Chris Boese's Weblog

I love this column by Ed Cone

It doesn't take any sides, but rather speaks to the polarized rhetoric, or even polemic, that seems to characterize much American discourse, both online (I say, having witnesses such things in a microcosm in listservs since just after 9/11) and in the mainstream media.

It also reminds me of a scholarly book by Gilbert and Mulcay, a chapter on "Accounting for Error" in the book listed below, where scientists attempt to deal with scientific theories based on different models than the ones they are using (think Kuhn, think Newtonian vs Einsteinian vs Quark physics, for instance).

In the book, they document these highly rational beings using the same polarized rhetoric to account for their colleague's disagreement on things that to them should be obvious, or foundational, or at least not up for debate.

Gilbert, G. N. and M. Mulkay (1984). Opening Pandora's Box: A Sociological Analysis of Scientists' Discourse. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

Here are some quick and pithy excerpts from this terrific column:

Don't talk while I'm interrupting

Edward Cone
News & Record
8-22-04

On television and the Web, talk radio and the pages of newspapers, multiplex screens and the Senate floor, the art of persuasion has given way to bluster and tirade.

Well, if you're going to do it, you might as well do it right, so I'm offering up this guide to modern political speech. It's a bipartisan, multimedia template that works for any point of view on the partisan spectrum, in any venue. Forget talking points -- these are shouting points. Repeat after me:

I am right, and you are wrong.

You are not just wrong, you and those like you are intellectually insufficient and morally suspect. Why do you hate our country? Think of the children. God said to tell you that he is not pleased.

Stop interrupting me while I'm shouting. Feel the crushing weight of my arguments, which are built on logic and constructed from facts that are sturdy and sound. You just whine about how you feel.

Your information is flawed because it came from a source I know to be aligned with the forces of darkness. I am able to parse the media and edit what I see for bias and spin, while you are a gullible sap who believes everything you see on the TV or read in that wholly discredited rag you just quoted.

[...]

My candidate is a hero. Yours is a zero. One cannot compare the youthful hijinks of my guy with the youthful wantonness of yours. My guy makes mistakes, yours commits sins of the worst kind. And likes it. My guy was misquoted, or simply misspoke, while your guy was caught on tape saying exactly what I expected him to say.

[...]

Read the Constitution. It clearly shows whatever it is that I want it to show. Context, schmontext. A nugget, a morsel, a soundbite plucked from any source can serve to make my point. Your copy of the Bill of Rights is missing a few. The flag waves for me; tremble in its shadow.

[...]

I disagree with what you say, and I will defend to the death my right to tell you so. Jerk.

OK, so I know I'm a nerd...

But can I help it that news like this gets me excited?

Hasselblad and Imacon merge
Tuesday, 17 August 2004 20:40 GMT < Prev Next >


Hasselblad has announced the acquisition and merger with Imacon, the digital cameraback and scanner company. The new company will be called Hasselblad Imacon and will be clearly targeting the professional digital market. Christian Poulsen, founder of Imacon and new CEO of Hasselblad said, "Both companies are committed to producing the highest quality products and the integration of established technological expertise and vision will ensure we maximise penetration for both new and existing products in the marketplace."

Press Release:

A BRAVE NEW WORLD: HASSELBLAD AND IMACON MERGE TO TAKE ON THE PROFESSIONAL DIGITAL MARKET

8/12/2004 - Shriro Sweden, the holding company of Victor Hasselblad AB, and part of the Hong Kong-headquartered Shriro Group, has announced the acquisition of leading international high-end scanner and digital cameraback manufacturer, Imacon. The move will see Imacon and Hasselblad merge to accelerate Hasselblad’s ambitions in the professional digital photographic sector, and creates the first single source supplier for digital photography at the top end of the professional photographic market.

The Executive Team of the merged Hasselblad Imacon company, Lars Pappila, Tom Olesen and Christian Poulsen, together with Mr. Michael Binns, second from the right, Managing Director of Shriro Pacific Ltd.

