American Morning
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July 23rd, 2010
12:00 PM ET
Is Internet culture ruining society?
(CNN) – "It could happen to anyone." That's the message from Shirley Sherrod after losing her job and having her life turned upside when an out-of-context video posted online branded her as a racist. Now that the apologies and reversals are rolling in, what does Sherrod's story say about the state of our hyper-speed Internet society? Andrew Keen is the author of "The Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet is Killing our Culture. He joined us on Friday's American Morning to talk about how the Internet can ruin lives.
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The internet doesn't need a gatekeeper. Responsible media needs to practice common sense and should investigate controversial issues before publishing them. In the Shirley Sherrod case the NAACP the USDA and some at Fox News responded in a knee jerk fashion. I'd like to know, as the rest of the media would, who, if anybody, supplied the video clip to Breitbart? I feel that's the story going forward.
The problem is not "Internet Culture" or irresponsible bloggers. The problem is with real journalists. What a blog post says is not newsworthy, what a public official says is newsworthy.
As little as 15 years ago, reporters were expected to actually go out and investigate – Now many turn to Google or Bing.
Mainstream media outlets desperately work to report on the news early – preferably first. In doing so, many ran with the blog posting only to have to back-track later.
I'd rather hear the real news tomorrow than an instant repeat of what some blogger posted today. I get so frustrated with news reporters on TV for a breaking story literally making up stuff as they go along to fill the gaps between new information.
The Internet can ruin lives? That's interesting. How man millions of lives have already been ruined by the false information of man-caused global warming, which the mainstream media continues to promote How many people on the Gulf Coast have been hurt economically and otherwise by an oil spill that we still do not know how big it is because the media is banned from filming it and talking to people and yet the media never says word one about freedom of speech being ignored. Everyday I have only more reasons to get my news and information from the Internet and not the mainstream media: I get relevant information, and much more truth. The mainstream media is an old, isolated, one-of-a-kind dinosaur that just hasn't died yet.
Mr. Moderator,
Was that last one better? Or will you keep dropping my comments down the memory hole?
It's hard to know what speech, if any on this topic, is acceptable here, online, at CNN.Com.
John makes salient points regarding the differential utility and credibility of anonymity in a free society, as ours seems to be, versus societies who do not respect free speech, who would imprison and torture its citizenry (especially if the disaffected were known entities) for speaking publically online. This is the kind of intelligent and nuanced understanding that rises like cream to the top of ones profession in the mainstream media versus the sort of vulgar, club-like opinions of bloggers used, more often than not, to beat partisan enemies over the head.
Mr. Roberts,
Here's a link to a blogger who is critical of your story.
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/07/24/anonymity/index.html
I think Mr. Greenwald envies your ability, as a credible mainstream media provider, to reach and influence a broad audience. Also, he's not even blogging in this country! He has a foreign (Brazilian) perspective, a laughably biased blog on a left-wing internet website, and the audacity to critique CNN. Take five minutes to read Salon and see what kind of trash they publish online about Girls Gone Wild and so forth. What kind of credibility base does Greenwald & Salon have? You shouldn't let his comments stand.
–Jebbie
John Roberts calls the Internet a big bathroom wall. Well, John, then cable "news" is the swirling bowl. How long did Lou Dobbs sit on CNN, booking his guests from the Conservative Citizens Council (a white supremacists hate group) and spreading false rumors about immigrants? No one at CNN fact checked him. Amy Goodman did that.
What about those CNN shows that get their content directly from Twitter? Not much fact checking there, either.
And what about Anderson Cooper saying over and over again that "both sides do it" when there is no Breitbart of the left? Oh - and ANDREW BREITBART is not anonymous, a fact that didn't even register with you folks.
The idea that you or anyone in the Info-tainment industry should fact check people who write n the net is hilarious.
An alternative viewpoint may be found here.
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/07/24/anonymity/index.html
While I do agree that the internet does give people the power to ruin someone's life, I feel that this argument is a little exaggerated, and does have an agenda of its own. The clip is set out to make it seem like news networks (CNN, Fox, MSNBC) are the only source for reputable information on the internet. I hate to say it, but the news is just as biased as all other sources of news we use.
The greatest worry is the exchange of information, coming entirely from the utterly depraved and paranoid US secret security agency's seen as America's Shadow Government and known under the guise of the hidden 4th. branch of Government, 'Dept. of Homeland Security' (DHS).
