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You mean, besides how this one is targeted at journalists and that one is targeted at the tech industry? The difference, besides everything else is expectation
by yifanl 1y ago
You mean, besides how this one is targeted at journalists and that one is targeted at the tech industry?
The difference, besides everything else is expectations: He expects the tech industry to overhype things because they're salespeople, he expects journalists to call them out when they're overhyping things.
- tptacek 1y agoCan you say more? I'm asking seriously; I'd like to have a better understand of "how to read" Zitron, because these pieces are long and emotive. Are they basically just responses to whatever the latest news is, the way David Gerard writes about blockchain stuff? Because I did see the utility in that kind of writing.
- yifanl 1y agoAre you asking because of the perceived poor reception to your recent blogpost? Because I'd say a lot of your questions are answered directly in this latest piece.
- tptacek 1y agoI've never written anything that got a better reception than that blog post, much to my chagrin, so I don't know where you're coming from with that. But put it aside: what parts of this Zitron piece are responsive to what I wrote? That would be super helpful to understand.
- altairprime 1y agoThe message, if stripped of emotion and audience, may not be wholly unique. The target audience of the two pieces is certainly different, and the emotional tone as well. Zitron doesn’t seem to direct his writing towards any single ‘audience’ week-to-week, as some others do; but each post does always appear to have a target in particular. So the way I would read Zitron, then, is to ask: ‘what is he trying to persuade who of, and how does his emotional intensity uniquely promote that outcome?’ (relative to less-intense others).
- rwmj 1y agoThe article is a long complaint about "churnalism". It's not exactly a new complaint. Nick Davies wrote a whole book about it in 2008 [1]. But it's getting worse and worse so it's worth reminding people of it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_Earth_News_(book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_Earth_News_(book)
- tptacek 1y agoThanks, that makes much more sense than my original read of the article.