The Net, Television, Cam-Corders and the Media

[AKDejaVu]

Some casual observations amids the tragedy of yesterday:

The Net and Television:  I could not access any of the news services yesterday.  The net will always be a backup system until bottleneck issues can be adressed by technology.  Television is still the best way to get this type of information across.

Cam-Corders:  Is it possible for an action not to be caught on a cam-corder these days?  I am simply amazed at the fact that someone caught the initial crash on film.

Reporters:  <vent mode>Perhaps the most self absorbed morons on the face of the earth.  We were given the day off yesterday and I had the priviledge of watching/listening to these people act like the biggest idiots on the face of the earth.  They'd spend countless hours trying to get "how many were killed" questions answered when anyone with a lick of common sense knows that the question is un-answerable right now.  They'd ask the N.Y. Mayor questions on US response to the action.  They'd ask the guy that filmed some footage somewhere what he thought our response would be or high high he guessed the death toll to be... someone who's only claim to fame was that he went in after a building colapsed with a video camera.</vent mode>

AKDejaVu

[Maverick]

Deja,

There is no way any event in an area with a large population and popular vacation spot will NOT have lots of video running. Hell the video of the first tower hit was taken by what looked like city crews taping work being done on the street.

I agree with your vent about the STUPID fediddleing questions being asked by the "talking heads". The only consolation is that those questions were in the front of everyones mind who saw the tragedy. Journalists are representative of society, sometimes of the lower common denominator.  

What I would have liked to see were pictures of those saddling up to help out. They were the ones going in harms way to help. They deserved to have their heroism documented. Today's coverage seems to be concentrating on that fortunately.

Mav

[AKDejaVu]

There is no way any event in an area with a large population and popular vacation spot will NOT have lots of video running. Hell the video of the first tower hit was taken by what looked like city crews taping work being done on the street.

I know.. it still makes it no less amazing.  I saw the video from the initial crash including the video that was being filmed just prior to it.  Someone that was preparing for a task instinctively trained his camera on a low flying jet.  I am still amazed by this simple act.  Not in a bad way... just in a "I can't believe we have all this footage" sort of way.

AKDejaVu

[Dowding]

A reporter and camera crew interviews a women, who is covered in dust and looks very shocked.

Reporter: Did you see anyone bleeding?

Women: You want to see blood? Look here.

Women lifts skirt slightly to reveal a badly bleeding leg.

I really couldn't believe the line of questioning.

[Dinger]

Hehe Journalists are like High School teachers in this country: most are not trained to be expert in anything but communicating something.  What it is they're supposed to communicate, they don't really need to know themselves.  The more people they succeed in communicating _something_ too, the more successful they are considered.
(my apologies to HS teachers reading this thread.  There are some good ones; just not many of the ones who ever taught me, and those were ill considered by their peers.)

So a moron who can show a bloody leg to 200 million people is more successful than someone with brains whom half the audience doesn't have the intelligence or education to understand.