it deteriorate, dessicate, and then die, is "warped." But we don't talk about it. "Tradition" ensures that it is seldom questioned, and that when it is, the questioner will most often be ignored or accused of unreasonableness--of being a killjoy. So as usual, we rely on artists and theorists to bring forward the question. They're used to being ignored and accused of unreasonableness.

The practice is disturbing, even considering only the actual physical waste related to cutting down a tree and putting it up indoors to watch it die. But I think also of the psychological and cultural significance of the practice. Observers of the hacked-off tree refer to the way the natural beauty of the tree makes them feel. When they talk about the tree's smell, its imperfect symmetry, its colour, the irony of the tradition becomes even more striking. And it's in this way that the cultural pathology of killing and displaying nature to celebrate that same natural beauty reaches its ultimate significance: this is the only context in which many people in the global West see trees. We do not smell, see, or touch the real outdoors, the underlying substructure on which our roads, houses, automobiles, and DVDs of "Planet Earth" depend.
So it's with recognition that I need to get into the woods, onto the plains, and on to the mountains more often that I suggest that we start to practice a new, or at least re-newed tradition: go outside; walk in the woods; look at a living tree; smell a living flower; watch the birds working and playing. The stuff you saw on the BBC series "Planet Earth" and elsewhere actually exists. A lot of it can be experienced not far from where you are right now.

Japancakes do My Bloody Valentine

When I saw the listing in the second-to-latest "new releases" e-mail from Darla Records I didn't expect that the new Japancakes album "Loveless" could have anything to do with the 1991 My Bloody Valentine album of the same name. But the track list indicated it was a song-for-song cover of one of my favorite albums by a more recent band I really admire.
The disc arrived today in the mail from Darla, and it's, uh, lovely.

What does an Athens, Georgia instrumental band do to a revered album by a British band known for multi-tracked guitar noise-pop? One thing they've done is given it the unmistakable sound of a Japancakes album. Secondly they show a lot of respect for the original material by doing covers that are very true to the originals. Japancakes don't do vocals. So the vocal melodies of the MBV album are reproduced variously by strings, keyboards, and electric guitar. It sounds, ironically, like the only track on which Japancakes have used a voice, is "Touched." MBV's version of the song was instrumental, and really stood out because of the Star-Wars-space-noise/whale songs sound that played off the treated guitar in the first half of the song. It sounds here like Japancakes have mixed a non-verbal (human) voice track with traditional strings to approximate the original. Japancakes produce pretty laid-back music. So they've treated the more raucous of the MBV tracks ("When You Sleep," and "Blown A Wish") with mellow, romantic touches. The soaring guitars of the originals are replaced by tasteful strings. But the songs are far from retiring or boring. Listen to the walking bass in "Soon," faithfully reproduced from the original. On this, and most of the others, I can't help grooving just as I did when I first heard MBV's original version.

But is Japancakes' treatment of "Loveless" as exciting as was the original when it first came out? I can't say for certain. Because Japancakes has done such a meticulous job of reproducing every layer of sound of the original, I can't tell if I'm hearing stored echoes of MBV when I listen to Japancakes. In any case, Japancakes' "Loveless" has me whirling and soaring to the melodies just like MBV did when "Loveless" first came out. I think Japancakes' "Loveless" will be as fun and heady for a new listener as was MBV's 1991 version.

Memories

To what degree does a society recall even the large details of devastating wars in which it's been involved?

Ken Burns, documentary director whose series "The War," about World War Two, has been playing recently on PBS, talks about this question in his recent comments to the National Press Club in Washington D.C. (also broadcast and podcast by American Public Media's Word for Word.) In his comments, Burns refers to a mid-1990s report issued by the National Council for History Education.

Referring to indications in the report of American students' ignorance of history, he says,

"In the end we could not ignore its stupefying truth, or the consequences it infers for our still fragile republic: An unacceptably large number of graduating high school seniors, those with diplomas in hand walking away from the podium, headed out into the real world to inherit eventually the responsibilities over the rest of us--too many think we fought with the Germans, against the Russians in the second world war."

The cull

I told myself that my peppers were still outside, in pots on the deck even though it gets cold at night now, because I wanted them to ripen. But I think part of the reason I've risked leaving them outside even when there's a risk of frost is that picking them all would be a concrete sign that winter is very close, and we can no longer rely on the sun for warmth. So two nights ago, I picked all the peppers that were large enough to use. Some are red, some are green, and a few are in between, partly ripened from green to red.
Anyone want some fresh, local hot peppers?

Grampy John

A short video of photos of John McAloon and family:

Hot pepper!

Many of the curry dishes I like require hot peppers. In the winter I culled some seeds from grocery store-bought Thai hot peppers, dried them for a few weeks, and planted them indoors. They sat by my wood stove for a month or so absorbing the heat, and what little sun they could, during the long winter. In spring I re-potted them, and put them on the deck. Now, near the end of the summer, many of the plants are fruiting.

The peppers mature from green to red. They vary a bit in size. This latter may be due to my laziness: in the spring I put far too many seedlings in each pot. As seedlings they look so small and inconsequential. But the potential! So the plants are all pretty crowded in the pots.
Last night I diced up one of the red peppers and put it in a stir-fry. I didn't notice the flavour/ heat very much in the meal. But later, after apparently not washing my hands quite sufficiently, I rubbed my eyes and ended up with a bit of a burning sensation.