17 November 2008

Should the CT calm down?

| johnboy
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Hardly a day goes by without a reader submitting something strange from the Canberra Times website.

Normally we refrain. But this morning provides two headlines which really need looking at:

L.A burns to the ground
‘Perfect storm’ as fires raze California

The State of California has been ‘razed’? My dictionary defines raze as to “completely destroy”. 36,553,215 people completely destroyed?

The whole city of Los Angeles burned “to the ground”?

I know we’re prone to hyperbole ourselves here. But really guys, get a grip. Maybe a thousand houses is a tragedy to be sure and great pictures no doubt. But it’s not the complete devastation of one of the world’s biggest economies.

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California “burns to the ground” like clockwork every year.. yawnn

The CT is good for exactly two things: starting my backyard chiminea and cleaning up dog shit.
In the CT’s defence, it’s a pretty good birdcage liner, too.

VYBerlinaV8_the_one_they_all_copy3:02 pm 17 Nov 08

The CT is good for exactly two things: starting my backyard chiminea and cleaning up dog shit.

I wonder if they’ll lift the “Robbie” story?

tylersmayhem1:56 pm 17 Nov 08

My guess is that the editor of the CT, is the same person who posts the news titles and content on Yahoo7. I have no idea how they get away with some of the spin they put on their headlines.

CT are pretty good…at lifting RA stories and doing some “investigation” to make it their own story.

They had mobile homes and they didn’t move them??

Over 500 of those houses are “mobile homes”, which while terrible if it is your residence that goes up in smoke, isn’t quite the same scale as 500 houses.

Aussies can claim some blame for the fires they have in California being so vicious; we gave them gum trees!

It should be compulsory for all reports of bushfires to include a simple map, so remote relatives can decide whether to ring or shrug…

Have you heard of the internet?? The Governor of California site provides maps of the fire areas.

By the way, just because there are (as yet) no fatalities doesn’t mean it is not a devastating fire. Over one thousand houses destroyed – clearly this has never happened to you.

The CT evidently can’t afford real journalists or even graduates of English, it seems. There’s too many semi-illiterate people in the media, buggering up the language. I imagine that for “raze”, they’d have been better of using a word like “ravage”. They could use “de-racinate” too, if they knew the word (which they probably don’t).

People read the CT? We *do* have RiotACT.

(When i read the title, I had to think about what ‘CT’ was)

After glancing at the “LA Burns to the Ground” headline I hastily foraged through my pockets for the funds to buy what I thought was surely to be the biggest story since 9/11 only to find out there wasn’t a single fatality. Not that I was hoping for large-scale carnage, but Jesus Christ CT, what have you been collectively smoking?

Consider it revenge – during the particularly bad bushfires we had a number of years back (late 90’s? Can’t recall exactly) a couple of US tabloids ran with the headline “Australia Burns from Coast to Coast”. Razing one little state is nothing by comparison 🙂

I just get annoyed whenever someone prints stories about bushfires in California; it happens several times a year, and they always seem to be in Orange County, which is HUGE, and worse, borders on my brother’s county, so I never know whether to ring or not (and I think he gets sick of the whole family ringing at the same time to find out that the fires are hundreds of Ks away!).

It should be compulsory for all reports of bushfires to include a simple map, so remote relatives can decide whether to ring or shrug…

I think they need to fire whoever looks after their website. I didn’t know that the US election, the LA wildfires, the SE Queensland storms, or the US withdrawal from Iraq where local Canberra events. But for some reason they make it under the local news section.

There are enough other news outlets that have snubbed Canberra for anything bar scandals in the house on a hill. (news.com.au, I’m looking at you) surly the “Canberra Times” could pretend to actually give a shit on what happens here in Canberra.

It’s like a print version of “A Current Affair”

Wide Boy Jake said :

54-11 said :

I must say that I am getting a bit jack of the CT. It has been displaying a very strong anti-Green focus lately, particularly in it’s editorials. . . If I want that sort of opinion, I’ll listen to John Laws (who at least doesn’t pretend he’s anything other than an ignorant shock-jock).

Anything anti-green is commonsense and displaying reality rather than naive starry-eyed idealism. As for John Laws, he retired a year ago and hasn’t been on the radio since November last year. Just go back to your moronic greenie pap, it’s obvious you are completely out of touch.

Hmmmm. Now who is out of touch? Is it someone who recognises that the Greens won the balance of power at the last ACT election with a massive increase in their vote, or is it the foaming-at-the-mouth John Laws fan?

Wide Boy Jake10:21 am 17 Nov 08

54-11 said :

I must say that I am getting a bit jack of the CT. It has been displaying a very strong anti-Green focus lately, particularly in it’s editorials. . . If I want that sort of opinion, I’ll listen to John Laws (who at least doesn’t pretend he’s anything other than an ignorant shock-jock).

Anything anti-green is commonsense and displaying reality rather than naive starry-eyed idealism. As for John Laws, he retired a year ago and hasn’t been on the radio since November last year. Just go back to your moronic greenie pap, it’s obvious you are completely out of touch.

And they are so lazy – they run articles from other papers about national surveys and can’t even be bothered highlighting the ACT information.

And they run press release info from govt, and don’t even bother to read their own past articles on the subject, even when the previous articles were only weeks ago.

Eg “great improvements in health waiting lists” – failing to mention that we are still equal last in waiting list times nationally.

Not to mention the endless typos and teenage grammar.

I’ll stop now…

The Canberra Times ceased to be worth reading a long time ago – round about when it was bought out by Rural Press, who saw fit to change it from a respected paper that was nationally respected as a leader in political reporting and commentary, into a broadsheet version of the Belconnen Chronicle.

I remember the day that the front page of the CT was dominated by a large photo of a line-dancing horse. That was pretty much the end for me.

I must say that I am getting a bit jack of the CT. It has been displaying a very strong anti-Green focus lately, particularly in it’s editorials. It does the old push-poll trick of putting up a straw man as an argument, then leaves it hanging. It also referred in an editorial recently to developments around the TCH, saying that community groups need to get more involved, yet they denigrate those people who put up an opinion.

I just think that somewhere along the line the capacity for genuine analysis has dried up, and they don’t know how to engage with their readership at the right level. They descend into tabloidism, as noted by JB, and rely on worn out hacks like Ian Warden for in-depth opinion. If I want that sort of opinion, I’ll listen to John Laws (who at least doesn’t pretend he’s anything other than an ignorant shock-jock).

Even Jack Waterford, who I usually enjoy, has lost that ability.

About 2000 firefighters, using helicopters, bulldozers and engines, were battling the fire…

Ahhh, engines. Beats the old pedal powered bulldozers…

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