Objectivity on the Ropes? April 22, 2006
Posted by theexpress in media, politics.3 comments
A few weeks ago, I was watching CNN Sunday Morning when the topic of objective journalism came up in a round table discussion of topics. I believe that when reporting a story, a journalist should keep his/her opinion to himself, but there are times when we should feel some strong opinions coming from the news desk. Jeff Jarvis of Buzz Machine came on and strongly supported the side of subjective journalism. It was quite funny that he came on the typical, relaxed Sunday morning show with strong opinions while pushing for strong opinions on static-viewed shows.
Those who opposed him, and supported objectivity, had the good point that the reporter is meant to tell the facts of the story and let the people draw their own opinions. The media has enough sway as it is currently, and expressing even more opinions could have a major effect on the country. Since the media is typically seen as liberal (except for a certain channel), it could push the majority of the country to the left side of the aisle after these past few years of conservatism. Objectivity is something that was always looked at for the perfect newsman, but it is being questioned and now viewed as an old quality. With the internet and its eclectic group of billions, one doesnt have to search too far for an opinion, so should the mainstream media show opinion?
Being objective is still something I prize when I try to make a post, but it is not something I break my back to achieve. After all, this is my blog and I belive that the few people that do come on here dont just want to here me reporting the news. They come on different blogs to hear people comment on the news, not just deliver it. It is and will continue to be an issue in the newsroom and all over for a while, but I believe that the future of news lies in hearing everyones opinion, not just the facts.
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With the pressures of school, I had to take a rest from blogging for a few weeks. I hope eveyone forgives me as I re-adjust to my old, blogging habits.
Tracking the Traffic April 2, 2006
Posted by theexpress in internet, web 2.0.add a comment
I was curious to how some of the current Web services are doing in terms of traffic, and I stumbled across Alexaholic, a service built to do just that. It is a site built to track some of the top sites in terms of traffic per day. You can compare up to five of your favorite sites and see who is performing the best. You could also compare similar or competing sites and see who is winning out. However, if you site is not in the top 100,000 in terms of traffic, you wont see you site or blog there.
After having more fun with various other websites, I thought I’d take a look at the matchups that Alexaholic has already. They compared the top trafficed web sites on the Internet: Yahoo!, Google, and MSN. The sites started out vey far apart because it tracks back a few years, but as one can see, the gap has closed and Google is number one.
As you can see, one can get wrapped up in comparing web site traffic. Everyone must go out, compare websites, and find out the most fascinating results. If you’ve ever thought one website outshined another, and it turns out that you were way off, let me know about it.
