huh...

September 25, 2005 3:43 PM

Real News. Compelling Stories. Always Positive.
posted by delmoi (28 comments total)

Now we know where the White House gets its news.
posted by clevershark at 3:46 PM on September 25, 2005

"New Orleans residents much better with two hurricanes than if a meteor the size of Kentucky had slammed into town."

I love positive news!
posted by chasing at 3:51 PM on September 25, 2005

("...much better off...")
posted by chasing at 3:52 PM on September 25, 2005

"U.S. relief officials say lessons learned last month in Hurricane Katrina were applied effectively in the weekend Gulf Coast strike of Hurricane Rita."

having the Hurricane downgrade to Category 1 at landfall helped a might, too.

Mother nature wants happier news, dammit!
posted by Busithoth at 3:52 PM on September 25, 2005

Trapeze artists save drowning man.

Thanks, Delmoi. =)
posted by Tlogmer at 3:56 PM on September 25, 2005

For those tired of happy news, there's always Failure Magazine.
posted by iviken at 4:10 PM on September 25, 2005

So I guess they're not going to cover the renegade blow-dart killer dolphin story?
posted by zardoz at 4:19 PM on September 25, 2005

Maybe it was Happy News that published all those "New Orleans dodged a bullet" headlines that the President and Michael Chertoff claimed to have seen all over the place.

Curse you Happy News, curse you!!!
posted by clevershark at 4:23 PM on September 25, 2005

Why should it be polar , either bad or good news ? Just mix the two.
posted by elpapacito at 4:24 PM on September 25, 2005

Balanced News? That is crazy.
posted by TwelveTwo at 4:25 PM on September 25, 2005

On The Media had a segment with the happy-founder not too long ago. (real audio link)

The assumption that news is bad by definition may be worth thinking about.
posted by marlowe at 4:37 PM on September 25, 2005

marlowe writes "The assumption that news is bad by definition may be worth thinking about."

I think the more suspect thing here is the assumption that you can choose to run only so-called "positive" stories and call it "news"...
posted by clevershark at 4:44 PM on September 25, 2005

can kittens smile? just asking....
posted by HuronBob at 4:53 PM on September 25, 2005

Can kittens smile? This and sports, plus traffic on the sevens, coming up next.
posted by boo_radley at 5:02 PM on September 25, 2005

Mr. President ... have we got a source of news for you!
posted by ericb at 5:17 PM on September 25, 2005

I'll take http://www.worldchanging.com/
posted by scarabic at 5:38 PM on September 25, 2005

How depressing.
posted by fungible at 6:05 PM on September 25, 2005

posted by nervousfritz at 6:45 PM on September 25, 2005

posted by caddis at 11:35 PM on September 25, 2005

I just looked over that site nervousfritz- Awesome!

posted by caddis at 11:53 PM on September 25, 2005

I tried setting up a blog a couple years ago with only good news and happy things to counter all the negative and horrible things everywhere else and it was really hard. In order to find the few bits of inspiration, I still had to wade through mountains of crap.


I think the more suspect thing here is the assumption that you can choose to run only so-called "positive" stories and call it "news"...

I don't think a focus on positive events is less valid as news, just not what we're all used to. I think our culture trains us to think that news is a description of things that are bad or scary or damning, but it doesn't have to be that way.

In any event, I think an attempt to pick out the good in situations is a nice idea and probably more productive than playing the worst case scenario game.
posted by Kimberly at 11:58 PM on September 25, 2005

Positive news? Am I really reading this on metafilter?
posted by taursir at 2:51 AM on September 26, 2005

Who says Tupperware's new marketing strategy is good news?

It might not be if you're one of their competitors, one of the little guys fighting tooth and nail to establish itself in the all-important 20 something food storage market. It might be the death knell for such a firm. It might be the worst news anyone working for that firm for the last twenty years, slogging their guts out day and night to make the damn thing work, has ever heard.

Of course, on the other hand, it might be good news for the self-same company because Tupperware's much vaunted new marketing strategy might be so poorly conceived and executed that it leaves the field wide open for the small guys.

In addition, if you're a twenty something, how do you feel about this targeting by Tupperware? Are you happy that they're doing a good job telling you about their great products, or do you feel that the whole thing's a bit sinister? Maybe you don't like being targeted...maybe you don't like to be categorised as "hip and happening"...maybe you simply don't care...
posted by johnny novak at 3:20 AM on September 26, 2005

What strikes me as funny is that while a few of the liberal mefites are pissed off that anyone would dare think about anything non-negative at a time like this, the site is really much more hostile to libertarians and conservatives (unintentionally, I think) with stories about debt relief, people helped by gov't programs, etc.
posted by Tlogmer at 6:43 AM on September 26, 2005

hey, the only reason Wolfowitz wants to support debt relief is so that all his buds' companies can get development contracts in those places.

see! i can turn any news story into something that makes me wanna vomit. i hate being literate.
posted by RedEmma at 8:39 AM on September 26, 2005

That's the spirit!
posted by Kimberly at 9:20 AM on September 26, 2005

The site has inspired me to take my TPS reports and turn them into streamers to aid me in bounding around the officer spreading my happiness.
posted by cleverusername at 11:19 AM on September 26, 2005