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Flat Earth News: An Award-Winning Reporter Exposes Falsehood, Distortion and Propaganda in the Global Media
WARNING!
Are newspapers seriously damaging your insight?
Does what you read every day contain lies, PR, propaganda and distortion?
Find out who's controlling your news in this shocking expose from the ultimate insider.
'Meticulous, fair-minded and UTTERLY GRIPPING'
Sam Leith, The Daily Telegraph
'If you read newspapers, YOU MUST READ THIS BOOK'
John Humphrys
'A MUST-READ for anyone worried by journalism – which, on this analysis, should be everyone'
Ian Hislop
'POWERFUL AND TIMELY... his analysis is fair, meticulously researched and fascinating'
The Observer
Are newspapers seriously damaging your insight?
Does what you read every day contain lies, PR, propaganda and distortion?
Find out who's controlling your news in this shocking expose from the ultimate insider.
'Meticulous, fair-minded and UTTERLY GRIPPING'
Sam Leith, The Daily Telegraph
'If you read newspapers, YOU MUST READ THIS BOOK'
John Humphrys
'A MUST-READ for anyone worried by journalism – which, on this analysis, should be everyone'
Ian Hislop
'POWERFUL AND TIMELY... his analysis is fair, meticulously researched and fascinating'
The Observer
420 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2008
164 people are currently reading
3068 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 175 reviews
September 7, 2022
A real eye opener for all those that are active in the media sector, and beyond. Davies is (was?) a journalist of the British leftist newspaper The Guardian, and a keen observer of the troubling evolution of British journalism, but also of journalism in general, in the West. Shocking is his description of the bad practices in the press: the consciously applied dirty tricks and the dubious links between press and politics, but that was already largely known. New in this book is the mechanism of 'churnalism': the continuous, excessive and almost automatic production of news, like it's an ordinary product. Of course, the result of this is bad journalism, journalism without check or without critical distance. Davies offers a great, well reasoned analysis, although sometimes a bit over the edge (Understandable when you see the deplorable state of British journalism). And occasionally he smuggles in points of view that have nothing to do with media in themselves, as for instance in his plea for the legalization of heroin.
October 18, 2011
Well, this is cheerful stuff. Nick Davies, respected journalist, gives the lie to the notion that the biggest threat to journalism is the interference of owners or the threats of advertisers. His thesis is that the drive for profits has driven journalism to the brink of destruction. Staff cuts and spending cuts have resulted in fewer journalists working with fewer resources on more stories. Unfortunately those stories are provided by the booming new sector that is the Public Relations industry, which is not above manufacturing news and events and whipping up fear and disinformation. Meanwhile, the network of reporters who used to cover all sorts of stories from all over the world has shriveled to nothing. Which leaves us with the interesting question of how true the picture of the world presented to us daily in the media actually is.
Davies traces the decline of old-fashioned journalistic practices and values and the rise of the new 'churnalism,' which reproduces and rewrites PR copy without much in the way of checking or exploring or context. Not everything you read on your newspapers or see on your television is churnalism. But a lot of it is. He also touches on the campaign of lies, distortions and misinformation that was part of the build-up to the invasion of Iraq, shocking in its scope and in the utter capitulation of the media in the face of the official line.
Just when you thought you were outraged out, Davies saves the most appalling for last: The Daily Mail and the Press Complaints Commission. One routinely lies and distorts and attacks innocent targets with unmitigated ferocity. The other turns down more than 90% of the complaints it receives without even considering their content.
It ends on a note of pessimism. The only real solution, unstated by Davies, is for a widespread return to the proper funding of proper journalism. The trend at the moment, however, is for less reporters, more stories, higher profits, and so long as that continues truth will suffer and so will we.
Davies traces the decline of old-fashioned journalistic practices and values and the rise of the new 'churnalism,' which reproduces and rewrites PR copy without much in the way of checking or exploring or context. Not everything you read on your newspapers or see on your television is churnalism. But a lot of it is. He also touches on the campaign of lies, distortions and misinformation that was part of the build-up to the invasion of Iraq, shocking in its scope and in the utter capitulation of the media in the face of the official line.
Just when you thought you were outraged out, Davies saves the most appalling for last: The Daily Mail and the Press Complaints Commission. One routinely lies and distorts and attacks innocent targets with unmitigated ferocity. The other turns down more than 90% of the complaints it receives without even considering their content.
It ends on a note of pessimism. The only real solution, unstated by Davies, is for a widespread return to the proper funding of proper journalism. The trend at the moment, however, is for less reporters, more stories, higher profits, and so long as that continues truth will suffer and so will we.
December 30, 2014
"Media outlets pick easy stories with safe facts and safe ideas, clustering around official sources for protection, reducing everything they touch to simplicity without understanding, recycling consensus facts and ideas regardless of their validity because that is what the punters expect, joining any passing moral panic, obsessively covering the same stories as their competitors. Arbitrary, unreliable and conservative . . . this flow of falsehood and distortion through the news factory is clearly being manipulated, by the overt world of PR and the covert world of intelligence and strategic communications . . . the boundaries of acceptability have slowly slipped backward . . . what was scandalous is now merely normal. Somewhere out there, the truth is dying." (pp. 255-256)
A highly recommended read, and a good companion to Knightfall: Knight Ridder and How the Erosion of Newspaper Journalism Is Putting Democracy at Risk and Will the Last Reporter Please Turn out the Lights: The Collapse of Journalism and What Can Be Done To Fix It.
A highly recommended read, and a good companion to Knightfall: Knight Ridder and How the Erosion of Newspaper Journalism Is Putting Democracy at Risk and Will the Last Reporter Please Turn out the Lights: The Collapse of Journalism and What Can Be Done To Fix It.
October 8, 2009
As a news junkie who loathes Metro and the redtops, this was right up my street, and depressingly re-inforced my suspciions/cynicisms and added a whole heap more.
John Humphries says "If you watch the news you should read this book" but don't let him put you off. This is an insider's expose of how and why journalism has descended into "churnalism" - regurgitating agency news feeds, press releases and celebrity gossip as "news", squeezing more column inches from tired journalists, and more pounds from a shrinking market, whilst genuinely big stories go ignored or unchallenged.
Nick Davies tells all(this is the guy who recently re-broke the News of the World hacking scandal) and whilst it must have made him feel good to get it off his chest, it made me angry and depressed to hear it like it is. And made me even more resolute not to pick up Metro again.
John Humphries says "If you watch the news you should read this book" but don't let him put you off. This is an insider's expose of how and why journalism has descended into "churnalism" - regurgitating agency news feeds, press releases and celebrity gossip as "news", squeezing more column inches from tired journalists, and more pounds from a shrinking market, whilst genuinely big stories go ignored or unchallenged.
Nick Davies tells all(this is the guy who recently re-broke the News of the World hacking scandal) and whilst it must have made him feel good to get it off his chest, it made me angry and depressed to hear it like it is. And made me even more resolute not to pick up Metro again.
January 11, 2015
Interesting, depressing, and a little repetitive. Worth a read, but the writing style is dull and becomes a chore after the first few chapters.
November 7, 2016
I studied as a journalist; worked as one for a while, and can sadly vouch for Mr Davies´ grim take on the world of the media. Things have probably worsened since this book was written - the internet has decimated the industry and more than ever it´s a wing of the PR and Marketing world.
Two bugbears for me, which Davies addresses, among others: one, the under-representation of real news, that is, local news which might make a difference to local communities. The national papers use a common agenda, narrow and limiting, which they all doggedly follow. Some might have a "northern correspondent" for example, or "Welsh correspondent", but ask yourself what that really means: Where that Welsh correspondent works, where his or her office is - and, ask yourself, how does one person cover the news of three million people?
Second: the sheer laziness of the media and the death of journalism. The flooding of UK newspapers with American news - not just politics, but showbusiness, tittle tattle and even weather stories. Why? Because it´s cheap. The American media churns out so much content that it´s cheaper for UK publications (many part of US media groups anyway) to simply pass on this dross to a country which is four thousand miles away. As someone who lives in Europe, this is awful stuff: France and Spain might as well be on another planet for all the coverage they get.
Ai ai ai...
Two bugbears for me, which Davies addresses, among others: one, the under-representation of real news, that is, local news which might make a difference to local communities. The national papers use a common agenda, narrow and limiting, which they all doggedly follow. Some might have a "northern correspondent" for example, or "Welsh correspondent", but ask yourself what that really means: Where that Welsh correspondent works, where his or her office is - and, ask yourself, how does one person cover the news of three million people?
Second: the sheer laziness of the media and the death of journalism. The flooding of UK newspapers with American news - not just politics, but showbusiness, tittle tattle and even weather stories. Why? Because it´s cheap. The American media churns out so much content that it´s cheaper for UK publications (many part of US media groups anyway) to simply pass on this dross to a country which is four thousand miles away. As someone who lives in Europe, this is awful stuff: France and Spain might as well be on another planet for all the coverage they get.
Ai ai ai...
February 12, 2018
Propaganda is as old as the flood... I'm not a particular fan of big media but Nick is. Especially if its of the type of which he approves. We're awash with news today, but the reader has to employ his own common sense and fact check himself if he really wants to ensure the veracity of any story. In fact he should have always done that rather than leaving it anonymous editors to do it for him.
In a lot of cases we only need the story. We shouldn't need a professional to interpret it for us. That is just the innate laziness of the consumer. . The solution which Nick suggests is a return to the good old days..( Bah...technology)..
The actual solution is we all have to became journalists of sorts..if we wish..
In a lot of cases we only need the story. We shouldn't need a professional to interpret it for us. That is just the innate laziness of the consumer. . The solution which Nick suggests is a return to the good old days..( Bah...technology)..
The actual solution is we all have to became journalists of sorts..if we wish..
May 26, 2019
An excellent discourse on why you shouldn't believe everything you read in the newspaper, hear on the radio or see on TV. Davies digs into the pitfalls of for-profit (above every other consideration) journalism, corruption, biased reporting, the problems arising from valueing speed over accuracy, and much more.
August 28, 2019
Hopelessly late in reading this, but Nick Davies´ Flat Earth News is probably more true now than it was when published first in 2008, before the great culmination of scandals that brought down the Sun and threatened the Murdoch media empire.
