The War
Just got done watching the first part of Ken Burns' new documentary 'The War'. It was pretty good, showing how the war affected people in the US and what the war was like for America. I didn't expect anything else, so it was quite well done.
Kinda getting sick of the discovery channel documentary. I'm a strong believer of documentaries being for educational purposes or to show a certain side of an issue. But The discovery channel and all its sister stations, (I'm looking at you, history channel), only seem to be sensationalist representations of things, that have little to no educational value. Who gives a shit if a crocodile can kill and shark, or what weapons will be used in the future? How does that educate children?
With kids learning alot from tv and the internet these days, its no wonder half of them are stupid. They do know that the shark would win though.
Anyways, back to another point. Watching The War was really great because you actually see combat footage and all the carnage that makes an event real. When was the last time we saw any useful footage shown of the iraq war or of the war in Afghanistan?
With all the social news stuff going on (Digg, etc) it makes me think how much better the world would be if that sort of thing existed for real news. All digg users do is take stories that already exist and decide if they're worth reading or not. Imagine if those same users had the power to report the news.
CNN, BBC and local news stations do allow the submission of news clips and input, but the company still controls the news, not the people. It gives the illusion that the people have some input, when they really don't.
Sorry for being so anti-corporate news, but I want to see on the news the Iraqi opinion of the war, I even want to see what ground troops think of the fact that their vacation time was cancelled and that there really is no clear victory for a war that was never formally declared and has no clear enemy.
This, I wish for the future of the news. Showing all sides has to be as objective as it gets. We have the technology to do so, so I hope this eventually happens.
Kinda getting sick of the discovery channel documentary. I'm a strong believer of documentaries being for educational purposes or to show a certain side of an issue. But The discovery channel and all its sister stations, (I'm looking at you, history channel), only seem to be sensationalist representations of things, that have little to no educational value. Who gives a shit if a crocodile can kill and shark, or what weapons will be used in the future? How does that educate children?
With kids learning alot from tv and the internet these days, its no wonder half of them are stupid. They do know that the shark would win though.
Anyways, back to another point. Watching The War was really great because you actually see combat footage and all the carnage that makes an event real. When was the last time we saw any useful footage shown of the iraq war or of the war in Afghanistan?
With all the social news stuff going on (Digg, etc) it makes me think how much better the world would be if that sort of thing existed for real news. All digg users do is take stories that already exist and decide if they're worth reading or not. Imagine if those same users had the power to report the news.
CNN, BBC and local news stations do allow the submission of news clips and input, but the company still controls the news, not the people. It gives the illusion that the people have some input, when they really don't.
Sorry for being so anti-corporate news, but I want to see on the news the Iraqi opinion of the war, I even want to see what ground troops think of the fact that their vacation time was cancelled and that there really is no clear victory for a war that was never formally declared and has no clear enemy.
This, I wish for the future of the news. Showing all sides has to be as objective as it gets. We have the technology to do so, so I hope this eventually happens.