MetaFilter posts tagged with news

Like StumbleUpon for magazine articles

allkindsoftime — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 23:00:45 -0800

"Maggwire.com makes discovering magazine content a personalized experience. Utilizing social intelligence, our system recommends magazine articles you will enjoy reading from over 600 magazine titles." More on how it works. They are just out of private beta and apparently will soon be offering a premium version with content from subscriptions sites.

How can one evict the homeless?

stinker — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 14:01:04 -0800

After a spate of recent deaths, efforts to rehabilitate homeless chronic inebriates in Anchorage now include involuntary confinement. Other city-wide efforts include a mayoral decree that established homeless camps should be scattered. In response to increased police activity and the absence of voluntary shelter options for inebriated homeless, John Martin mounted a one-man hunger strike to improve options for homeless in Anchorage (with particular concern for alcoholics), but was removed from his camp when he was found to be a registered sex offender.

Fox "upset-the-White-House-won't-call-it" News

ADoubtfulTrout — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 10:34:57 -0800

Fox News's bent on the news is well known, but recently the White House has begun actively excluding the network, including skipping Fox's Chris Wallace on a recent round of Sunday morning news shows. “We simply decided to stop abiding by the fiction ... that Fox is a traditional news organization.” says White House Depty Communications Director Pfeiffer (as has Press Secretary Gibbs and others). The responses range from concern about an attempt to control the media to a feeling that it's about time. Is it just about Fox's anti-Obama pundits, or is it also about Fox's consistent errors and misinformed viewership? Or is the White House attempting containment so that Fox's ratings-gold style and ideas don't take over the rest of the press?

Chimpanz-eek!

mippy — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 06:57:30 -0800

Take A Break magazine has such a huge readership that it was the publication chosen by Tony Blair to address the women of Britain through during the 2005 election. It covers social issues, health, problems and many other mainstays of the women's weekly market. But what makes it so popular? As Take A Weird Break demonstrates, it brings us the stories other magazines won't print.

Making the Real World Look as Good as Cinema

netbros — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 17:34:23 -0800

DSLR News Shooter is a new photo site featuring the use of the latest HD-dSLRs like the Canon Eos5DmkII, 7D and Nikon D300s for news, documentary and factual shooting. By Guardian news photographer Dan Chung, it's a place for professionals, educators, students and industry figures to discuss the practice and the art of cinematic photography in documenting the real world. For example, the time-lapse and slow-motion film of the recent 60th anniversary parade of the PRC. Other places to look for information and discussion of DSLR video are the Planet5D blog, and filmmakers such as Vincent Laforet and Phillip Bloom. (previous 1, 2)

Eric Schmidt on journalism and the future of newspapers

reenum — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 23:20:05 -0800

Google CEO Eric Schmidt gave a talk at the Newspaper Association of America convention on April 9, 2009 in San Diego. He speaks about how Google and newspapers might co-exist in the future. Here is a transcript of Schmidt's April talk. Schmidt also spoke at length with Danny Sullivan of Search Engine Land recently about Google's responsibility to newspapers.

Google Asks: "What Would Email Look Like, If It Were Invented Today?"

zarq — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 07:45:13 -0800

Google began inviting volunteers to a public preview test of their new Wave web-based collaborative email and document communications platform yesterday, which enables users to "communicate and work together in real time." Initial reviews this past May seemed positive. (Previously) Features include real-time collaboration, (including concurrent editing and control of each "wave" thread,) natural language tools and a variety of APIs which users can use to embed content in other sites. Google Wave Developer Preview at Google I/O 2009 (80min video -- an abridged 10 minute version is here. Wave login page is here. Google Wave Federation Protocol is an open source project for developers. The WSJ reports that invites are now for sale on EBay. Something similar happened when Google launched GMail in 2004.

Poland Approves Mandatory "Chemical Castration" Drug Treatment for Convicted Pedophiles

zarq — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 10:56:48 -0800

In response to an incest case in which a man imprisoned, raped and fathered two children with his own daughter, Poland's Lower House of Parliament has approved an amendment to their penal code which makes chemical castration of pedophiles mandatory in certain cases. The bill still needs final approval from the Upper House of Parliament and President Lech Kaczynski, but passage is considered inevitable. Poland would be the first nation in the EU to make such drug treatment obligatory. Similar, voluntary policies for convicted sex offenders currently exist in Sweden, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Canada, eight US states (pdf) and South Korea. The severity of the impending Polish law has sparked a debate in the EU as well as increased attention on whether the Czech Republic's voluntary chemical castration program is humane and effective.

The Terrorist Within

reenum — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 20:32:10 -0800

The Terrorist Within is an in-depth look at the story of Ahmed Ressam. There's an interesting look at the lives of Ressam and other would-be jihadis and the way the authorities dealt with the information obtained about Ressam's activities.

University of California Budget Walkout

spitefulcrow — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 16:16:55 -0800

Thousands of students, faculty, and staff have walked out today in protest of the University of California's budget cuts. Today marks the first day of classes for eight of the ten UC campuses, all of which have been hit hard by budget cuts as a result of the statewide budget crisis, which has resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars of reductions to UC's budget. The cuts are being implemented via pay cuts and forced furloughs for UC faculty and staff, and drastic fee increases have been proposed. UC employees are worried about what is seen as the potential privatization of the nation's largest public university system. Many see the California budget process, hampered by a two-thirds majority requirement and numerous ballot initiatives blocking tax increases, as the source of the problem. Local coverage per campus: Berkeley Los Angeles Davis Santa Barbara Irvine

We Bite Back

netbros — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:37:52 -0800

Zombie World News

The futurity of science journalism?

albrecht — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 11:04:34 -0800

In response to the declining quantity and quality of science journalism in U.S., a group of 35 universities have created their own online wire service called Futurity.org to distribute research results directly to news sites like Yahoo and Google News. The hope is that this new model of science journalism can avoid the budgetary and "equal time" issues that newspapers face, which have contributed to Americans being less informed about science issues than people in other Western countries.

