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Five things that are not the news (but we think are)

Sandy Ezekiel, Blue Flags, Independent Dominated Council and McFood are non-news.

Now, obviously I don't completely believe that but I'd like to take a leaf out of the book of certain local political types and justify why I have not had anything to say when the council's one time leader is being charged with corruption, Jimmy (I didn't start that fire) Godden's death, the change in local blue flags and the fact that the unaligned members are ruling the roost... and so on and so forth.

Peter C rightly accused me of running a boring blog. TDC being hijacked by independents, Sandy being charged with bribary, Theatre Royal in trouble (& rescued), blue flags returning to our beaches... & you're reviewing the service at McDonalds.

Peter is right but just admitting that would be boring. This has nothing to do with "other commitments" such as earning a living so let us see if I can do the political shuffle - here's an alternative argument why these things are phooy.

Sandy is not news


To some Sandy Ezekiel has been guilty since 2009 (or before). I reported this for Thanet News Network months ago. December of last year in fact.

The only real news is how much Chris Wells jumped up and down and threw his toys out of the pram. Chris, having less of a grasp of the role of media and news than say he has of the finer points of C++ Compiler Optimisations declared ...it must be asked with malicious intent when I asked facebook readers if they thought the old codger was guilty.

Over 66% of my straw poll pronounced him guilty.

No-one is, therefore, the least bit surprised that the slimy wat-not has been charged with something. To be honest most of us are supprised it did not happen sooner. (Standards board hearings in 2009 aside).

Sandy is not news.

Keep reading to find out what else is not the news

...

» Continue Reading: Five things that are not the news (but we think are)

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Is the last journalist about to switch off the lights?

Three years ago today the demise of the Thanet Gazette was predicted. Is that prediction coming true?

Back in 2008 Justin Williams an Assistant Editor at the Telegraph Media Group wrote of the impending demise of Thanet's print media and the Gazette especially. Are we starting to see this prediction come true?

Although Mr Williams no longer maintains a personal website (although he is active on twitter) his post of the eighth of August 2008 (08/08/08) still rings true for me. It was titled The Thanet Gazette: Will the last journalist to leave please turn out the lights.

In that post Mr Williams expressed his horror over the bungled handling of what should have been their biggest story in years. The story of a certain carrier bag of "lost papers" that suggested that Sandy Ezekiel (Council Leader at the time) and others had lied about expenses relating to the China Gateway planning proposal.

The story was broken on Thanet's blogs a good long time before the newspaper's were willing to print it. When they did they refused to put the story on their own website - it was only available in the print edition.

Journalism, Williams concluded, was alive and well in Thanet on a select few blogs (including Thanet Star). It was from this that a number of thinkers in the world of journalism suggested that blogging was the future of journalism in Thanet and that the Thanet star was a prime example of this.

Then Williams predicted the end of the Gazette and possibly print journalism in Thanet. Most people dismissed him as over-reacting. Now we see that the Thanet Gazette is due to be flogged off to Kent Messenger. Who is the sane one now I wonder?

It seems to me that blogging is more important than ever before but how can it gain the reach of the print papers or indeed should it?


The countervalue.com article and blog are no longer online but the story was located here.
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Is Thanet poorer for lack of news reporting diversity

Nationally there are moves afoot to ensure greater press diversity which is in stark contrast to Thanet Council's moves in completely the other direction.

According to the BBC (see link below) Mr Miliband has told BBC One's Andrew Marr Show that there is a need to look again in the round at the plurality rules to make sure there is proper plurality in the British press.

Of course in Thanet we do not exactly have a lot of papers all owned by one body unless you count KM Media which controls a lot of radio and newspaper output in the area. Certainly KM Media control more than 20% even if you count bloggers in that number. Meanwhile Mr Miliband has said I think that we've got to look at the situation whereby one person can own more than 20% of the newspaper market.

This raises an interesting question - is Thanet suffering for lack of sufficient news diversity?

BBC News - Hacking: Miliband and Clegg seek media ownership limits

Labour leader Ed Miliband and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg call for new media ownership rules to prevent individuals becoming too powerful.



