The Line Between Reporting the News and Promoting the Product

[Note: If I sound a little peevish here, it's because I'm getting into subjects that tend to set me off. Take that into consideration as you read and just discount the excesses. Thanks.]

I took a picture of this eye-catching LA Times ad waiting at LAX for our flight north. (You can double click it to enlarge.) It outlines some of the key flaws of the iPhone. I don't have an iPhone, but I'm one of those Mac users who seem overly attached to their machines. Truly, I never thought I'd have a relationship with my computer, but if it got run over today, I'd go out and buy a new one tomorrow. Even with all the snow leopard trouble I had.

But not being open source and the way they control iTunes are two of the troubling aspects that remind me that Apple is a big for-profit company. Even if they do make much more user friendly machines, they still care about my money more than they care about me. But I was curious about who was suggesting they'd fix these things. So I snapped this picture as J was saying, "Quick, they're boarding" and forgot about it.

Until yesterday morning when NPR had a segment on the Droid campaign. (You can read and/or listen at the link.)

When regular listeners to NPR, not just right wing talk show bullies, characterize NPR as being liberal, I bristle. On social issues they may lean a bit left, but on the issue of the economy, they are thumpingly pro-business and pro-market. Yes, they talk about environmental challenges and they mention labor now and then, but their news shows are heavy with promotional pieces for movies, books, television shows, new techie gadgets, etc. It seems like half their programing is based on calls they get from agents trying to book their clients. Going out and gathering real news takes more work and money. And it's much harder to do an honest negative review when the person you are reviewing is right there with you.

And they tend not to look too closely behind the curtains of corporate America unless someone else has already pulled them back. They've even added business shows like Market Place that implicitly buy into our national infatuation with making money.

Mind you, I think we need to have programs on business and the market. But not ones that echo and promote them uncritically. Rather shows that analyze not just individual businesses, but the whole economy and our assumptions about it. They've done shows that question why regulators missed the then impending economic crisis. Why did NPR miss it?

Schools too should be teaching about business and how corporations are structured and which companies own which other companies and how they manipulate images and emotions to get people to buy, buy, buy. We need to understand, as a culture the conditions under which the market makes important contributions and the conditions which require government oversight and regulation.

But NPR tends to cheerlead more than they do serious critical challenges of our economic assumptions. Listening to Democracy Now, Media Matters, and such programs gives you a sense of how anemic NPR's business coverage is. As I've said in other posts, Richard Nixon, in today's political climate in the US, would make most current congressional Democrats look downright conservative.

NPR, compared to most other mainstream sources of news today, also looks 'liberal' in comparison. But as the Nixon example points out, the political playing field has shifted waaaay over to the right since the election of Reagan; NPR is part of the shift. When All Things Considered began in the early 70s it was a completely new, somewhat irreverent news show. Now they are too comfortable in their mold and boringly predictable and repetitive, with interchangeable broadcasters (most having one of four or five patterns of speech,) and with only rare surprises.

Clearly the weaning off of government funding which forced NPR to seek corporate funding plays a big role here. They used to only say things like "Sponsored by XYZ Corporation" but now they have mini- commercials that tell you about new products and services they offer. It is no longer commercial-free radio, despite the semantic games they play about those words. I also acknowledge that a government financed network does raise other issues. But commercial radio based on advertising, as NPR has also become, has its own set of problems - not the least of which is how to report the news without jeopardizing your funding.

And this piece on Google, Motorola and Verizon's challenge to the iPhone seemed to gloss over one of the major issues about cell phone service - the cost. NPR's tech guru, Mario Alexander tells us it's all about applications.

Applications on mobile devices is really the new sweet spot, so these companies are really going to start competing on who is having the most relevant applications, the easiest to use applications, and the best applications that meet users needs. And so I don't think it's necessarily just about the device. The device is a big deal, but I think it's more about the applications and what you can do with the device.

What about competing on cost and plan simplicity? OK, I think some of the things they talked about were potentially important. Rene Montagne asks why Google is getting into the phone business and Mario says that's all about search.

Google wants to own the search business and the mobile device is becoming more useable for searching for information.