Somalia's refugee camps

allkindsoftime — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 00:16:07 -0800

Inside Somalia. Mike Thomson of the BBC makes a rare visit to the refugee camps in one of the most dangerous places on earth.

Gene Therapy for Color-blindness

spitefulcrow — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 12:58:23 -0800

"But after five months, something clicked. The monkeys picked out red and green, again and again." UW researchers use gene therapy to give squirrel monkeys trichromatic vision. “Not only might we be able to cure disease, but we might engineer eyes with remarkable capabilities. You can imagine conferring enhanced night vision in normal eyes, or engineering genes that make photopigments with spectral properties for whatever you want your eye to see.”

A front pages post

fatllama — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 01:54:33 -0800

Google Fast Flip: Newspaper Stand 2.0

One giant leap for Chinese Internet Censorship

allkindsoftime — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 05:18:05 -0800

Chinese news site dispense with user anonymity. Includes an updated list of sites China actively blocks, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International (?!? - both links work only outside of China). prev

Sometimes When You Give, You Get Back

saulgoodman — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 07:57:34 -0800

TARP investments yield 15% returns. Almost trom the start, critics characterized the TARP program that first began under the Bush administration and that continued through early this year under President Obama as a taxpayer funded giveaway, while government officials insisted it was a long-term investment program whose initial costs would eventually turn a profit as economic recovery began. Now the NY Times reports that the program has already yielded $4 billion in profits, and a separate report reveals that related Federal Reserve loan programs aimed at economic stabilization have returned $14 billion in profits.

First, do no harm

anigbrowl — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 00:29:49 -0800

Was it triage or murder? A disturbing NY Times story about the choices made by certain medical staff at a New Orleans hospital during Hurricane Katrina. Long and not easy reading.

Long form journalism on the Web is "not working."

thisisdrew — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 12:17:20 -0800

Long form journalism on the Web is "not working." - TIME.com Managing Editor Josh Tyrangiel ..Among the detractors of this statement is David Sleight, Deputy Creative Director of BusinessWeek.com: "Really? It’s 2009 and we’re still having this conversation?" Scattered industry advice on this topic varies from moderate to extreme, and while web analytics paint a convincing picture of web readers, some wonder if long form journalism has EVER worked. Of course there seem to be other factors at play, like methods of presentation and quality of content.

Threat Level Elevated

saulgoodman — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 11:36:19 -0800

US News reports that in a new tell-all book, Tom Ridge admits manipulating terror threat levels for political motives. In the forthcoming book, Ridge reportedly acknowledges for the first time that he was pushed to raise the security alert on the eve of President Bush's re-election, something he "saw as politically motivated and worth resigning over." But as The Atlantic points out, Ridge apparently gave in to the White House demands anyway, resigning only after the election. Huffington Post also provides additional discussion on this developing story.

Do I know you?

Korou — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 11:11:48 -0800

What you don't know about your friends: The problem, [Francis Flynn, a psychology professor at Stanford] says, is that interacting with people and sharing experiences with them doesn’t necessarily translate into knowing lots of things about them. The main hurdle is the way we talk to those we’re close to: our conversations are usually meant not so much to gather information as to establish rapport and to bond - in short, to make friends.

Even sage Mr. Owl can't proffer an estimate

Christ, what an asshole — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 09:50:16 -0800

Dog Assaults News Anchor...with love!

Liberal media? Free press? Journalistic integrity? How quaint.

mek — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 13:40:04 -0800

The NYT reports that GE has brokered a deal between MSNBC and Fox News to "reconcile" Keith Olbermann and Bill O'Reilly, preventing further criticism of each other or GE. The deal went into effect June 1, the very same day Olbermann declared he was "quarantining" Fox, avoiding discussion of the channel in the future. Mr. Olbermann, who is on vacation, said by e-mail message, “I am party to no deal.” Glenn Greenwald breaks down the political consequences of the deal.

Can the New York Times and Washington Post survive on a pay-wall business model if they do it together?

dyslexictraveler — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 22:35:24 -0800

In a new essay entitled Build the Wall, David Simon (who was a Baltimore Sun reporter before he produced The Wire) argues that if the larger newspaper industry is to survive, The New York Times and Washington Post must start charging readers for access to their websites (preferably done as a single action in concert with each other) — John Gruber, Dave Winer, and the folks at Gawker disagree, and Steven Berlin Johnson argues that while the future for newspapers might be quite bleak, the future for journalism and high quality analysis is actually quite bright. Meanwhile, the Times is currently doing market research to see if it's readers would be willing to pay $5 a month for online access, and the Associated Press announced it's intent to build a new news DRM system that will enable users to “consume, mash up and share AP content based on rights”.

Meet the new type

msalt — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 09:38:42 -0800

A new type of newspaper for a new type of world One story from it previously. About us: "The Faster Times is a collective of great journalists who have come together to try something new. As we launch this July, we will have more than a hundred correspondents in over 20 countries. We have someone on the ground in Kenya and someone else reporting from Lebanon. Our arts section will cover not just film and books, but also theater and dance and photography. We will launch with seven writers on books alone. These writers are not “citizen journalists” but among the most accomplished and recognized names in their respective fields."