Those fucking miners.

[tisl]

So what the fuck is with the news channels and the coverage of the Chilean miners? Back in the old days the purpose of news channels was to provide the viewer with a global coverage. Having the news constantly on when doing office work meant knowing what was happening throughout the entire world. Major events similar to September 11 would have extended coverage. Now we get 24 fucking hours of a bunch of fucking miners trapped in Chile. Who gives a shit? How is this relevant on a global scale?

Fucking shit.

[Alchi]

It's a proof to my theory, that world and living itself is becoming more and more boring. And so there's nothing interesting on teli.
I blame the left and all who think that safety is great.

Fuck you people, take a chance.

[Fatty]

Apparently it's a really big deal in Chile.

[LittleChief]

Ever since I turned 18, I have done my best to ignore miners.

[Hobbes874]

I heard one commentator compare that over simplified elevator to the engineering feat of "landing on the moon". I just about had an aneurysm.

[schnitzel_bob]

Good for the miners and their families, but yeah, that's hardly global news. It certainly doesn't merit 24h coverage. Although I will add that I don't think Americans realize the extent to which their media covers only US events, which by extension means that relatively unimportant stories get covered in international media outlets as well.

The world isn't getting more boring, but the media coverage of the world sure is. It seems like the CBC newsnet(Canadian Broadcasting Corp) only has the budget to cover three stories a day. It's very annoying.

[RacerX]

The media sucks dry any story that they think gets ratings. Douche bags!

[IcedEarth]

The media sucks dry any story that they think gets ratings. Douche bags!

That's what it's all about.

[Lehesu]

Just reaffirming my belief that us Americans don't give a shit if it ain't about America...

[Rhenna]

Just reaffirming my belief that us Americans don't give a shit if it ain't about America...

I don't believe that to be accurate. A significant number of Americans, perhaps, but certainly not all of us. But, I'll readily concede that I'm almost certainly parsing your words too closely.

There are a lot of people in both the Nation, and around the World, who feel we're too involved in everyone else's business. That we should just go full-on isolationist. Seemingly, everyone else feels we're far too introspective and self-absorbed, and really need to open up and get more involved.

A great many people think that China is well on it's way to ascending past the United States as the No. 1 superpower. Should this occur in my lifetime, I'll watch with interest how the rest of the World speaks of their global interference/generousity ratio. Somehow, I feel a few countries might find they have, unaccountably, lost their voice...

As for the news media deciding what to cover, and, perhaps more importantly, how to cover it, I'm pretty much at the point to declare most of the traditional media as irrelevent. I can, for example, accept the narrative of an event as presented by some network newsjock, or I can watch the event itself on the web, courtesy of someone's cellphone. Everytime I feel I detect a mismatch between the two, my already ravaged trust in the traditional media erodes just that much more.

I recall a semester of journalism I had in college. The professor stressed the importance of what he liked to call R.I.O.T.; Research, Impartiality, Objectivity and Thoroughness. He felt a reporter should have the detachment, dispassion and non-biased discipline that we expect of an umpire or referee in a sporting event, or more to the point, of a judge in a court of law. Compromise those qualities, and you simply become a tool. A tool to be used for your own ends, or, as likely, for someone else's. I don't get a sense that too many people working in the media ever attended this particular professor's Journalism class. Perhaps a Theatre or Drama class, instead. As it turns out, an education in those areas may have proved to be more beneficial.

As to the Chilean event, the obvious thing to have done would have been to lower Samuel L. Jackson down to the trapped workers, followed by a sack of lethal pit vipers, and then we could have had Snakes In A Mine. Perhaps in 3D. But, this was another golden opportunity missed.