Media Criticism

A Potential Waste

Zeyad is coming to the US. That’s good.

He’s going to study journalism. That, not so much.

Jeff says that he’s a “born journalist.” If so, why need he study journalism?

Will he learn things in journalism school that actually make him a better journalist? Will he learn things that make him a worse one? Will he have to unlearn some of them to find his full potential?

No secret–I’m not a big fan of the major of journalism. I think of it as a metadegree, a pseudodegree, and one that in fact is probably almost as damaging and counterproductive as a degree in education, in which all of the training is about how to convey information, whereas very little actual information to convey is learned. Were it up to me, neither of these would even exist as majors, or schools.

If he persists in this, I hope that he’ll be sure to take some classes that aren’t required in a journalism curriculum, like statistics, and history, and logic, and solid training in basic science. And for the history classes, I hope that he can find a non-leftist instructor.

Good luck to him.

[Update a couple minutes later]

Here’s a relevant piece in today’s Journal (sorry, subscribers only, but I think it goes free after a week):

…a band of Democratic-leaning thinkers wants to reclaim the issue. Their proposal, unveiled yesterday, is simple: Get rid of bad teachers and reward good ones.

Simple, in this case, is significant on two counts. First, the proposal publicly confronts teachers’ unions, an influential Democratic Party constituency, with the fact that bad teachers are part of the problem…

…[it] rests on several arguments: that the current practice of demanding certification based on teacher-training courses has outlived its usefulness, that routinely granting teachers lifetime tenure after two or three years is stupid, and that student test scores and other systemic ways to evaluate teachers are now good enough to act on.

Good for them. And good luck with that. I can already hear the howls and cries of “treason” from the NEA.

Social Commentary

Recognition

The new Battlestar Galactica (not the old one) has won a Peabody Award, a well-deserved first for the Sci Fi Channel.

I think this is a good sign of the mainstreaming of this important genre of literature, for too long ghettoized, when it’s becoming more and more relevant to the technological future rapidly closing in.

Space

Space Tourism=Space Settlement

We start with the richest among us only able to afford a few minute or a few days in space. As we get richer and space gets cheaper, we can have space studios, then space apartments, space mansions, space palaces and space shopping malls. People live where they are. The spectrum from tourism to settlement is just a measure of time. Where does space tourism leave off and space settlement begin? Two-week time shares are probably tourism. One-way tickets, definitely settlement. What’s the down payment on a one-year lease?

Space Science

Tweaking The Drake Equation

Planet formation may be much more common than previously thought:

Scientists say the latest finding should shed light on how planetary systems form.

“It shows that planet formation is really ubiquitous in the universe. It’s a very robust process and can happen in all sorts of unexpected environments,” said lead researcher Deepto Chakrabarty, an astrophysicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

War Commentary

Tell Us Something We Don’t Know

Not all’s well in terrorist paradise. Osama bin Laden apparently has a big mouth.

Mohammed, held in American custody at an unknown location since his capture in Pakistan three years ago, portrays himself as a brilliant terrorist manager.

Throughout the discussion, he is almost contemptuous of the wealthy bin Laden, who held the purse strings.

According to Mohammed, bin Laden lacked inspiration and vision. The Saudi failed to understand the basic security requirements of terrorist plots, such as keeping silent about impending attacks. Mohammed cites bin Laden’s decision to inform a group of visitors to his Afghan headquarters that he was about to launch a major attack on American interests.

Then he told trainee terrorists at the al-Farooq training camp “to pray for the success of a major operation involving 20 martyrs”.

Mohammed and a fellow terrorist manager, Mohammed Atef, who was later killed in an American air attack, were so concerned that they asked bin Laden to shut up.

I guess he never heard the phrase, “loose lips sink ships.”

War Commentary

Tell Us Something We Don’t Know

Not all’s well in terrorist paradise. Osama bin Laden apparently has a big mouth.

Mohammed, held in American custody at an unknown location since his capture in Pakistan three years ago, portrays himself as a brilliant terrorist manager.

Throughout the discussion, he is almost contemptuous of the wealthy bin Laden, who held the purse strings.

According to Mohammed, bin Laden lacked inspiration and vision. The Saudi failed to understand the basic security requirements of terrorist plots, such as keeping silent about impending attacks. Mohammed cites bin Laden’s decision to inform a group of visitors to his Afghan headquarters that he was about to launch a major attack on American interests.

Then he told trainee terrorists at the al-Farooq training camp “to pray for the success of a major operation involving 20 martyrs”.

Mohammed and a fellow terrorist manager, Mohammed Atef, who was later killed in an American air attack, were so concerned that they asked bin Laden to shut up.

I guess he never heard the phrase, “loose lips sink ships.”

War Commentary

Tell Us Something We Don’t Know

Not all’s well in terrorist paradise. Osama bin Laden apparently has a big mouth.

Mohammed, held in American custody at an unknown location since his capture in Pakistan three years ago, portrays himself as a brilliant terrorist manager.

Throughout the discussion, he is almost contemptuous of the wealthy bin Laden, who held the purse strings.

According to Mohammed, bin Laden lacked inspiration and vision. The Saudi failed to understand the basic security requirements of terrorist plots, such as keeping silent about impending attacks. Mohammed cites bin Laden’s decision to inform a group of visitors to his Afghan headquarters that he was about to launch a major attack on American interests.

Then he told trainee terrorists at the al-Farooq training camp “to pray for the success of a major operation involving 20 martyrs”.

Mohammed and a fellow terrorist manager, Mohammed Atef, who was later killed in an American air attack, were so concerned that they asked bin Laden to shut up.

I guess he never heard the phrase, “loose lips sink ships.”

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!