DHS employs more computer hackers than the rest of the entire world, the chances the hacker in your home or business computer is in fact working from some US governmental agency is very high, much higher than some kid in Germany, Moscow or the Chinese government.
Without a doubt, East Germany and the utterly depraved East Berlin secret security agency's also saw information exchanges among it's citizens as a bad thing. And their paranoia peaked just shortly before their fall along with the fall of the Berlin Wall.
So does this also mean John Roberts won't be quoting any more anonymous sources in his "gatekeeper" reporting? Or is some anonymity good and some bad, depending on John Robert's mood?
This guy keeps saying over and over that "someone posted a lie that was the opposite of the truth." I don't think that's accurate. "This guy", breitbart, DID publish enough of the video to see that this was indeed, a moment early in this woman's history, that she later recanted. I knew that from what Breitbart posted. I don't think Breitbart took it out of context.
BUT, then a lot of people didn't bother to watch all of what was posted and overreacted, including the NAACP who had full access to the complete, unedited video. even more than Breitbart posted.
It sounds like they're trying to say, "Aw, this is a big fake like Acorn" but acorn wasn't a fake, there were 30 convictions of ACORN employees. That's very much news, and very much real, even if left-leaning news organizations choose to filter such information out because they don't want you to have that information, or you might not vote the way they'd like, frankly.
Talk about hypocrisy – what about the lies that were spread about the Tea Party (called Tea Baggers by CNN's own Anderson Cooper), Rush Limbaugh (lied about repeatedly on CNN) and many other conservatives who have been lied about on CNN. Where was your outrage about those, Mr. Roberts? You are not a journalist, but a political hack.
It's kind of funny listening to you report about the internet. Sense someone can do that much damage just by starting a rumor in a community without using the internet. By the way your talking in your report. We are not smart enough to tell if someone is telling a lie. It just suprises me that the masters of twisting information and the context of something. Are attacking the amuetures. It does not matter which news channel you watch they all take things out of context and twist then news to fit it the way they want.
So why not try this frist clean up yalls act and do true honest reporting. Then you can talk about use everyday people that do what you do. I would prefer to use the whole context of john 8; 1, 11 but verse seven says it pretty good by its self. So I will just use it. But when they continued asking him, he straightened up and said to them, "Let the one among you who is with out sin be the first to throw a stone at her". I will make it simple you are the pharisees in this parable.
So before you throw stones at the bloggers. you need to start to report the right way by not taking things out of context yourselves first. Also to report the honest truth not what you feel.
This is a message that has been a while coming. The ease with which things can be falsified and then the fraud replicated multiple times over is a growing problem. Could you post a transcript of this interview somewhere? Many people who mistrust links or who have low performing computers will not get this very insightful thinking and it is very worthwhile in this age of dissent.
How can reporting what a person said "IN THEIR OWN WORDS" be construed as a lie or slander? If it is deemed out of context, who gets to decide what is valid context? If its the person, they could redefine "the context" as they see fit to end negative public scrutiny. If its the mainstream media i.e you, it can redefine the context through the reporters latent bias and/or a media agenda. No, your arguments for media control are invalid and thoroughly statist in character (because you are asking for a media suitability decision from government when one is really not warranted). Your arguments also reveal a latent disregard for free speech & the US constitution and a call for even more government interference (statism). It has been up ontil now,the individual processing the information to make the context decision, not you. So I believe both of you are totally wrong on this.
I'd love to be the gatekeeper for CNN. There's a lot of garbage leaking out of this outlet. But I guess the people at CNN that want to censor are talking about censoring only conservative outlets.
an internet gatekeeper??? Brilliant idea .... let's just burn the Constitution and the First Amendment while we're at it!
This morning's session conducted by John Roberts was excellent and is indeed indicative of what is happening within our society.
Any published news item found today on the internet leaves an area available for comment. Take the time to read these commentaries and you will see what is the gradual deterioration of people's feelings for others and caring about others. Just this week I read an article about several people killed in a bus accident and comments by readers were nothing short of "sick". Don't know how to stop this trend but society as a whole needs to address the issues.
indeed it has.... but good luck putting that geni back in the bottle. can't wait for the solar flares to hit , so we sane folks can watch all the "twittin" "textin" cell phone junkies start to jones out.