Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - the astroturf factory: on the conservative media apparatus

roachboy · 10-04-2010, 11:47 AM

well, there's the nation. there are some alt-weekly papers in different cities, though less than there once was. the village voice seemed to me to be eviscerated some time ago...alot of others seem more entertainment listings than news outlets at this point--but there are exceptions. the chicago reader sometimes. the boston phoenix sometimes twitches back to life. i don't think there's any national-level even vaguely left news magazines. certainly nothing off the planet hearst. progressive/left programming on radio--it exists but it's negligible.

were the fairness doctrine still in place, it wouldn't matter in the way that it does that there's been massive concentration of media ownership in the states so it's not real surprising that you can have the kind of am radio numbers that are cited above if there's only 5 corporations really running the show.

fm..it's most a matter of syndication. one of the main actions that the reagan people took was to mount what has become a routine conservative smear campaign against npr, claiming that it was hostile to conservatives and using that the threaten to choke off it's funding. whence things like "marketplace."

i dont think people use netradio in the same way they use fm. narrowcasting as over against broadcasting at the level of labelling--but i dont know of anyone who's really looked at how people are using the medium. nor do i know how podcasting fits in, nor how archival functions on conventional broadcast outlet websites fit into broader patterns of usage.

[[btw if anyone's nerdliness runs in the direction of knowing about research into usage patterns of various "new media" please post cites or insights...]]

that leaves the sea of schlock that is 24/7 cable infotainment.

it's hard to know where to start with these, but my favorite quip---and i can't remember who said it (either danny schechter or d.a.pennebaker) is that cable infotainment outlets have traded an illusion of "being-there" for "being informed". but they don't even do that particularly well.

for years it's been the case that left talking heads have been shut out of opinion mangement programs because they in the main haven't worked out how to deal with the constraints of the form--and those constraints (basically talking in little sentences) are severe if you're operating from a viewpoint that's outside the nitwit center-right ideological consensus that is somehow confused for "left" by the far right in the states.

10-04-2010, 11:47 AM	#7 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	well, there's the nation. there are some alt-weekly papers in different cities, though less than there once was. the village voice seemed to me to be eviscerated some time ago...alot of others seem more entertainment listings than news outlets at this point--but there are exceptions. the chicago reader sometimes. the boston phoenix sometimes twitches back to life. i don't think there's any national-level even vaguely left news magazines. certainly nothing off the planet hearst. progressive/left programming on radio--it exists but it's negligible. were the fairness doctrine still in place, it wouldn't matter in the way that it does that there's been massive concentration of media ownership in the states so it's not real surprising that you can have the kind of am radio numbers that are cited above if there's only 5 corporations really running the show. fm..it's most a matter of syndication. one of the main actions that the reagan people took was to mount what has become a routine conservative smear campaign against npr, claiming that it was hostile to conservatives and using that the threaten to choke off it's funding. whence things like "marketplace." i dont think people use netradio in the same way they use fm. narrowcasting as over against broadcasting at the level of labelling--but i dont know of anyone who's really looked at how people are using the medium. nor do i know how podcasting fits in, nor how archival functions on conventional broadcast outlet websites fit into broader patterns of usage. [[btw if anyone's nerdliness runs in the direction of knowing about research into usage patterns of various "new media" please post cites or insights...]] that leaves the sea of schlock that is 24/7 cable infotainment. it's hard to know where to start with these, but my favorite quip---and i can't remember who said it (either danny schechter or d.a.pennebaker) is that cable infotainment outlets have traded an illusion of "being-there" for "being informed". but they don't even do that particularly well. for years it's been the case that left talking heads have been shut out of opinion mangement programs because they in the main haven't worked out how to deal with the constraints of the form--and those constraints (basically talking in little sentences) are severe if you're operating from a viewpoint that's outside the nitwit center-right ideological consensus that is somehow confused for "left" by the far right in the states. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 10-04-2010 at 11:53 AM..