You're finding that more and more people are going to their mobile devices versus going to their computer to find relevant information that they need while on the go. So they want to dominate the mobile market like they've dominated in the desktop market.

But what's main issue?

So the bottom line is we're going to have more choice. You have the iPhone store, the Microsoft place for applications, RIM has a store, Palm has a store. It's going to be a very interesting fall and certainly an interesting 2010.

Choice of what? Not good, inexpensive plans. Montagne then gets close to the important question:

MONTAGNE: And if - what - you just need a phone?

(Soundbite of laughter)

MONTAGNE: I guess they're out there, right?

(Soundbite of laughter)

MONTAGNE: So...

Mr. ALEXANDER: Just to make calls.

MONTAGNE: Well, you know, any tips on how one decides?

In the end Alexander says:

I think it's going to come down to really three things: simplicity with style, useful features, and then the applications that make a difference in your life.

For me, the glaring issue about cell phones is how people in the US have relatively little choice about cost. Sure, there are lots of choices in plans, but all those plans mean a fairly hefty minimum payment and they are all designed to keep adding minutes to your phone experience (just time the voice mail features and add up the all the extra seconds people take waiting for those recordings and then multiply them times the hundreds of millions of calls made every day. There's a reason why they don't say "Leave message now.") There are precious few choices for just a phone with low cost minutes where I can easily keep the costs pretty low. For example this March 2009 LA Times article on a study of cell phone usage found:

When you do the math, you find the average cellphone customer actually pays more than $3 per minute, according to a report being issued this week by the Utility Consumers' Action Network, a San Diego consumer advocacy group.

In Thailand I could buy a relatively cheap prepaid card and call at rates that were, compared to US rates, very reasonable. (Though from 2008 to 2009 it was clear the Thai phone companies are watching how the US companies have made phones into money conduits from customers to companies.) When I ran out of time, I could 'fill up' at one of the ubiquitous phone shops. But in the US, that kind of plan is so expensive per minute that it 'makes sense' to 'choose' packaged monthly plans that have innumerable hidden traps to siphon your money.

These are hard economic times and they're promoting the $100/month product that everyone needs to have that didn't even exist 20 years ago.

But NPR didn't even mention cost competition. The marketing and cost, I guess, is a given and not a factor in the choice consumers have. Why didn't the whole issue of cost and how phones plans are designed come up in this piece? Because this was pretty much a fluff piece promoting how cool phones are. Phones are one of the biggest rackets to transfer money from consumers to the large corporations going on in the US today.

A Sign of the Difference Between Palin and Parnell

Arriving in Anchorage September 8, 2008.

Arriving in Anchorage October 26, 2009.

The Gate is Done

Here's what the gate at my mom's place looked like a week ago. The 50 year old gate was heavy, caught on the ground, and was very hard to open. And an almost dead tree was pushing the fence into an awkward angle.

Here's Brian finishing the new gate. (For other earlier views see Gate Almost Done)

The gate got done before I left LA. The latch was having trouble closing on its own, so Brian brought in some bike cable and some other small equipment to give it more weight.

Will Kim Ng Be Baseball's First Female General Manager? [Update: Not this time]

I got this from my favorite Dodger fan:

Source: Padres interview Kim Ng for GM job

By BERNIE WILSON, AP Sports Writer Oct 18, 1:53 am EDT


SAN DIEGO (AP)—Kim Ng interviewed for the San Diego Padres’ vacant general manager’s job on Saturday, giving her another chance to become the first female GM in major league history.

Ng, the Los Angeles Dodgers’ assistant general manager, interviewed with Padres CEO and vice chairman Jeff Moorad, according to a person familiar with the process. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the club is still in the process of finding a replacement for Kevin Towers, who was fired two weeks ago.

Both Ng and Moorad declined comment when reached Saturday night.

In her eighth season as vice president and assistant GM with the Dodgers, Ng is one of only two women executives in major league baseball to hold such a position in baseball operations.