Davies argues that by the establishment of media empires in the 1980 and 1990s there started a trend towards rationalisation of news production. Budgets were lowered, fewer journalists were required to produce more news. This has led to a decline in the quality of journalism as there is not enough time to check facts and dig beyond what is delivered to them.
News is now delivered by press agencies with similarly reduced staff, but increasingly directly by PR organisations from the government, interest organisations, companies and intelligence agencies. Davies notes that the time is fast approaching where PR personnel outnumbers the journalists.
PR people have become much better at offering journalists ready-made news items. Political press officers provide Sound bites, arrange exclusive interviews and plant scoops. Interest groups selectively quote-mine scientific reports to support their arguments. Businesses subsidise related research that draws headlines, so that their message gets across. This is just what allows journalist, short of time, to meet their expected levels of productivity.
The lack of time available has led to several sub-trends, picking stories which:
Are easy to process. So only give the facts, not the context
Carry low risk. They come from 'trusted' sources like the government, don't offend those powerful/wealthy enough to sue you or block your access to new stories, present both sides of the story as is they are equal. It also means that news media tend to hunt in packs, because a story published elsewhere is a safe source. Esepecially when there's a moral panic.
Are guaranteed to sell. So no news from far off places that nobody cares about, but endless celebrity gossip. And nothing that challenges the preconceptions of your audience.
The most interesting development is the support of astro-turf organisations, that is (fake) grassroots organisations supported by companies or intelligence agencies. Look for instance at the many patients representation groups supported by the pharmaceutical industry and non-representative expatriate organisations like the Iraqi National Council. Or the dubious think tanks and research establishments used by the oil industry to sow doubt about climate change.
Most worrying is that the intelligence agencies have found their way to the newsrooms as well. It is not entirely new, as Cold War agencies also had their journalistic ´assets´, conduits through which they could convey their message. Or undermine the credibility of someone who lifted the lid on them. But since the 1990s they have used their information monopoly to steer reporters in their desired directions. Their power is as big as those of the independent press agencies. The War in Iraq being a case in point.
Davies´ chapter on The Observer shows how the CIA led reporters astray by misinforming them (through the Iraqi National Council) while the political editor was bagged by Downing Street. But the chapters on other newspapers are as chilling and depressing, especially the collusion with private investigators and policemen that bug phones, gather private information from protected databases and harrass victims to get their side of the story even when all they want is to be left alone.
Tragically, it seems that this book has not been able to change much, although I can see an undercurrent of journalists trying to wrest away from Big Media. And judging by the results of the Leveson Inquiry and the opposition from the media to its conclusions, I have no confidence that it will prove more than a dint in the trend, let alone a break.
It would be nice to say that this trend is only confined to the UK or the anglo-saxon media, but there's enough signs that it also applies to the Netherlands. Joris Luyendijk, writing about the same time, showed the weakness of foreign correspondents in the Middle East. He argued that in countries with hardly any room for independent public opinion, lacking social scientific research or even opinion polls, if not controlled by security services, how could the foreign correspondent really know what people felt?
And when you cover such a large and diverse region, you end up doing a standup from your hotel roof 30 minutes after you'd flown in based on nothing more than what you got from the newsroom and a quick chat with your taxi driver on the way in from the airport. But his criticism of the work of foreign correspondents was met as much by indignant replies from his colleagues as by others commending him for his bravery to be open about the limitations of his job.
Davies argues that by the establishment of media empires in the 1980 and 1990s there started a trend towards rationalisation of news production. Budgets were lowered, fewer journalists were required to produce more news. This has led to a decline in the quality of journalism as there is not enough time to check facts and dig beyond what is delivered to them.
News is now delivered by press agencies with similarly reduced staff, but increasingly directly by PR organisations from the government, interest organisations, companies and intelligence agencies. Davies notes that the time is fast approaching where PR personnel outnumbers the journalists.
PR people have become much better at offering journalists ready-made news items. Political press officers provide Sound bites, arrange exclusive interviews and plant scoops. Interest groups selectively quote-mine scientific reports to support their arguments. Businesses subsidise related research that draws headlines, so that their message gets across. This is just what allows journalist, short of time, to meet their expected levels of productivity.
The lack of time available has led to several sub-trends, picking stories which:
Are easy to process. So only give the facts, not the context
Carry low risk. They come from 'trusted' sources like the government, don't offend those powerful/wealthy enough to sue you or block your access to new stories, present both sides of the story as is they are equal. It also means that news media tend to hunt in packs, because a story published elsewhere is a safe source. Esepecially when there's a moral panic.
Are guaranteed to sell. So no news from far off places that nobody cares about, but endless celebrity gossip. And nothing that challenges the preconceptions of your audience.
The most interesting development is the support of astro-turf organisations, that is (fake) grassroots organisations supported by companies or intelligence agencies. Look for instance at the many patients representation groups supported by the pharmaceutical industry and non-representative expatriate organisations like the Iraqi National Council. Or the dubious think tanks and research establishments used by the oil industry to sow doubt about climate change.
Most worrying is that the intelligence agencies have found their way to the newsrooms as well. It is not entirely new, as Cold War agencies also had their journalistic ´assets´, conduits through which they could convey their message. Or undermine the credibility of someone who lifted the lid on them. But since the 1990s they have used their information monopoly to steer reporters in their desired directions. Their power is as big as those of the independent press agencies. The War in Iraq being a case in point.
Davies´ chapter on The Observer shows how the CIA led reporters astray by misinforming them (through the Iraqi National Council) while the political editor was bagged by Downing Street. But the chapters on other newspapers are as chilling and depressing, especially the collusion with private investigators and policemen that bug phones, gather private information from protected databases and harrass victims to get their side of the story even when all they want is to be left alone.
Tragically, it seems that this book has not been able to change much, although I can see an undercurrent of journalists trying to wrest away from Big Media. And judging by the results of the Leveson Inquiry and the opposition from the media to its conclusions, I have no confidence that it will prove more than a dint in the trend, let alone a break.
It would be nice to say that this trend is only confined to the UK or the anglo-saxon media, but there's enough signs that it also applies to the Netherlands. Joris Luyendijk, writing about the same time, showed the weakness of foreign correspondents in the Middle East. He argued that in countries with hardly any room for independent public opinion, lacking social scientific research or even opinion polls, if not controlled by security services, how could the foreign correspondent really know what people felt?
And when you cover such a large and diverse region, you end up doing a standup from your hotel roof 30 minutes after you'd flown in based on nothing more than what you got from the newsroom and a quick chat with your taxi driver on the way in from the airport. But his criticism of the work of foreign correspondents was met as much by indignant replies from his colleagues as by others commending him for his bravery to be open about the limitations of his job.
December 29, 2017
Reading this book (published first in 2009) at the end of 2017 raises much curiosity how Davies would react and analysis today's "fake-news" "Post-Truth" environment. In many respects Flat-Earth News lays the ground-work for modern 'news' and explains clearly how we got to this place of political echo chambers, shareable garbage and click-bait. The greatest irony is towards the conclusion of the story Davies saw the internet as a possible solution to the problem of inaccurate and biased media.
Anywho as to the book itself, I absolutely loved it, while written quite densely and unapologetically thorough Flat-Earth News provides an excellent review and explanation of how and why news is so often warped, spun, biased and sometimes outright wrong. While I think most of us have a general sense that there is something a bit off about journalism and news, Davies does a brilliant job of summarizing the issues pointing out that its not so much that people peddle "fake-news" its more a systemic problem of PR, profits, manpower and politics. Probably the most alarming thing for me wasn't actually the racist spins, the invention of facts or absurd lack of checking, but the omissions - the fact that despite how it feels, the world isn't covered in media, much of foreign and internal news is simply generated by 'expert' opinion and the is a massive dearth of journalists on the ground.
The best thing about Flat-Earth News is that Davies perspective is relatively balanced. He is one of the few non-fiction writers I've picked up (possibly the only) that actually pointed out his conflicts of interest in the beginning of the story, and while he does have some opinions and obvious stances he doesn't pick on any particular cause or political wings, for example he reveals the poor tactics of both big petroleum companies and environmental groups in the same chapter.
Overall this book is a must read for anyone wanting to understand journalism and media better, especially in today's somewhat toxic environment - "It's not a conspiracy, its a mess"
Anywho as to the book itself, I absolutely loved it, while written quite densely and unapologetically thorough Flat-Earth News provides an excellent review and explanation of how and why news is so often warped, spun, biased and sometimes outright wrong. While I think most of us have a general sense that there is something a bit off about journalism and news, Davies does a brilliant job of summarizing the issues pointing out that its not so much that people peddle "fake-news" its more a systemic problem of PR, profits, manpower and politics. Probably the most alarming thing for me wasn't actually the racist spins, the invention of facts or absurd lack of checking, but the omissions - the fact that despite how it feels, the world isn't covered in media, much of foreign and internal news is simply generated by 'expert' opinion and the is a massive dearth of journalists on the ground.
The best thing about Flat-Earth News is that Davies perspective is relatively balanced. He is one of the few non-fiction writers I've picked up (possibly the only) that actually pointed out his conflicts of interest in the beginning of the story, and while he does have some opinions and obvious stances he doesn't pick on any particular cause or political wings, for example he reveals the poor tactics of both big petroleum companies and environmental groups in the same chapter.
Overall this book is a must read for anyone wanting to understand journalism and media better, especially in today's somewhat toxic environment - "It's not a conspiracy, its a mess"
December 17, 2016
Британська журналістика уже не та. Золоті стандарти БіБіСі не виконуються й у самому БіБіСі, а що вже казити про інші ЗМІ, що вже казати про газетярів? Журналістика з мистецтва (чи, окей, ремесла) ретельного написання вдумливих і цікавих текстів перетворилася на фабрику новин. Кадри скорочують, навантаження на них усе збільшується. А типовий день типового журналіста з Фліт-стріт майже не включає в себе особистих зустрічей з ньюсмейкерами, коментаторами, експертами або ж "польової" роботи. В кращому випадку- телефонні дзвінки. В гіршому - "пресрелізм", передирання інформації з прес-релізів, які щедро розсилають установи, організації, спільноти, партії тощо.Фактчекінг? На нього просто немає часу!