Christian Poulsen, founder of Imacon, and CEO of the newly-enlarged Hasselblad says: “Hasselblad has long been synonymous with quality in the field of analogue photography and Imacon is recognised as leading the way in terms of innovative technologies in the high-end digital photographic sectors.

This new company presents us with tremendous opportunities to move forward and is the most exciting development in the field of professional digital photography for many years. It will significantly lower the barriers to entry and allow more photographers than ever before to realise the quality, versatility and performance of our high-end digital solutions.”

Says Lars Pappila, managing director of Hasselblad’s Swedish HQ: “The professional photographic market has truly entered the digital age and Hasselblad needed to further develop its digital offering to ensure it maintains its leading position in the photographic sector.

We had been working closely with Imacon on developing professional digital solutions for the Ixpress digital camera back and the Hasselblad H1. During this process we discovered a number of natural synergies between the two companies.

We both share a similar culture of passion for quality based on strong core Scandinavian business values and recognise the extraordinary benefits of combining our respective experience in these fields. Using a combination of leading edge technology and strong photographic heritage, the new organisation will enable us to increase the digitalisation for Hasselblad customers, and introduce new customers to truly advanced professional digital solutions.”

Mr Poulsen concludes: “Both companies are committed to producing the highest quality products and the integration of established technological expertise and vision will ensure we maximise penetration for both new and existing products in the marketplace. The newly enlarged Hasselblad is the only company in the market today that can not only optimise the quality and value of the captured image, but also dramatically increase the pleasure of capturing the image itself – the true essence of all photography.”

What I'm reading right now...

oreilly.com -- Online Catalog:

We the Media

Dan Gillmor has some cool stuff going on over at O'Reilly...

I got a lot of the same stuff in the prologue of a book in Argentina on Carolina Podesta's OJO Iraq warblog. The prologue was translated into Spanish, but Carolina has helpfully provided the full English version up at her web site. Very kind of her... here's the link to it:

Prologue of the book "Ojo, ver desde Irak"
by Christine Boese.

Here's the full description of Dan Gillmor's book:

We the Media (hardback) Full Description Grassroots journalists are dismantling Big Media's monopoly on the news, transforming it from a lecture to a conversation. Not content to accept the news as reported, these readers-turned-reporters are publishing in real time to a worldwide audience via the Internet. The impact of their work is just beginning to be felt by professional journalists and the newsmakers they cover. In We the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People, nationally known business and technology columnist Dan Gillmor tells the story of this emerging phenomenon, and sheds light on this deep shift in how we make and consume the news.

We the Media is essential reading for all participants in the news cycle:

Consumers learn how they can become producers of the news. Gillmor lays out the tools of the grassroots journalist's trade, including personal Web journals (called weblogs or blogs), Internet chat groups, email, and cell phones. He also illustrates how, in this age of media consolidation and diminished reporting, to roll your own news, drawing from the array of sources available online and even over the phone.

Newsmakers politicians, business executives, celebrities get a wake-up call. The control that newsmakers enjoyed in the top-down world of Big Media is seriously undermined in the Internet Age. Gillmor shows newsmakers how to successfully play by the new rules and shift from control to engagement.

Journalists discover that the new grassroots journalism presents opportunity as well as challenge to their profession. One of the first mainstream journalists to have a blog, Gillmor says, "My readers know more than I do, and that's a good thing." In We the Media, he makes the case to his colleagues that, in the face of a plethora of Internet-fueled news vehicles, they must change or become irrelevant.

At its core, We the Media is a book about people. People like Glenn Reynolds, a law professor whose blog postings on the intersection of technology and liberty garnered him enough readers and influence that he became a source for professional journalists. Or Ben Chandler, whose upset Congressional victory was fueled by contributions that came in response to ads on a handful of political blogs. Or Iraqi blogger Zayed, whose Healing Irag blog (healingiraq.blogspot.com) scooped Big Media. Or acridrabbit, who inspired an online community to become investigative reporters and discover that the dying Kaycee Nichols sad tale was a hoax. Give the people tools to make the news, We the Media asserts, and they will.

Journalism in the 21st century will be fundamentally different from the Big Media that prevails today. We the Media casts light on the future of journalism, and invites us all to be part of it.