A little more information on Kim Ng can be found at Alyssa's blog at MLBblogs (including the photo):

At the luncheon, Kim Ng was honored for her excellence in raising awareness for women in sports. For those of my blog readers that may not be Dodgers fans and don't know, Kim Ng was the youngest person to present a salary arbitration case in the major leagues at age 26. She has three World Series rings from when she was the Yankees assistant GM. She is the first woman to interview for a general manager's position in Major League Baseball history. Recently, she was picked as one of the most influential people in the game by Baseball America. AND Kim Ng is the Vice President and Assistant General Manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

I have always been an admirer of Ms. Ng. I would imagine that she doesn't want to be known as a trailblazer. Like any woman who has achieved absolute greatness, she wants to be recognized for her brain and talent, not her gender. But, my God, what an amazing role model she is for women everywhere.

There's more at Alyssa's blog.

For those, like me, who don't follow baseball that closely, she wouldn't be the first Asian-American general manager.

[Update 11:15am: Anon in a comment below let me know that Jed Hoyer got the job.]

For My Blogger and MSM Friends

I posted (as did other bloggers) Dennis Zaki's video of a local TV reporter asking Lisa Murkowski to say and spell her name and then to state her title. We all expressed dismay at a reporter's lack of preparation when interviewing, in our state, a US Senator from our state.

A number of people with journalism training defended her action as standard operating procedure for testing the mic and getting the data onto the video.

I think we might all do well to take Rogers and Hammerstein's advice to farmers and cowmen:




[We arrived a little early to a balmy 42˚F (5˚C) Anchorage.]

Orchard's Bistro and Angel Street

Last night we were having dinner at the Orchards Bistro in McMinnville, Oregon. We'd stopped at the Gallery Theater a few blocks away before dinner to try to buy tickets for the play "Angel Street" but it was closed. Our terrific waitress asked if we wanted dessert. We had an hour to curtain time. So I said, "Well, if you could call the Gallery Theater and ask them if they can hold two tickets for us, we'd love to have a little dessert." She brought me her cell phone with the number punched in. I hit the green button, but nobody answered. "Hi, this is Steve, we're at the Orchard Bistro and would like to have dessert, can you hold two tickets for us for tonight?" Five minutes later the phone rang. "Hi Steve, this is Paula. I've got two tickets for you, enjoy your dessert."
And Paula was in the ticket booth when we came and had our tickets. She's also the director and showed us around. The play was written in 1938 and was the basis for the movie Gaslight in which a husband is trying to drive his wife crazy.
The set was really well done. The husband and wife were both excellent actors and it was done with English accents, including the two servants, one of whom sounded like she had studied old Upstairs Downstairs episodes and one who had a believable Cockney accent I believe. The actor who played the inspector was, if I read the program right, in his first major role and he showed us why the other two were so good. He accent, elocution, mastery of the script were all of a much lower level. But it didn't ruin the experience. For $13 a person, this is live theater for just a little more than a movie.

I took this about 15 minutes before curtain time so this isn't the whole audience. We had a delightful evening.

We're at Portland International airport right now which still has free wifi and, if all goes well, will sleep in our own bed tonight.

A Low Point in Alaska Journalism

Yesterday there was a news conference with Lisa Murkowski. The brains and brawn behind the Alaska Report attended and made this tape of a local Anchorage TV journalist who asked Lisa Murkowski to "Please state and spell your name." Then, "And for the record, your title."

I understand that many Americans cannot name their representatives or senators, but a journalist?! This is pathetic.

Dennis writes that Sen. Murkowski smiled when she saw him cracking up. Watch and listen for yourself. This is a sad day in Alaska journalism.

LA to Portland

We got to the airport a bit early, so we walked
around enjoying the beautiful weather.

The waterway breaking the beach goes into Marina del Rey.

Half Dome as we fly over Yosemite.

Welcome to Oregon.

Actually, the clouds broke up as we landed in Portland.

Our good friend Marty was there to pick us
up and take us home for the night.

Surfing with Dolphins

We biked down to Venice Beach Thursday to enjoy the beautiful weather before heading back north again. The dolphins were out enjoying the weather too, along with the surfers.

There are no dolphins in this picture, just a guy about to catch a nice wave.

Then we rushed off to visit our relatives and some friends. By the time you read this we should be in or near Portland.