Нік Дейвіс переконує - те, що постачають читачу, - це не новини. Це пережована жуйка із прес-релізів і псевдоновини із псевдоподій- таких, як прес-конференції,які не відбуваються органічно- їх скликають навмисно, аби донести до журналістів (і далі, до читачів) певні факти, вкласти в голову саме те, що потрібно організаторам "псевдоподії".
Насправді це дуже інформативне, пізнавальне і досить захопливе, але разом із тим депресивне чтиво. Або автор трохи згущує фарби... або в Україні, порівняно з Британією, все не так паскудно. Особливо в регіонах. Звичайно, it depends, до того ж у нас є свої трабли - наприклад, газетки, які досі живуть у своєму мікросвіті, який застиг на рівні 1989 року,і працюють за радянськими принципами. Але вони (ті, які не хочуть мінятися) поступово вимирають, і це процес природний і незворотній.
"Новини пласкої землі" - це книга, яка не надихає. Але вона спонукає розібратися і мотивує- "зберігай пильність, не повтори наші помилки". Ну, принаймні, отак я її сприйняла:)
Нік Дейвіс переконує - те, що постачають читачу, - це не новини. Це пережована жуйка із прес-релізів і псевдоновини із псевдоподій- таких, як прес-конференції,які не відбуваються органічно- їх скликають навмисно, аби донести до журналістів (і далі, до читачів) певні факти, вкласти в голову саме те, що потрібно організаторам "псевдоподії".
Насправді це дуже інформативне, пізнавальне і досить захопливе, але разом із тим депресивне чтиво. Або автор трохи згущує фарби... або в Україні, порівняно з Британією, все не так паскудно. Особливо в регіонах. Звичайно, it depends, до того ж у нас є свої трабли - наприклад, газетки, які досі живуть у своєму мікросвіті, який застиг на рівні 1989 року,і працюють за радянськими принципами. Але вони (ті, які не хочуть мінятися) поступово вимирають, і це процес природний і незворотній.
"Новини пласкої землі" - це книга, яка не надихає. Але вона спонукає розібратися і мотивує- "зберігай пильність, не повтори наші помилки". Ну, принаймні, отак я її сприйняла:)
April 10, 2012
Phone hacking is not in the index of this book, published in 2008 so just before that story broke. Every other journalistic crime is. The central argument is that corporate commercialism in what we used to fondly call "Fleet Street", has created two huge abuses: firstly cost and corner cutting, so "churnalists" no longer have time to check stories,but rely on re-churning everybody else's stories; secondly profit-chasing, resulting in news "values" which pander to market prejudice and the rejection of anything that might not sell easily to global news outlets (this includes stories showing black people in positive settings, stories set in the developing world, anything difficult). But the most riveting chapter is the one about one paper, the Daily Mail. Quite simphly the Mail dictates the "rolling narrative" of our whole national discourse. Its driving force is the semi-psychotic fury of its disturbing, "c**t"-yelling editor, Paul Dacre. His skillful articulation and profoundly cynical manipulation of the psychoses of middle England has boosted the Mail's circulation into the stratosphere, making Dacre indespensable, invincible, invulnerable. He can afford to bribe his staff (big salaries, cars) into toeing his hateful and morally corrput line. He can buy off any potential theat from his many litigious (and frequently 100% traduced) victims. Thus Dacre has succeeded in bullying an entire nation and its governing elite into total, hopeless, fearful submission. Forget Murdoch. Our tabloid problem has another name. It is more intractable. And much, much corrupt. The reason is clear. Absolute power and all that.
June 21, 2013
It seemed interesting when I picked it up in the library: an insider account on how the modern media are being corrupted by mass hysteria, propaganda and commercial objectives. Unfortunately "Flat Earth News" has become an endlessly long list of examples that are treated in the utmost detail. You quickly get the jest of it, but start to wonder if yet another example is really going to make the point even better. The book seems to favour quantity over quality where evidence is concerned. Therefore, leafing through "Flat Earth News" is a much more rewarding activity than actually reading it from cover to cover.
December 23, 2010
I chose to listen to the Audio Book version to fit into my on-road activities...
Very intersting!
Very intersting!
January 14, 2019
!!!!!!!!!!!! Amazing book.
March 12, 2020
People have faces, organisations don't have faces - they have masks. A face reflects what is inside the person but a mask is a construct. What is behind the mask can be entirely different to what is portrayed at the front.
The media is not the face of the world. It's not the face of anything. It is a bunch of masks that are produced to sell. You wouldn't trust an entertaining anecdote on the back of a pack of chips to tell you the truth about reality so why would you trust the media? You trust the media because it has a beautiful mask of truthfullness and trustworthiness. But it is still a mask.
Before reading this book i had several beliefs about the media:
1. The media industry is vast so there must be some value to it, otherwise it would collapse. If they say they provide a service of investigating the truth then there is a high chance that that is where their value lies.
2. There are checks and balances around the media. If they tell a lie then somebody will point it out and the lie will be corrected and i will know about it.
3. The media is neutral and covers most aspects of life uniformly. If there is a gap then eventually another media outlet will fill it.
4. The commercial PR is somehow separated from the main content of the media or made clear that it is PR.
5. Personal blogs and forums are trustworthy because they are written by individuals who are not subject to the pressures of a media company.
After reading the book i now believe that:
1. The media often don't know the truth, don't like the truth, don't care about the truth, don't have time and resources to get to the truth. What is packaged as news and truth often has nothing to do with the truth. It's fiction. Fiction might be good when you know it's fiction.
2. There are checks and balances but they are not enough. The scale of the lies and propaganda overwhelms the available institutions that protect the reader. Sometimes there are no institutions at all, or just fake institutions created by the media itself.
3. The media doesn't cover everything and is not neutral. It covers what it will be paid for. It will blatantly lie to you to push an agenda or to grab your attention. Many important aspects of life are not covered at all because they are hard to exploit for money.
4. There is a lot of manipulation embedded in the media products which is not made clear at all. Some of it is very hard to notice but it nevertheless makes an impact on your opinions.
5. Uncovering truth is hard work. The individuals often don't have the resources, the skills, the will to do it. Some bloggers share their own experience which can be valuable but not necessarily true on a larger scale. Others just regurgitate the same lies but filtered only to those they personally enjoy.
My heart is bleeding now. Digesting the detail after excrutiating detail of how this person lied and this group people deceived and this agency betrayed and these guys stole and this newspaper threw their ideals and humanity out the window and on and on until my head hurts - well, it's painful and sad. I don't remember being as sad reading any other book. With every story i felt like a piece of my idealism fell off and withered. It's revolting to drink such concentrated essence of the dark side of humanity. I desperately need to watch kitties playing with cotton balls now.
Besides the numerous examples of the workings of the media the book also provided glimpses into workspace environments in agencies, newspapers and even governments. It was enlightening to see how human interactions in toxic environments play a role in the production of lies. Some journalists hate their jobs and their bosses, they hate to tell lies, they didn't sign up for it, they came into the industry to deal with truth and facts - but now they are stuck because they enjoy the pay and can't leave.
The media is in constant conflict between telling the truth and earning a profit. I wish i could proclaim that from now on and until they figure their shit out i will not trust anybody, i will not derive any of my opinions based on speculative fiction dressed as news, i will discover the world for myself and check everything important. But i realise that it's just a dream. Just like the media i don't have the resources to find the truth and i most certainly have to rely on other people. The question is how do i do that without getting bamboozled. I guess reading this book and learning about the production of news is a good start.
The media is not the face of the world. It's not the face of anything. It is a bunch of masks that are produced to sell. You wouldn't trust an entertaining anecdote on the back of a pack of chips to tell you the truth about reality so why would you trust the media? You trust the media because it has a beautiful mask of truthfullness and trustworthiness. But it is still a mask.
Before reading this book i had several beliefs about the media:
1. The media industry is vast so there must be some value to it, otherwise it would collapse. If they say they provide a service of investigating the truth then there is a high chance that that is where their value lies.
2. There are checks and balances around the media. If they tell a lie then somebody will point it out and the lie will be corrected and i will know about it.
3. The media is neutral and covers most aspects of life uniformly. If there is a gap then eventually another media outlet will fill it.
4. The commercial PR is somehow separated from the main content of the media or made clear that it is PR.
5. Personal blogs and forums are trustworthy because they are written by individuals who are not subject to the pressures of a media company.
After reading the book i now believe that:
1. The media often don't know the truth, don't like the truth, don't care about the truth, don't have time and resources to get to the truth. What is packaged as news and truth often has nothing to do with the truth. It's fiction. Fiction might be good when you know it's fiction.
2. There are checks and balances but they are not enough. The scale of the lies and propaganda overwhelms the available institutions that protect the reader. Sometimes there are no institutions at all, or just fake institutions created by the media itself.
3. The media doesn't cover everything and is not neutral. It covers what it will be paid for. It will blatantly lie to you to push an agenda or to grab your attention. Many important aspects of life are not covered at all because they are hard to exploit for money.
4. There is a lot of manipulation embedded in the media products which is not made clear at all. Some of it is very hard to notice but it nevertheless makes an impact on your opinions.
5. Uncovering truth is hard work. The individuals often don't have the resources, the skills, the will to do it. Some bloggers share their own experience which can be valuable but not necessarily true on a larger scale. Others just regurgitate the same lies but filtered only to those they personally enjoy.
My heart is bleeding now. Digesting the detail after excrutiating detail of how this person lied and this group people deceived and this agency betrayed and these guys stole and this newspaper threw their ideals and humanity out the window and on and on until my head hurts - well, it's painful and sad. I don't remember being as sad reading any other book. With every story i felt like a piece of my idealism fell off and withered. It's revolting to drink such concentrated essence of the dark side of humanity. I desperately need to watch kitties playing with cotton balls now.
Besides the numerous examples of the workings of the media the book also provided glimpses into workspace environments in agencies, newspapers and even governments. It was enlightening to see how human interactions in toxic environments play a role in the production of lies. Some journalists hate their jobs and their bosses, they hate to tell lies, they didn't sign up for it, they came into the industry to deal with truth and facts - but now they are stuck because they enjoy the pay and can't leave.
