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Lol. There's no such thing as "neutrally reporting accurate facts and news." If I was going to report on your comment, should I talk about how many sentences y

Lol. There's no such thing as "neutrally reporting accurate facts and news." If I was going to report on your comment, should I talk about how many sentences you wrote? How many uppercase letters you used. When you posted it? The italics? The fact that you posted on a website run by investors? The world is a sea of facts. Choosing which ones to talk about is inherently subjective. The "view from nowhere" you espouse does not exist. That view, while purporting to be apolitical is deeply political, meaning "journalists" should write from a place that does not question any larger contexts. Understanding tech and holding tech to account/having a point of view are not mutually exclusive. For instance, see Jon Stokes's takes on 3-D printed guns.

rsingel 8y ago
Lol on being downvoted. I was a writer and editor for Wired for a decade, including writing the first story ever about YC, covering security and breaking news on the NSA and AT&T's spying of Americans. But sure, what journalism needs is "neutral reporting of facts." F*ckin' engineers should spend less time debating React vs. Vue.js and try the humanities some time.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- flexball 8y ago
  F'ing engineers can read just fine, the humanities are not the bastion of enlightenment and hard work that its graduates think it is. That was already clear to me in college when their weekly course and work load was approximately half of ours. I have since then read a book or two, yes. A better question is: how many journalists know how to code? Because that's the skill necessary to make sense of the world today and the massive volume of data it throws your way. I don't expect completely neutral reporting, but I do expect some basic data literacy rather than anecdotes spun into narrative and repeated breathlessly from outlet to outlet. Plus, if we are awash in manipulation, I'd prefer to find that out from an independent source rather than a three letter acronym with a long rep sheet of human rights abuses. The GDPR cookie debacle revealed this better than anything: what really drives the news industry now is tech, they're beholden to it. Plus, it's all third party. They no longer own their beat, the beat owns them. All the griping about FB and Twitter is exceedingly amusing to me for this reason. It's the news industry that capitulated, but is now chiding the rest of us for not having stood up, using the giants as a scape goat. We need journalism more than ever, but journalism needs to get its shit together first.
- rossdavidh 8y ago
  Speaking as someone with an engineering degree, I am all for having engineers know something of the humanities. I'm not sure that your comment is demonstrating the kind of communication skill that is often improved by some time studying the humanities. I have gotten comments downvoted as well (on this very thread), and I can't say that I see a whole lot of correlation between which of my comments get downvoted and which were ill thought out. But, if a typical humanities prof were grading a reply that was written in the style of yours, I'm not sure they would think, "aha, this shows the benefit of a humanities education". But, it's annoying to get downvoted, and not always deserved. It's just not usually helpful, in my experience, to respond to it directly. You said something, others didn't like it. Either: 1) you said something true, but painful, in which case you don't need to repeat it, and responding just distracts from your original point, or 2) you said something that wasn't on target, in which case again complaining about the downvotes isn't constructive.
- debatem1 8y ago
  I see your time studying the humanities has given you a fine grasp of the art of persuasive writing. Why you wanted to pursuade people to downvote you is a mystery to me, but perhaps a more careful study of Vue.js will yield the understanding I so long for...
repolfx 8y ago
This attitude is exactly why people don't trust journalists (and that's a fact, check opinion polls). You flatly reject even the very idea that journalism can improve or become better. Yes, selection of facts is a place where bias can enter. But parking that issue for a moment, modern journalism is awash with false claims, retracted stories and repetition of clearly wrong statements made in interviews or by sources. In many cases, basic knowledge of statistics or even just using common sense would be sufficient to challenge the source, check the claim and drop it - but it doesn't happen. There's such a vast gulf between the rigour you find every day in engineering and the mental sloppiness you find in journalism that I'm not even sure journalism can be reformed: your own post here indicates you never even tried.

rsingel 8y ago

Lol on being downvoted. I was a writer and editor for Wired for a decade, including writing the first story ever about YC, covering security and breaking news on the NSA and AT&T's spying of Americans. But sure, what journalism needs is "neutral reporting of facts." F*ckin' engineers should spend less time debating React vs. Vue.js and try the humanities some time.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
flexball 8y ago
F'ing engineers can read just fine, the humanities are not the bastion of enlightenment and hard work that its graduates think it is. That was already clear to me in college when their weekly course and work load was approximately half of ours. I have since then read a book or two, yes. A better question is: how many journalists know how to code? Because that's the skill necessary to make sense of the world today and the massive volume of data it throws your way. I don't expect completely neutral reporting, but I do expect some basic data literacy rather than anecdotes spun into narrative and repeated breathlessly from outlet to outlet. Plus, if we are awash in manipulation, I'd prefer to find that out from an independent source rather than a three letter acronym with a long rep sheet of human rights abuses. The GDPR cookie debacle revealed this better than anything: what really drives the news industry now is tech, they're beholden to it. Plus, it's all third party. They no longer own their beat, the beat owns them. All the griping about FB and Twitter is exceedingly amusing to me for this reason. It's the news industry that capitulated, but is now chiding the rest of us for not having stood up, using the giants as a scape goat. We need journalism more than ever, but journalism needs to get its shit together first.
rossdavidh 8y ago
Speaking as someone with an engineering degree, I am all for having engineers know something of the humanities. I'm not sure that your comment is demonstrating the kind of communication skill that is often improved by some time studying the humanities. I have gotten comments downvoted as well (on this very thread), and I can't say that I see a whole lot of correlation between which of my comments get downvoted and which were ill thought out. But, if a typical humanities prof were grading a reply that was written in the style of yours, I'm not sure they would think, "aha, this shows the benefit of a humanities education". But, it's annoying to get downvoted, and not always deserved. It's just not usually helpful, in my experience, to respond to it directly. You said something, others didn't like it. Either: 1) you said something true, but painful, in which case you don't need to repeat it, and responding just distracts from your original point, or 2) you said something that wasn't on target, in which case again complaining about the downvotes isn't constructive.
debatem1 8y ago
I see your time studying the humanities has given you a fine grasp of the art of persuasive writing. Why you wanted to pursuade people to downvote you is a mystery to me, but perhaps a more careful study of Vue.js will yield the understanding I so long for...

repolfx 8y ago

This attitude is exactly why people don't trust journalists (and that's a fact, check opinion polls). You flatly reject even the very idea that journalism can improve or become better. Yes, selection of facts is a place where bias can enter. But parking that issue for a moment, modern journalism is awash with false claims, retracted stories and repetition of clearly wrong statements made in interviews or by sources. In many cases, basic knowledge of statistics or even just using common sense would be sufficient to challenge the source, check the claim and drop it - but it doesn't happen. There's such a vast gulf between the rigour you find every day in engineering and the mental sloppiness you find in journalism that I'm not even sure journalism can be reformed: your own post here indicates you never even tried.