What do you think? Is Thanet poorer for lack of news reporting diversity?
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Even the seagulls don't care

Defiancesee more Very Demotivational
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Using and abusing TDC FLV files

How to make Thanet Council video's usefull.

TDC video's are published in the .flv format that youtube loves so much sadly it's not terrably easy to make use of it off line and with the video only being avilable for a short while you might want a back up for later reference.

FLV format is a video format for Flash so in this TDC atre doing it right for once. However by not letting suers full screent hey are possibly breaching the one or two points of the disability act so watch your backside TDC the fines can get big!

How to grab the FLV file

Assuming I've remembered to include the image the above picture is of the source code for the webpage that has the council hosted videos. If you are not used to web source code then it can be impossible to read so make a note of some text before you press View > Source.

Search for that text (I chose the word "slower" fromt he blurb about slower connection). Look for the FLV file in the code (as highlighted in the image).

Past that into your web browser and your browser should offer to download the file. (Or skip that and use the links from Thanet Online.

Now what?

Well Windows Media player lacks the codecs required to cope witht his format and skipping the technical stuff I'll just tell you that VLC Media Player which is available on Linux and Windows for free will play FLV files and pretty much everything else too.

VLC was made for dealing with streaming media so you should be able to give it that URL you grabbed earlier from the TDC site source code and it will play the file. Now free of the flash player you can resize and see what is going on.

Convert it!

So you don't want to be stuck in FLV format. I can not blame you. One not converting the format for anything other than accessability could breach some bit of copyright law or something so use your head.

Stick Convert FLV into google for lots of options. Here are two.

CNET have a free converter but you need to opt out of an annoying toolbar apaprently. It's windows so I've not tested it.

There is also www.flvto.com which also apparently does the trick too. Again not tested.

So now you don't need to be worried by the "odd" format that TDC seem to want to use (correct as it turns out). You can grab a back up and make use of it for private and accessable viewing.

One last word of warning if, for some reason, you want to stick it up on youtube please remember that TDC will complain.
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It could actually be worse

No matter how bad it get's around here remember that it could be so bad that we need training videos on how to pour a hot drink.



They have one for cold drinks too!
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Media Manipulation - Our Reality Every Day

Today's article is a guest post one of the first of many quality articles written by people other than myself. This article on the subject of media manipulation (a topic I am sure we are all familiar with is by Manny Hawkins

Media manipulation is part of our daily life. Each event is presented by the media in a way that is convenient for each of them. The misconception of the reality created by the media in the audience, can lead to wrong assessment and behavior in humans.

Media not only have a social role, but they actually are tools for controlling public temperature. Media manipulation consists of the way news is presented and depends on how people will understand a process and how they will react to it.

The media have a social role to varying degrees. They can talk about certain issues and keep silent about others. This is exactly what turns them into a new type of power.

In closed and authoritarian countries, media aim at persuading the audience that we should accept unconditionally all political and social actions of the government. So they become part of the state power bodies. While in the open and democratic societies, the media are an intermediary between the authorities and people. They should provide a two-way flow of information from the institutions to society and vice versa. Media competition leads to differentiation of news and information, also called media manipulation

The relationship between media and politics is an important issue. Some authors argue that mass media have a negative role in the political sphere. According to some experts, manipulation occurs when people are forced to accept beliefs and actions. Thus, they become dependent objectively and become objects of manipulation.

There are two types of manipulation. In the first case, certain classes and elites occupy the media and provide information suitable for them. A second option - in the society is formed apolitical mass culture through the mechanisms of market economy. So politicians are free to act without worrying that the society might be dissatisfied with their work. There are five types of media manipulation:

  • Publication and broadcasting of materials criticising existing political and social conditions
  • Isolation of the personal lives of a public framework, leading to underestimation of the problem
  • Giving priority to volume of the entertainment at the expense of political information
  • Unclear boundaries between information and entertainment
  • Depoliticize issues by omitting important details of the information

Many analysts believe that the media are harmful to democracy because they encourage political passivity by offering only sensational and entertainment information.

For more readings about media manipulation, just visit this blog http://youarebeingmanipulated.com

About the Author

Article by Manny Hawkins, he is working as  a part time business analyst.

(ArticlesBase SC #3681330)

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/ - Media Manipulation - Our Reality Every Day

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