The media is in constant conflict between telling the truth and earning a profit. I wish i could proclaim that from now on and until they figure their shit out i will not trust anybody, i will not derive any of my opinions based on speculative fiction dressed as news, i will discover the world for myself and check everything important. But i realise that it's just a dream. Just like the media i don't have the resources to find the truth and i most certainly have to rely on other people. The question is how do i do that without getting bamboozled. I guess reading this book and learning about the production of news is a good start.
May 3, 2014
I’ve been putting off writing this review for a little while now. It’s a difficult one for me. I only read Flat Earth News because so many people had recommended it, and most of them are people whose views I tend to agree with. But I’m afraid I didn’t really like it.
Flat Earth News is Nick Davies’s “exposé” of the practices of the media. Nick is, of course, a brilliant Guardian journalist, and is perhaps the journalist most responsible for the eventual uncovering of the widespread use of phone hacking by members of the press. Unfortunately, he approaches the task of “exposing journalism” with two central premises which I find bizarre.
Firstly, he appears to labour under the wrongful impression that members of the public imagine journalists to be crack investigators who stalk the streets with notebooks and pens, looking for exclusive stories to serve up to expectant readers. Clearly, as an adult who lives in the real world, I know that’s not what a journalist’s job is like. I know that journalists are expected to churn out multiple stories per day, and I know that most of what they write starts out as wire copy or press releases. It’s true to say that I didn’t fully realise the extent of the number of stories they’re expected to file, nor the extent of the reliance on agency copy, but I didn’t think the world of modern journalism was made up of Lois Lanes. This makes the tone he uses for much of the book seem enormously patronising. I can honestly say that I’ve never felt as patronised by any factual book I’ve ever voluntarily subjected myself to as I did by the first third of this book. It’s horrendous.
Secondly, he claims – and repeats ad nauseam – that the central job of any journalist is to tell the truth. Again, I’m afraid I cannot agree with this. There are many parts of any journalist’s job which are equally as important as telling the truth – engaging readers and selling papers being two of the more important ones. He seems to suggest that an ideal newspaper would simply be a list of facts of things that occurred during the day, with few adjectives and no opinions. That is clearly not sensible, as nobody in their right mind would part with good money for something so utterly dull.
Those are the two big, central problems with the book. They are the two which each and every time they crop up made me want to scream. There were times when I actually had to put this enormously repetitive book down and walk away. But, in a way, this is only the start of the list of problems.
When I read books with the intention of reviewing them, I often make notes along the way. I select key quotes, I list the bits I really like and the bits that made me angry. This book caused me to write more notes than any other I’ve ever reviewed for this site, and almost all were in the “bits that made me angry” category. I don’t intend to make all of those points here, but I will share a select few which raised questions in my mind that Davies failed to answer.
Davies has bizarre ideas on what is and isn’t news. He cites a story in which there was a rumour of Terry Leahy stepping down from his role at Tesco. In the face of these rumours, Tesco issued a denial. Davies then criticises news bulletins for continuing to run the story that a rumour was circulating but that it had been denied by Tesco. Does he honestly believe that this story is not newsworthy? Should flat denials always be taken at face value?
There’s a section of this book where Davies criticises the Daily Mail for not having a coherent economic policy. Seriously, I’m not making this up. He talks about the unexpressed and hence unexamined “moral values” which underpin reportage in newspapers, citing the Daily Mail’s treatment of asylum seekers as an example. I’m afraid it’s a little beyond this reviewer to understand how Davies can argue that the Daily Mail’s attitude towards asylum seekers has not been widely acknowledged, criticised and challenged. But, beyond this, he then goes on to suggest that the Daily Mail’s opposition to immigration coupled with its support of free trade adds up to a deeply flawed economic policy. Does Davies honestly believe that a newspaper like the Daily Mail should put forward coherent economic policies? Really? Of course the Daily Mail picks and chooses causes, and of course they do not add up to anything sensible. I struggle to believe that people – including its readers and editor – would argue that the Daily Mail offers a cohesive policy for government, however it presents itself. This feels a bit like criticising Bram Stoker for opening Dracula with the suggestion that all events within the novel are accurate reporting of a true event.
There’s an odd passage in which Davies criticises a newspaper – I forget which one – for reversing its stance on the Iraq war in the face of plummeting readership. Yet I wonder what he believes to be the alternative? If readers are deserting a paper due its opinions, does Davies suggest that it should continue to parrot the same line until it is forced, by lack of readership, to close?
Davies argues that the BBC’s aim to break news within five minutes of it reaching the newsroom is flawed because it doesn’t allow for checking. Does he honestly think that the BBC should only ever report confirmed stories? Does he believe that repeating clearly identified “unconfirmed reports”, as they so frequently do, harms the practice of journalism? Is it his honest belief that if they returned to the old days of checking every detail before publishing that their readers, viewers and listeners wouldn’t desert them in favour of faster rivals? Or does he believe that it doesn’t matter than nobody watches, provided that there is a news outlet of record?
And how does Davies suggest that journalism should be funded? He suggests several times in the book that the funding sources of some campaign groups mean that their view of the world is, by definition, skewed by the funders and should be ignored. So who does he suggest should fund the media? Who has he thought of as a potential provider of revenue to fund totally impartial journalism? He has no answer to this question, but suggests in his epilogue that money saved from moving to digital publication rather than dead tree publication should be reinvested in journalism. The suggestion, of course, completely misses the point that nobody has yet worked out how to make anywhere like the revenue from digital journalism as from print journalism, so there is no money to be reinvested.
Yet, for all of its many faults, I think this is an important book. Strip away the odd proselytising tone, and within this book there is an interesting, informative and detailed “state of the profession” report. There are still those who believe that the Daily Mail prints literal truth, those that don’t understand how news stories are gathered, and those that think that quotes in newspapers are verbatim transcripts of something that someone actually said. For those people, this book would doubtless be an eye-opener.
All of this leaves me with something of a dilemma. I hated this book. I found it patronising, and a real struggle to get through. It’s irritating tone made me frequently set it aside to read something that made me less angry. And yet, I recognise that it is important, and that many people like it. Indeed, many people like it very much. So how many stars should I give? Since there’s no easy answer, I’m going to plump for an arbitrary three.
Original review can be seen at http://sjhoward.co.uk/archive/2013/02...
Flat Earth News is Nick Davies’s “exposé” of the practices of the media. Nick is, of course, a brilliant Guardian journalist, and is perhaps the journalist most responsible for the eventual uncovering of the widespread use of phone hacking by members of the press. Unfortunately, he approaches the task of “exposing journalism” with two central premises which I find bizarre.
Firstly, he appears to labour under the wrongful impression that members of the public imagine journalists to be crack investigators who stalk the streets with notebooks and pens, looking for exclusive stories to serve up to expectant readers. Clearly, as an adult who lives in the real world, I know that’s not what a journalist’s job is like. I know that journalists are expected to churn out multiple stories per day, and I know that most of what they write starts out as wire copy or press releases. It’s true to say that I didn’t fully realise the extent of the number of stories they’re expected to file, nor the extent of the reliance on agency copy, but I didn’t think the world of modern journalism was made up of Lois Lanes. This makes the tone he uses for much of the book seem enormously patronising. I can honestly say that I’ve never felt as patronised by any factual book I’ve ever voluntarily subjected myself to as I did by the first third of this book. It’s horrendous.
Secondly, he claims – and repeats ad nauseam – that the central job of any journalist is to tell the truth. Again, I’m afraid I cannot agree with this. There are many parts of any journalist’s job which are equally as important as telling the truth – engaging readers and selling papers being two of the more important ones. He seems to suggest that an ideal newspaper would simply be a list of facts of things that occurred during the day, with few adjectives and no opinions. That is clearly not sensible, as nobody in their right mind would part with good money for something so utterly dull.
Those are the two big, central problems with the book. They are the two which each and every time they crop up made me want to scream. There were times when I actually had to put this enormously repetitive book down and walk away. But, in a way, this is only the start of the list of problems.
When I read books with the intention of reviewing them, I often make notes along the way. I select key quotes, I list the bits I really like and the bits that made me angry. This book caused me to write more notes than any other I’ve ever reviewed for this site, and almost all were in the “bits that made me angry” category. I don’t intend to make all of those points here, but I will share a select few which raised questions in my mind that Davies failed to answer.
Davies has bizarre ideas on what is and isn’t news. He cites a story in which there was a rumour of Terry Leahy stepping down from his role at Tesco. In the face of these rumours, Tesco issued a denial. Davies then criticises news bulletins for continuing to run the story that a rumour was circulating but that it had been denied by Tesco. Does he honestly believe that this story is not newsworthy? Should flat denials always be taken at face value?
There’s a section of this book where Davies criticises the Daily Mail for not having a coherent economic policy. Seriously, I’m not making this up. He talks about the unexpressed and hence unexamined “moral values” which underpin reportage in newspapers, citing the Daily Mail’s treatment of asylum seekers as an example. I’m afraid it’s a little beyond this reviewer to understand how Davies can argue that the Daily Mail’s attitude towards asylum seekers has not been widely acknowledged, criticised and challenged. But, beyond this, he then goes on to suggest that the Daily Mail’s opposition to immigration coupled with its support of free trade adds up to a deeply flawed economic policy. Does Davies honestly believe that a newspaper like the Daily Mail should put forward coherent economic policies? Really? Of course the Daily Mail picks and chooses causes, and of course they do not add up to anything sensible. I struggle to believe that people – including its readers and editor – would argue that the Daily Mail offers a cohesive policy for government, however it presents itself. This feels a bit like criticising Bram Stoker for opening Dracula with the suggestion that all events within the novel are accurate reporting of a true event.
There’s an odd passage in which Davies criticises a newspaper – I forget which one – for reversing its stance on the Iraq war in the face of plummeting readership. Yet I wonder what he believes to be the alternative? If readers are deserting a paper due its opinions, does Davies suggest that it should continue to parrot the same line until it is forced, by lack of readership, to close?