Free Enterprise, Hard Times, and the Rules

Brian the WLA Bikeguy has a tiny bike shop in a garage on a residential street, but right close to a commercial street. Brian's a vet, he's been through hard times, but the VA has helped him through alcohol rehabilitation and he's set up this bike shop. He's also got good carpentry skills and I hired him to replace my mom's side gate. So I've been seeing a lot of him the last five days. He's bright and and knows a lot about a lot of things. He catches all the references I make whether it's art, music, geography, or history and drops his own set of references.

These are hard economic times. In addition we're trying to reduce the amount of energy we use to become less dependent on the middle east and to reduce global climate change. LA has lots of traffic.

So Brian gets used bikes - through thrift shops, Craigslist, and people he knows. He fixes the bikes and sells them for a small profit. This has a number of advantages to the community.

1. He's not homeless and he's feeding himself.
2. He's providing a recycling service - taking old bikes that would otherwise end up as junk and putting them back on the market.
3. He's providing a low cost option in hard economic times. Not everyone can afford $300 - $3,000 bikes. Brian provides low cost bikes which give people a means of transportation. In Southern California, the weather is not an issue, so people could ride more if they could get inexpensive bikes.
4. If enough people ride bikes, there will eventually be a critical mass where they are taken seriously and infrastructure is adjusted to make bike riding safer, more convenient, and a reasonable alternative to the car for many trips. As that happens, even more people will ride bikes.

(I would add here that Brian has made it clear to me that he is very careful about where his bikes come from. Bike theft is, apparently, an issue in the LA area, and he assures me that while he can't be 100% sure, he does his very best to stay away from hot bikes. He keeps receipts for the bikes he buys. Maybe he should take pictures of the bikes and sellers too.)


But Brian's garage which he gets cheap through a relative, isn't zoned for a shop. And essentially, this is, de facto, an underground business that doesn't pay taxes at this point. While other bike shops could complain it's unfair competition, I strongly suspect rather than taking away their customers, he simply offering a supply to people who otherwise wouldn't buy a bike. And as I said before, the more people ride, the more other people will see it's doable and will buy bikes. So the total demand should increase.

Given that the feds thought things were hairy enough to pony up hundreds of millions to prop up banks and car companies during hard times, doesn't it make sense to note the extraordinary times and look the other way for situations like this? Or even have an official waiver until the economy gets on its feet? Or until the Brians of the world have a little more solid ground underfoot? If the big boys can get a break, how about the little guys?

Sometimes some rules which in isolation make sense, don't make sense when taken into context of all the issues facing a community. I suspect that what Brian's doing is in the overall balance of things, a net gain for the community.

I'm not the only one who thinks vets should get a break. From Thursday's LA Times:

For 16 years, Connell sparred with the state Board of Equalization over the interpretation of an 1872 statute exempting street peddlers who are disabled veterans from paying various taxes. This morning, he’ll celebrate his victory by giving away hot dogs and carving up sheet cakes decorated with the Stars and Stripes. Politicians who supported Connell’s cause will speechify on a platform set up at his Surf Dog stand, a cart commanding an ocean view that would be the envy of any five-star hotel.

“This was a real David-and Goliath struggle, and Bill never gave up,” said state Sen. Jeff Denham (R-Atwater), chairman of the Senate Veteran Affairs Committee. “It’s an emotional issue for him and it’s an emotional issue for all veterans.”

Denham sponsored a bill, inspired by Connell, allowing veterans with service-related disabilities not to pay sales taxes when peddling things such as T-shirts, tacos and incense on the street. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed it into law earlier this month.

Brian's situation isn't exactly the same - but he's definitely a pedelar and arguably a peddlar.

One who offers merchandise (as fresh produce) for sale along the street or from door to door (from Merriam Webster online.)

The intent of the law is certainly the same - to help people, particularly disabled vets, to make a living in hard times.

Note: The cops have been by Brian's place a few times, so this post isn't blowing his cover. Instead of being shut down, he needs the police to work with whatever other agencies are out there to help Brian get to where they can accept what he's doing as in compliance.