World in Crisis

It's when the world is in crisis that a capable mainstream media (MSM) is something that we wish we had.

Because it's only when things are going pear shaped at the speed of sound that being properly informed can mean the difference between "losing your shirt" and "making a killing".

Those Australians who get their news and information from our MSM are being poorly served. There are two reasons for that.

Firstly, the vast majority of the people who work in and around the MSM are simply not up to it. Many have been playing at the journalism game all their working lives and they simply don't recognise or understand facts anymore. Or perhaps it's the truth they don't recognise. Often they are driven by *ratings* or *eyeballs* or *revenue* because that is what their employer demands. And the ones who sit in front of a lens looking pretty have little understanding of what it takes to hunt down a story and explain it to you. Their job now is to be *dumb and blonde and pretty*.

And secondly their employers have all adopted a business model that is built around *obfuscation*. This is the game they play when they want to gain your eyeballs but they don't want to invest in the quality journalism or the effort and resources that are needed to seek out the real stories and expose the facts. So they make stuff up and embellish and manufacture things and basically create a parallel universe which they then write about each day. And this charade is often helped out by presenting nubile young flesh on page 3 or at 7:30pm.

And they do it Virginia, because they think that we won't notice. Or care.

Murdoch may be the most odious practitioner but all Australian media are doing the same thing. Even your ABC. Speaking of which what has happened to the place? ABC evening television is now so bad that it is unwatchable. The only things worth a look are 5 year old re-runs from the BBC and even those are becoming less frequent. Looks like ABC News/24 has sucked all the blood from Aunty. Perhaps they should just point a lens at Mark Scott's desk and play that from 7:30pm?

The big crises in Europe and the USA are either going unreported or are being misrepresented with lightweight commentary. So if you want to be informed - then you will need to find another source.