Davies argues that the BBC’s aim to break news within five minutes of it reaching the newsroom is flawed because it doesn’t allow for checking. Does he honestly think that the BBC should only ever report confirmed stories? Does he believe that repeating clearly identified “unconfirmed reports”, as they so frequently do, harms the practice of journalism? Is it his honest belief that if they returned to the old days of checking every detail before publishing that their readers, viewers and listeners wouldn’t desert them in favour of faster rivals? Or does he believe that it doesn’t matter than nobody watches, provided that there is a news outlet of record?
And how does Davies suggest that journalism should be funded? He suggests several times in the book that the funding sources of some campaign groups mean that their view of the world is, by definition, skewed by the funders and should be ignored. So who does he suggest should fund the media? Who has he thought of as a potential provider of revenue to fund totally impartial journalism? He has no answer to this question, but suggests in his epilogue that money saved from moving to digital publication rather than dead tree publication should be reinvested in journalism. The suggestion, of course, completely misses the point that nobody has yet worked out how to make anywhere like the revenue from digital journalism as from print journalism, so there is no money to be reinvested.
Yet, for all of its many faults, I think this is an important book. Strip away the odd proselytising tone, and within this book there is an interesting, informative and detailed “state of the profession” report. There are still those who believe that the Daily Mail prints literal truth, those that don’t understand how news stories are gathered, and those that think that quotes in newspapers are verbatim transcripts of something that someone actually said. For those people, this book would doubtless be an eye-opener.
All of this leaves me with something of a dilemma. I hated this book. I found it patronising, and a real struggle to get through. It’s irritating tone made me frequently set it aside to read something that made me less angry. And yet, I recognise that it is important, and that many people like it. Indeed, many people like it very much. So how many stars should I give? Since there’s no easy answer, I’m going to plump for an arbitrary three.
Original review can be seen at http://sjhoward.co.uk/archive/2013/02...
March 19, 2025
This is, or was a fascinating examination of newspapers and the way the news was distorted and in cases manufactured in a way no different to producing loaves of bread. Stuff was needed and it was churned to fill space unchecked. The problem is that in 2008 newspapers were a heartbeat away from disappearing as every day on your way to work physical purchases and disappear into to the ether were they would compete with every other source of online information.
I agree and sympathise with the lament of Nick Davies for a past were local newspapers carried copious reports on local government and courts and journalists spent long hours listening to debates and court cases. Now unless it is a celebrity case or gruesome crime (and of those very few get covered) the debates of local and national politicians are ignored and so are most court cases. Newspapers, like all businesses desire remove the most expensive part of its production capacity, people. The real scandal is not that newspapers are manipulated by the rich and powerful, that has always been the case. But now no one cares, and in fact so many people would rather Trust rich white men than journalists. I knew the world had changed and that I no longer understood nor had a place in this new world when in 2015 Donald Trump, not yet president for the first time, mocked the disability of NYT journalist and his supporters loved it.
What would Trump have said if he was running against Franklin Roosevelt?
This book has been overtaken by events. It is almost antiquarian in its outlook. I wouldn't say don't read but I fear the audience for it decreases by the day, like that for newspapers.
I agree and sympathise with the lament of Nick Davies for a past were local newspapers carried copious reports on local government and courts and journalists spent long hours listening to debates and court cases. Now unless it is a celebrity case or gruesome crime (and of those very few get covered) the debates of local and national politicians are ignored and so are most court cases. Newspapers, like all businesses desire remove the most expensive part of its production capacity, people. The real scandal is not that newspapers are manipulated by the rich and powerful, that has always been the case. But now no one cares, and in fact so many people would rather Trust rich white men than journalists. I knew the world had changed and that I no longer understood nor had a place in this new world when in 2015 Donald Trump, not yet president for the first time, mocked the disability of NYT journalist and his supporters loved it.
What would Trump have said if he was running against Franklin Roosevelt?
This book has been overtaken by events. It is almost antiquarian in its outlook. I wouldn't say don't read but I fear the audience for it decreases by the day, like that for newspapers.
February 16, 2022
I was convinced that I was a very cynical person. After reading this, I came to the conclusion that I am still too naive.
I started losing my faith in the media in the mid nineties. As a civil servant I had to occasionally write a press release. I found this hard work distracting from my real job. Those press releases were send to all newspapers and mostly appeared in the regional section. Not once was I contacted by a journalist. When my articles got published, most of the time they were just copy/pasted with the name of a journalist underneath. When you can't trust journalists with the little things like regional news, you cannot trust them with big issues.
One the one hand, I would want to recommend this book to everyone because of the contents: it is well-organized and well-researched. On the other hand, I am hesitant because of the style: reading this was a chore. The author gives so many examples, names so many people, that it becomes hard to see the forest through the trees. For an infovore or infojunkie this was an enlightening but depressing read. To answer the question on the back of the book: "Yes, newspapers are seriously damaging your insight".
Mark Twain (1835-1910)
I started losing my faith in the media in the mid nineties. As a civil servant I had to occasionally write a press release. I found this hard work distracting from my real job. Those press releases were send to all newspapers and mostly appeared in the regional section. Not once was I contacted by a journalist. When my articles got published, most of the time they were just copy/pasted with the name of a journalist underneath. When you can't trust journalists with the little things like regional news, you cannot trust them with big issues.
One the one hand, I would want to recommend this book to everyone because of the contents: it is well-organized and well-researched. On the other hand, I am hesitant because of the style: reading this was a chore. The author gives so many examples, names so many people, that it becomes hard to see the forest through the trees. For an infovore or infojunkie this was an enlightening but depressing read. To answer the question on the back of the book: "Yes, newspapers are seriously damaging your insight".
“If you don't read the newspaper, you are uninformed.
If you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed.”
Mark Twain (1835-1910)
September 20, 2018
This could also have been called "why news is crap and should not be believed". The book itself, even though showing the somewhat obvious fact that most journalism nowadays is biased, distorted and outright wrong, has the same issues itself - there are parts where you stop and start asking yourself "why is this piece of information presented in this way?".
The book is focused on the UK with bits on the US, but as the media is becoming more and more global (and more crap), a lot of the descriptions in it would match almost any country.
This should be a book that everyone who watches TV or reads newspapers should read, but I highly doubt that would happen...
The book is focused on the UK with bits on the US, but as the media is becoming more and more global (and more crap), a lot of the descriptions in it would match almost any country.
This should be a book that everyone who watches TV or reads newspapers should read, but I highly doubt that would happen...
June 11, 2018
An amazing book. Even more relevant today than it was back when it was written. It fact it shows what went wrong and why people like Trump and Putin could so easily manipulate the media. So if you want to understand how we got here, this is a good place to start.
It is also a sober reminder of why we have to be critical of the media, even though it is a necessary foundation of democracy. In fact if the media is the 4th state, then the reader is the 5th state.
As a side note. I thought I could not hate Rupert Murdoch any more. After reading this book I realized that disgust has no limit.
It is also a sober reminder of why we have to be critical of the media, even though it is a necessary foundation of democracy. In fact if the media is the 4th state, then the reader is the 5th state.
As a side note. I thought I could not hate Rupert Murdoch any more. After reading this book I realized that disgust has no limit.
November 13, 2014
*SPOILERS!* (in Dutch, as I read the Dutch version) Ik was al een tijdje kritisch van wat er in de kranten en het journaal verteld werd, hoe selectief men te werk ging, maar na het lezen van "Gebakken Lucht" ben ik alleen maar kritischer geworden en weet ik niet meer wat nog waar is en wat niet.
Nick Davies baseert zich, logisch, op wat er zich afspeelt in de Britse pers, maar je kunt het patroon ook toepassen voor de Belgische pers, me dunkt. Wat krijg je te lezen: hoe bepaalde nieuwsjes uitvergroot worden zodat er bijna massahysterie uitbreekt (bijv. millenniumbug), terwijl de gevolgen ofwel nul zijn ofwel zo miniem dat al dat gehyp puur voor de verkoop vd krant was. Verder behandelt Nick het probleem van kostenbesparing, hoe journalisten minder kunnen beroep doen op bronnen, op collega's bij lokalere kranten/tv-stations. Hoe kranteneigenaren vnl. aan winst denken en hoe er nog meer te krijgen. Hoe men de concurrentie te snel wil af zijn met primeurs, gegrond of niet.
Verder: productieregels als veilige verhalen, gemakkelijke verhalen (zodat er minder tijd moet ingestoken worden met natrekken e.d.), en hoe PR machtig wordt => copy-paste, werkt sneller natuurlijk, plus makkelijk om publiek te misleiden, manipuleren. Verder speelt PR ook een rol om bijv. militaire missies tot stand te brengen (Irak en WOMD, Libië en Gaddafi, ...)
Verder: hoe journalisten contacten hebben met agenten, privé-detectives, (ex-)criminelen, ... om toch maar verhalen te kunnen schrijven. Contradictie met H4, waarin men beknot wordt in werkingsmiddelen, maar dan zelf wel de wet overtreedt met schenden van privacy van anderen d.m.v. voormelde personen.
The Sunday Times: voorheen een vd kranten met een onderzoeksteam (Insight) dat budget had om eerlijke journalistiek te doen, om echt zaken te onderzoeken en naar waarheid te plaatsen. Toen Rupert Murdoch de krant kocht, werd dat team opgedoekt en werd TST blijkbaar even oppervlakkig als de modale krant. Het moet verkopen en onderzoek kost tijd en geld, wat Rupert niet wilde spenderen, want dan verkocht je minder kranten, natuurlijk. Ook hier speelde PR (bijv. persattaché van Tony Blair en beïnvloedbare journalist vd krant) een rol, en dat was van bij The Observer. Dus, ook hier werden leugens en verdraaiingen geschreven, bijv. ter stimulatie vd inval in Irak (om Saddam af te zetten e.d.), ook al was The Observer blijkbaar niet het soort krant dat de regering aanhing. Soit, 2 maten en gewichten.
Dan The Daily Mail: hoe dit de machtigste krant werd, zich niets onziend. Verhalen weer oprakelen, er een draai aan geven om de massa te beïnvloeden, de politiek, enz. Waren de leugens en propaganda aangevochten, deed men ofwel niks met de klacht ofwel plaatste men een kleine rechtzetting ofwel procedeerde men ofwel betaalde de krant een schadevergoeding. Zelfs het controle-orgaan vd pers deed niks om de krant erecht te wijzen. Zelfs de politiek deed niks om het vuile spel vd krant te stoppen. Hoe dan ook, The Daily Mail is volgens wat ik las een vd meest verachtelijke kranten. en weer stond/staat een manipulatieve hoofdredacteur aan het hoofd vd redactie. Zo erg dat men op den duur de doctrine volgde als journalist, ook al wist je beter.
Laatst pleit Nick voor een soort controle-organisme voor de pers, om enkel de correcte informatie te laten publiceren, niet de leugens, propaganda, ... hij maakt ook melding van alternatieve nieuwssites en m.n. blogs, hoe mensen op de duur zelf naar de waarheid zoeken.
Zoals ik in het begin aangaf: wat moet je nog geloven? Lees je in de ene krant versie A, zie je op het internet versie B, of zaken die niet in A verteld werden. Het nieuws idem: 13u, reactie van bijv. een minister, om 19u is de reactie ingekort. En waarom?
Hoewel "Gebakken Lucht" dus vnl. op Britse leest is geschoeid en sommige feiten uit het verleden niet duidelijk zijn (want puur Britse actualiteit), kan je de kranten en eventuele feiten vervangen door zaken die hier gebeurd zijn. Langs de andere kant: het is geen pure zwart-witte situatie. Er zijn natuurlijk nog journalisten die correct hun werk willen en kunnen doen, maar zijn die in de meerderheid? Het is ongelooflijk hoe er zoveel kranten zijn en men dagelijks toch zoveel tekst erin krijgt, zei ook een treincollega van me enkele jaren geleden. Soit, in ieder geval is "Gebakken Lucht" een ferme aanrader om inzicht te verwerven over hoe de pers tegenwoordig te werk gaat, hoe verkoop en winst telt, NIET de waarheid want die kost tijd en geld en dat heeft invloed op de winst. Zoals het spreekwoord zegt: 't Gemak goa vo d'ere (het gemak gaat vóór de eer, ofte waarom ergens tijd en moeite in steken - en trots zijn op je werk - als je ook gemakkelijke en manipulatieve berichten kunt publiceren?)For shame!
Nick Davies baseert zich, logisch, op wat er zich afspeelt in de Britse pers, maar je kunt het patroon ook toepassen voor de Belgische pers, me dunkt. Wat krijg je te lezen: hoe bepaalde nieuwsjes uitvergroot worden zodat er bijna massahysterie uitbreekt (bijv. millenniumbug), terwijl de gevolgen ofwel nul zijn ofwel zo miniem dat al dat gehyp puur voor de verkoop vd krant was. Verder behandelt Nick het probleem van kostenbesparing, hoe journalisten minder kunnen beroep doen op bronnen, op collega's bij lokalere kranten/tv-stations. Hoe kranteneigenaren vnl. aan winst denken en hoe er nog meer te krijgen. Hoe men de concurrentie te snel wil af zijn met primeurs, gegrond of niet.
Verder: productieregels als veilige verhalen, gemakkelijke verhalen (zodat er minder tijd moet ingestoken worden met natrekken e.d.), en hoe PR machtig wordt => copy-paste, werkt sneller natuurlijk, plus makkelijk om publiek te misleiden, manipuleren. Verder speelt PR ook een rol om bijv. militaire missies tot stand te brengen (Irak en WOMD, Libië en Gaddafi, ...)
Verder: hoe journalisten contacten hebben met agenten, privé-detectives, (ex-)criminelen, ... om toch maar verhalen te kunnen schrijven. Contradictie met H4, waarin men beknot wordt in werkingsmiddelen, maar dan zelf wel de wet overtreedt met schenden van privacy van anderen d.m.v. voormelde personen.
The Sunday Times: voorheen een vd kranten met een onderzoeksteam (Insight) dat budget had om eerlijke journalistiek te doen, om echt zaken te onderzoeken en naar waarheid te plaatsen. Toen Rupert Murdoch de krant kocht, werd dat team opgedoekt en werd TST blijkbaar even oppervlakkig als de modale krant. Het moet verkopen en onderzoek kost tijd en geld, wat Rupert niet wilde spenderen, want dan verkocht je minder kranten, natuurlijk. Ook hier speelde PR (bijv. persattaché van Tony Blair en beïnvloedbare journalist vd krant) een rol, en dat was van bij The Observer. Dus, ook hier werden leugens en verdraaiingen geschreven, bijv. ter stimulatie vd inval in Irak (om Saddam af te zetten e.d.), ook al was The Observer blijkbaar niet het soort krant dat de regering aanhing. Soit, 2 maten en gewichten.
Dan The Daily Mail: hoe dit de machtigste krant werd, zich niets onziend. Verhalen weer oprakelen, er een draai aan geven om de massa te beïnvloeden, de politiek, enz. Waren de leugens en propaganda aangevochten, deed men ofwel niks met de klacht ofwel plaatste men een kleine rechtzetting ofwel procedeerde men ofwel betaalde de krant een schadevergoeding. Zelfs het controle-orgaan vd pers deed niks om de krant erecht te wijzen. Zelfs de politiek deed niks om het vuile spel vd krant te stoppen. Hoe dan ook, The Daily Mail is volgens wat ik las een vd meest verachtelijke kranten. en weer stond/staat een manipulatieve hoofdredacteur aan het hoofd vd redactie. Zo erg dat men op den duur de doctrine volgde als journalist, ook al wist je beter.
Laatst pleit Nick voor een soort controle-organisme voor de pers, om enkel de correcte informatie te laten publiceren, niet de leugens, propaganda, ... hij maakt ook melding van alternatieve nieuwssites en m.n. blogs, hoe mensen op de duur zelf naar de waarheid zoeken.
Zoals ik in het begin aangaf: wat moet je nog geloven? Lees je in de ene krant versie A, zie je op het internet versie B, of zaken die niet in A verteld werden. Het nieuws idem: 13u, reactie van bijv. een minister, om 19u is de reactie ingekort. En waarom?
Hoewel "Gebakken Lucht" dus vnl. op Britse leest is geschoeid en sommige feiten uit het verleden niet duidelijk zijn (want puur Britse actualiteit), kan je de kranten en eventuele feiten vervangen door zaken die hier gebeurd zijn. Langs de andere kant: het is geen pure zwart-witte situatie. Er zijn natuurlijk nog journalisten die correct hun werk willen en kunnen doen, maar zijn die in de meerderheid? Het is ongelooflijk hoe er zoveel kranten zijn en men dagelijks toch zoveel tekst erin krijgt, zei ook een treincollega van me enkele jaren geleden. Soit, in ieder geval is "Gebakken Lucht" een ferme aanrader om inzicht te verwerven over hoe de pers tegenwoordig te werk gaat, hoe verkoop en winst telt, NIET de waarheid want die kost tijd en geld en dat heeft invloed op de winst. Zoals het spreekwoord zegt: 't Gemak goa vo d'ere (het gemak gaat vóór de eer, ofte waarom ergens tijd en moeite in steken - en trots zijn op je werk - als je ook gemakkelijke en manipulatieve berichten kunt publiceren?)For shame!
May 30, 2021
A harsh reality. Often journalism is seeing as the 4th power that keep the balance and uncovers the truth. But newspapers, as everything else, is a business. The bottom line is strongly dictating what goes in what gets blocked (ahem censored).
People want instantaneous, accurate, and free information. There is no realistic way of doing that. But reading this book, I was under the impression that if news where delivered weekly or even monthly (as opposed to daily) the panorama would be better.
I read this book as a call for paying for the news. The newspapers answers to whoever brings the money, be highly suspicious of all the abundant free content you can find online.
The first half of the book has a more universal character that applies in most countries. The second half is centered in particular stories from UK, so beware that it is a slog to read if you don't have the context.
People want instantaneous, accurate, and free information. There is no realistic way of doing that. But reading this book, I was under the impression that if news where delivered weekly or even monthly (as opposed to daily) the panorama would be better.
I read this book as a call for paying for the news. The newspapers answers to whoever brings the money, be highly suspicious of all the abundant free content you can find online.
The first half of the book has a more universal character that applies in most countries. The second half is centered in particular stories from UK, so beware that it is a slog to read if you don't have the context.
September 8, 2014
Flat Earth News examines the reasons behind the decline in both standards and depth of news media in the UK.
Nick Davies looks at the changing face of media owners. They are no longer people whose main interest is good news reporting but business folks whose focus is profit over good journalism and that is reflected in ever increasing cuts in budgets and resources leaving little time for fact checking.
The increasing reliance upon and influence of PR is examined. It's sobering to note that there are now more journalists in the UK working in PR than in news gathering.
Particularly disquieting is Davies account of media coverage of the build up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq where half truths and outright lies went unquestioned.
The extent to which the CIA (and to a lesser extent MI6) infiltrated mainstream media is chilling. At one point apparently there were half a dozen journalists at the influential New York Times who were CIA agents.
Davies track record as one of the rapidly dwindling number of true investigative journalists gives the book considerable credibility. Among his achievements are Julian Assange/Wikileaks Warlogs and the Phone Hacking scandal that brought down the News of the World.
A major focus of FLAT EARTH NEWS is the reprehensible behaviour of many of the major newspapers in the UK who seem to have thrown all morality out of the window in pursuit of news.
Even the "quality"newspapers are guilty of this. Davies names names and details stories to back up his claims.
Davies looks at a number of stories and takes them apart to examine how distortions, half truths, misleading headlines and downright fabrication take place to give the reader a skewed view of a story that doesn't quite fit the actual facts.
There is an entire chapter devoted to the most aggressive of these publications, The Daily Mail and it's editor Paul Dacre. Dacre comes across as a foul mouthed bully completely devoid of any scruples whatsoever, who has no hesitation in going after someone who has incurred his displeasure. In fact while writing this I noticed that the Daily Mail has a column on its website devoted to doing just that to Davies.
While FLAT EARTH NEWS is about the news media in the UK, it pays to be mindful that it could apply to any news outlet, anywhere. And while Australia does not have a publication as venomous as The Daily Mail (yet!), there are signs that it could be on its way (case in point some of the headlines in The Daily Telegraph before the last Federal election. Is a photo of Kevin Rudd on the front page photoshopped to look like Adolf Hitler actually news?)
I found FLAT EARTH NEWS one of the most fascinating and compelling reads I've had in a long time and highly recommend it to everyone.
Nick Davies looks at the changing face of media owners. They are no longer people whose main interest is good news reporting but business folks whose focus is profit over good journalism and that is reflected in ever increasing cuts in budgets and resources leaving little time for fact checking.
The increasing reliance upon and influence of PR is examined. It's sobering to note that there are now more journalists in the UK working in PR than in news gathering.
Particularly disquieting is Davies account of media coverage of the build up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq where half truths and outright lies went unquestioned.
The extent to which the CIA (and to a lesser extent MI6) infiltrated mainstream media is chilling. At one point apparently there were half a dozen journalists at the influential New York Times who were CIA agents.
Davies track record as one of the rapidly dwindling number of true investigative journalists gives the book considerable credibility. Among his achievements are Julian Assange/Wikileaks Warlogs and the Phone Hacking scandal that brought down the News of the World.
A major focus of FLAT EARTH NEWS is the reprehensible behaviour of many of the major newspapers in the UK who seem to have thrown all morality out of the window in pursuit of news.
Even the "quality"newspapers are guilty of this. Davies names names and details stories to back up his claims.
Davies looks at a number of stories and takes them apart to examine how distortions, half truths, misleading headlines and downright fabrication take place to give the reader a skewed view of a story that doesn't quite fit the actual facts.
There is an entire chapter devoted to the most aggressive of these publications, The Daily Mail and it's editor Paul Dacre. Dacre comes across as a foul mouthed bully completely devoid of any scruples whatsoever, who has no hesitation in going after someone who has incurred his displeasure. In fact while writing this I noticed that the Daily Mail has a column on its website devoted to doing just that to Davies.
While FLAT EARTH NEWS is about the news media in the UK, it pays to be mindful that it could apply to any news outlet, anywhere. And while Australia does not have a publication as venomous as The Daily Mail (yet!), there are signs that it could be on its way (case in point some of the headlines in The Daily Telegraph before the last Federal election. Is a photo of Kevin Rudd on the front page photoshopped to look like Adolf Hitler actually news?)
I found FLAT EARTH NEWS one of the most fascinating and compelling reads I've had in a long time and highly recommend it to everyone.
February 24, 2022
'Flat Earth News' (2008) by Nick Davies is about how and why so much falsehood ends up in the news. His titular 'flat earth news' refers to stories which appear true but would quickly be shown to be false if anyone bothered to check. It's a book about fake news and the need for fact-checking way before those topics became so massive in the public consciousness, post-2016.
A lot of mainstream coverage of these topics, by journalists not wanting to attack their own profession and colleagues, has pinned the blame on social media. Davies shows that all that falsehood and distortion is a product of decades-long trends in the news industry. The Internet and social media has accelerated those trends, dialling them up to 11.
He opens the book by explaining that a lot of news industry criticism is done by outsiders who don't actually know how the industry works, so their analyses miss an awful lot and tend to focus on a few basics: the influence of advertisers and owners.
Newspapers want to please their advertisers; owners want their papers to push certain lines. As a result, the news industry presents a version of reality that is acceptable to corporate advertisers and billionaire media moguls. Davies accepts that advertisers and owners do influence editorial decisions, but far less than popular media criticism would have you believe.
Advertisers don't care that much about the political stances of where the adverts show up, as long as people are seeing the adverts. The only time that advertisers properly influence the editorial line is when the story is directly about the advertiser - such as when the Daily Telegraph refused to run stories about HSBC's money laundering, because the bank was one of their big advertisers.
Historically, a lot of newspaper owners wanted their papers to push their political opinions - they were propaganda outlets first and foremost, a way for the wealthy to push for what they thought was positive social and political change. However, through the 20th century, newspapers were bought up by corporate owners who saw the papers primarily as a business which made a profit. They would still influence the paper's line when doing so would benefit the business, but the motivation was profit and business growth - not the desire for particular social and political change.
In order to increase profits, the new owners cut staffing numbers, and wanted the remaining journalists to write more and cheaper stories, which fuelled the rise of 'churnalism' - writing stories based largely on material already written by someone else - and meant a massive reduction in the time that journalists had to properly check their stories.
The quality and veracity of the stories didn't matter, so long as the paper was making a profit. Reporters were encouraged to make stories out of anything they could to fill space - especially on the local papers. I thought a lot about Nottinghamshire Live when reading this book.
Churnalists are reliant on others having written the stories, and so the majority of news stories are reproductions or slight rewordings of press releases, PR, and stories from news agencies.
Wire agencies are like the news industry wholesalers - they write stories which are then purchased by news outlets to present to the public, either reproduced word-for-word, or altered and expanded upon depending on the outlet. Different papers and websites have almost exactly the same story in almost exactly the same words because they've all purchased the same story from the same wire agency.
This is far more obvious to see nowadays with online news, but back when people would read just one newspaper, it would be unlikely that the readers would notice that almost the exact same report appeared in multiple papers.
The wire agencies have also suffered from staffing cuts over the years, and the demand for more and cheaper stories has led to a decline in both the range of topics covered and the quality of the stories for sale.
There's an excellent chapter on the various ways the PR industry manipulates and colludes with journalists, and the various tricks PR companies use to create pseudo-news and pseudo-events, with fake grassroots (astro turf) organizations, and fake experts (who are just PR employees). Reporters desperate for stories will happily run something handed to them ready-written by a PR agency and present it as news. Many journalists are in regular contact with PR agencies, requesting stories from them that fit certain themes.
PR companies understand the time pressures that journalists are under, and know that they are extremely unlikely to check whether the story they're given is true. And so, too, do politicians, government press officers, and the intelligence agencies.
There's another excellent chapter on media manipulation by intelligence agencies. If you visit some of the more paranoid far-left places on the Internet, you'll likely encounter people who label everything they disagree with as CIA propaganda, and any media figure (incl. YouTubers) or outlet that is insufficiently left-wing will be accused of being CIA-funded. Davies' exploration of Cold War CIA activity shows there is a bit of grounding to this paranoia.
After 9/11, the US and UK's strategic communications (propaganda) operations were massively expanded. Davies explores this through a few case studies of misinformation, and by attending a conference on the subject and speaking to a lot of people directly involved (on condition that the quotes are not attributed to a name).
One of his sources paints a hilarious-yet-terrifying picture of state disinformation campaigns: all these different agencies and teams, are each putting out their own misinformation, but doing so in a chaotic, uncoordinated fashion, so that false information put out by one agency, another agency will pick up and treat as legitimate intelligence. And that's before we even start to think about the chaos caused by the misinformation campaigns of hostile regimes.
Journalistic time pressures; the inability to check stories; manipulation by PR, politicians, press officers, and propagandists. These are major systemic causes of the falsehood, distortion, and trivia in the media, which ultimately presents a version of reality favourable towards the powerful and the wealthy. And then we can add in the influence of advertisers, owners, and the fact that most journalists come from similar middle class and upwards backgrounds (because getting into the industry often involves unpaid internships), and we can start to see why news media is so full of falsehood, why the reality it presents is so detached from the lived reality of ordinary people.
I was pleased with this book, it made me even more disillusioned with the news media industry.
(The final three chapters are, admittedly, weaker than the rest of the book: they are case studies looking at the decline of particular newspapers - The Sunday Times, The Observer, The Daily Mail - and Davies unfortunately gets a bit too personal in his attacks on specific journalists.)
A lot of mainstream coverage of these topics, by journalists not wanting to attack their own profession and colleagues, has pinned the blame on social media. Davies shows that all that falsehood and distortion is a product of decades-long trends in the news industry. The Internet and social media has accelerated those trends, dialling them up to 11.
He opens the book by explaining that a lot of news industry criticism is done by outsiders who don't actually know how the industry works, so their analyses miss an awful lot and tend to focus on a few basics: the influence of advertisers and owners.
Newspapers want to please their advertisers; owners want their papers to push certain lines. As a result, the news industry presents a version of reality that is acceptable to corporate advertisers and billionaire media moguls. Davies accepts that advertisers and owners do influence editorial decisions, but far less than popular media criticism would have you believe.
Advertisers don't care that much about the political stances of where the adverts show up, as long as people are seeing the adverts. The only time that advertisers properly influence the editorial line is when the story is directly about the advertiser - such as when the Daily Telegraph refused to run stories about HSBC's money laundering, because the bank was one of their big advertisers.
Historically, a lot of newspaper owners wanted their papers to push their political opinions - they were propaganda outlets first and foremost, a way for the wealthy to push for what they thought was positive social and political change. However, through the 20th century, newspapers were bought up by corporate owners who saw the papers primarily as a business which made a profit. They would still influence the paper's line when doing so would benefit the business, but the motivation was profit and business growth - not the desire for particular social and political change.
In order to increase profits, the new owners cut staffing numbers, and wanted the remaining journalists to write more and cheaper stories, which fuelled the rise of 'churnalism' - writing stories based largely on material already written by someone else - and meant a massive reduction in the time that journalists had to properly check their stories.
The quality and veracity of the stories didn't matter, so long as the paper was making a profit. Reporters were encouraged to make stories out of anything they could to fill space - especially on the local papers. I thought a lot about Nottinghamshire Live when reading this book.
Churnalists are reliant on others having written the stories, and so the majority of news stories are reproductions or slight rewordings of press releases, PR, and stories from news agencies.
Wire agencies are like the news industry wholesalers - they write stories which are then purchased by news outlets to present to the public, either reproduced word-for-word, or altered and expanded upon depending on the outlet. Different papers and websites have almost exactly the same story in almost exactly the same words because they've all purchased the same story from the same wire agency.
This is far more obvious to see nowadays with online news, but back when people would read just one newspaper, it would be unlikely that the readers would notice that almost the exact same report appeared in multiple papers.
The wire agencies have also suffered from staffing cuts over the years, and the demand for more and cheaper stories has led to a decline in both the range of topics covered and the quality of the stories for sale.
There's an excellent chapter on the various ways the PR industry manipulates and colludes with journalists, and the various tricks PR companies use to create pseudo-news and pseudo-events, with fake grassroots (astro turf) organizations, and fake experts (who are just PR employees). Reporters desperate for stories will happily run something handed to them ready-written by a PR agency and present it as news. Many journalists are in regular contact with PR agencies, requesting stories from them that fit certain themes.
PR companies understand the time pressures that journalists are under, and know that they are extremely unlikely to check whether the story they're given is true. And so, too, do politicians, government press officers, and the intelligence agencies.
There's another excellent chapter on media manipulation by intelligence agencies. If you visit some of the more paranoid far-left places on the Internet, you'll likely encounter people who label everything they disagree with as CIA propaganda, and any media figure (incl. YouTubers) or outlet that is insufficiently left-wing will be accused of being CIA-funded. Davies' exploration of Cold War CIA activity shows there is a bit of grounding to this paranoia.
After 9/11, the US and UK's strategic communications (propaganda) operations were massively expanded. Davies explores this through a few case studies of misinformation, and by attending a conference on the subject and speaking to a lot of people directly involved (on condition that the quotes are not attributed to a name).
One of his sources paints a hilarious-yet-terrifying picture of state disinformation campaigns: all these different agencies and teams, are each putting out their own misinformation, but doing so in a chaotic, uncoordinated fashion, so that false information put out by one agency, another agency will pick up and treat as legitimate intelligence. And that's before we even start to think about the chaos caused by the misinformation campaigns of hostile regimes.
Journalistic time pressures; the inability to check stories; manipulation by PR, politicians, press officers, and propagandists. These are major systemic causes of the falsehood, distortion, and trivia in the media, which ultimately presents a version of reality favourable towards the powerful and the wealthy. And then we can add in the influence of advertisers, owners, and the fact that most journalists come from similar middle class and upwards backgrounds (because getting into the industry often involves unpaid internships), and we can start to see why news media is so full of falsehood, why the reality it presents is so detached from the lived reality of ordinary people.
I was pleased with this book, it made me even more disillusioned with the news media industry.
(The final three chapters are, admittedly, weaker than the rest of the book: they are case studies looking at the decline of particular newspapers - The Sunday Times, The Observer, The Daily Mail - and Davies unfortunately gets a bit too personal in his attacks on specific journalists.)
June 7, 2014
This is a really important book. I stumbled upon it in the back of another book (I think it was Female Chauvinist Pigs) and when I was working in London I found it in Barnes and Noble and bought it. It was not lost on me that I discovered the TV show ‘The Newsroom’ about two months after I read this book, late one night while staying in New York City with my parents, after I’d finished my stint in London. This book compliments what the show is trying to do.
Davies worked on Fleet Street, home of London’s media, and in Flat Earth News, he takes apart the mess that is the media industry in the modern day, and why not a word of what it spews out can be trusted, not because of the evil desires of the Murdoch’s of the world to direct what we think, but rather to make money. Cutting, and cutting, and cutting back the budgets for journalism teams while expecting faster and faster news coverage in order to ‘get the scoop’ before anyone else has resulted in news that is barely news, human interest crap to keep the masses watching, but providing little actual truthful news about what is happening in the world. Davies details how this has come to be, how pervasive it is, and what media outlets are the worst. There is, in fact, a whole chapter dedicated to the Daily Mail, which is one of my favourite papers to read online, despite the fact that I know its utter trash. This book confirms that view (I still read the Daily Mail – its hilarious!). All in all, along with the noble endeavor of the Newsroom (even if some consider it completely fanciful), this is an important book, highlighting the critical thinking we all need to apply when watching the news.
Davies worked on Fleet Street, home of London’s media, and in Flat Earth News, he takes apart the mess that is the media industry in the modern day, and why not a word of what it spews out can be trusted, not because of the evil desires of the Murdoch’s of the world to direct what we think, but rather to make money. Cutting, and cutting, and cutting back the budgets for journalism teams while expecting faster and faster news coverage in order to ‘get the scoop’ before anyone else has resulted in news that is barely news, human interest crap to keep the masses watching, but providing little actual truthful news about what is happening in the world. Davies details how this has come to be, how pervasive it is, and what media outlets are the worst. There is, in fact, a whole chapter dedicated to the Daily Mail, which is one of my favourite papers to read online, despite the fact that I know its utter trash. This book confirms that view (I still read the Daily Mail – its hilarious!). All in all, along with the noble endeavor of the Newsroom (even if some consider it completely fanciful), this is an important book, highlighting the critical thinking we all need to apply when watching the news.
June 29, 2016
I read the Vietnamese version of this book. Hence, any comment/judgement in this review is only applicable to the translation.
First of all, the publisher successfully managed to publish a book with low translation quality. To think this book is an award-winning work of a well-known journalist, I strongly recommend a re-do of the translation. Many times it was easy to guess the English words for the Vietnamese texts that I was reading (and I was so sure that my reverse translation would be very close to the original texts). Since I desperately tried to get ahold of an English version but to no avail, it is my guessing (again) that the translator had used too much "big words" or at least wrongly chosen words through the whole translation. The level of exaggeration, which was particularly found in the author's description of the characters involved, was too much that I was fed up with the reading after several chapters. More than once had I questioned myself if I was really reading a non-fictious book.
So, please, Nha Nam and the publishing house, do the readers a big favour of having this book retranslated by a capable translator. I have never been an avid fan of Nha Nam (mostly due to the popularity of their cheesy books in the bookstores) but this low quality work could totally butcher the interest of any Vietnamese reader once they bother to buy this book (which clearly is not a best-selling).
First of all, the publisher successfully managed to publish a book with low translation quality. To think this book is an award-winning work of a well-known journalist, I strongly recommend a re-do of the translation. Many times it was easy to guess the English words for the Vietnamese texts that I was reading (and I was so sure that my reverse translation would be very close to the original texts). Since I desperately tried to get ahold of an English version but to no avail, it is my guessing (again) that the translator had used too much "big words" or at least wrongly chosen words through the whole translation. The level of exaggeration, which was particularly found in the author's description of the characters involved, was too much that I was fed up with the reading after several chapters. More than once had I questioned myself if I was really reading a non-fictious book.
So, please, Nha Nam and the publishing house, do the readers a big favour of having this book retranslated by a capable translator. I have never been an avid fan of Nha Nam (mostly due to the popularity of their cheesy books in the bookstores) but this low quality work could totally butcher the interest of any Vietnamese reader once they bother to buy this book (which clearly is not a best-selling).
July 3, 2011
this should be compulsory reading for anyone who reads newspapers or who likes to pass on 'news' items as truth. and while you might think you are aware of the role of PR in current media, or how rupert murdoch is changing global media and politics, this is still a necessary read. davies makes his statements and then backs them up with example after example of how media manipulates and is manipulated. and unfortunately, the conclusion is rather depressing.
i reread the bit on chernobyle, after all the fukushima hype, and was reminded of how fear plays such a big role in misinformation. twenty five years later, and there is no difference in media coverage of nuclear power plants and radiation 'evil'. sigh. and all this while japanese gov't needs to make rational decisions on the future of nuclear power in their country.
the focus is a bit heavy on the brit newspapers, as that is davies' milieu, but the examples he provides are no less worthy of examination. in fact, you might it exhausting after a lengthy reading session. but more info is surely better than less?
it would be interesting to read davies' comments after wikileaks (this book was published in 2008); i should look for his blog...
i reread the bit on chernobyle, after all the fukushima hype, and was reminded of how fear plays such a big role in misinformation. twenty five years later, and there is no difference in media coverage of nuclear power plants and radiation 'evil'. sigh. and all this while japanese gov't needs to make rational decisions on the future of nuclear power in their country.
the focus is a bit heavy on the brit newspapers, as that is davies' milieu, but the examples he provides are no less worthy of examination. in fact, you might it exhausting after a lengthy reading session. but more info is surely better than less?
it would be interesting to read davies' comments after wikileaks (this book was published in 2008); i should look for his blog...
April 20, 2022
Vote: 3,50
Class: P-B1 (FP)
This was a surprising book, which made me open my eyes about what I diary read in the newspaper.
This was also a sad book, because now I know for certain (I already had my doubts!) that much of what I see in the news has very little to do with the truth.
It was a surprising book and it was a good book to read, but it has its flaws:
- it is too long and often slow to come to the point;
- the author too has his personal battles and prejudice: is anger toward Murdoch (maybe justified, but anger all the same!); his prejudice against the Catholic Church and against some specific journals (I had direct information about one only thing he said against the Church in all the book and he was mistaken and he didn't give any evidence!).
This last particular thing left me dawn: how can you criticize all the world for writing news without checking the facts and then write something totally untrue?
But I'll recommend this book because it's quite well done and a real eyes opener.
Class: P-B1 (FP)
This was a surprising book, which made me open my eyes about what I diary read in the newspaper.
This was also a sad book, because now I know for certain (I already had my doubts!) that much of what I see in the news has very little to do with the truth.
It was a surprising book and it was a good book to read, but it has its flaws:
- it is too long and often slow to come to the point;
- the author too has his personal battles and prejudice: is anger toward Murdoch (maybe justified, but anger all the same!); his prejudice against the Catholic Church and against some specific journals (I had direct information about one only thing he said against the Church in all the book and he was mistaken and he didn't give any evidence!).
This last particular thing left me dawn: how can you criticize all the world for writing news without checking the facts and then write something totally untrue?
But I'll recommend this book because it's quite well done and a real eyes opener.
May 18, 2018
This book is too long for itself, the classic example of a should-have-been-a-blogpost book.
Don’t read it, it’s not worth it. Why? Because the whole thing could be summarized in one line, and here it is: “You can never trust any news organization because everything they say is biased”. Just as much as you can’t trust my review because it’s biased.
But look, you don’t need an endless stream of examples to understand that. It is obvious, isn’t it?
Plus, most of the times I felt like it was trying to hit a word count.
I don’t mean to be pedantic but I have to be honest: you will like this if you are still enamored with the concept that news organizations are truthful; if you are not, you won’t like it. And if you have, there’s nothing in here for you other than useless examples and lots of “gotcha’s”, “turns-out’s”, and the like.
If you want to read it really bad, do this: read the prologue and the epilogue, and you’ll get all the value this book has. This structure is classic for book-length blogposts: all the sauce is at the beginning and the end, the middle is just padding.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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