BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?"
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https://twitter.com/BBCNews/status/996417817334382593
(Yes it's from BBC News Uk, where it arguably belongs if you consider it news at all, but it was retweeted by BBC World News, so I still have to see it and it still ends up here.)
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Actress departs sitcom, news of worldwide import. Apparently.
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@blakeyrat said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
but it was retweeted by BBC World News, so I still have to see it and it still ends up here
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@blakeyrat said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
BBC News is supposedly a reputable international news organization which takes great effort to have reports on the ground in every country and provide up-to-date, unbiased, information about world events.
They are neither reputable or unbiased. Their political coverage has been appallingly biased for as long as I can remember. I'd say Chinese state media are a more reliable news source.
I CBA to do any proper searching, but this article has some notable examples from around the recent general election.
It's ironic that they've been biased towards the Conservative government, considering the same government wants to abolish the licence fee and would like to get rid of the BBC.
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@doctorjones Is it the conservatives or are they just literally bootlicking vassals of the royal family? Because goddamned do they do a lot of bootlicking.
I don't know why any real journalist would stay there after the 37th Breaking News "is a dad attending a wedding!??!?!?!!?" alert.
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@blakeyrat both mate, it's absolutely both.
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@doctorjones quoted in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
If you can’t have a free and balanced press, I don’t think you can have a free election.
You have the BBC, the Times, the Sun, the Grauniad, the Daily Fail, and undoubtedly a bunch of lesser-known outlets, espousing a range of viewpoints with varying degrees of respectability, and nobody is seriously trying to shut any of them down. That is a free press, and probably about as balanced anyone could reasonably expect.
As far as a particular newspaper, radio or TV station, website, or whatever, the press has never been unbiased; every news organization has always had an editorial policy of one flavor or another. Two things have changed, though. Once upon a time, they at least paid lip service to keeping that on the editorial page and out of the news. Second, they no longer pretend to have any journalistic integrity; it's very openly all about money, and blatantly pandering to their preferred political base is a way of ensuring a steady revenue stream.
While this is deplorable from the viewpoint of someone with a strong sense of traditional journalistic ethics, as long as a variety of media are presenting a broad range of viewpoints, it's not necessarily fatal to the democratic process. It's not good, as it probably tends to reinforce the polarization of society, but the sky is probably not falling.
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@doctorjones said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
"I think it calls into question the fairness of the election. If you can’t have a free and balanced press, I don’t think you can have a free election."
That speaks more about the population than the media.
I get that media can lie about facts, and that can affect opinions, but more often the bias in media has success just telling people what to think, even if they straight up tell the truth, and the suggested thought is non-sequitur.
So, you have a balanced press, both telling lies in opposite directions, and the population falls for it on either side, you don't really have a fair or even free election, you just have a more creative way of herding sheep.
IOW, that statement betrays the truth of the situation, which is, without even having to alter facts, the media controls the minds of the people, and the speaker fully recognizes it.
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@hardwaregeek said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
You have the BBC, the Times, the Sun, the Grauniad, the Daily Fail, and undoubtedly a bunch of lesser-known outlets, espousing a range of viewpoints with varying degrees of respectability, and nobody is seriously trying to shut any of them down.
The main issue is that their funding (within the UK) is predicated on their being as balanced as possible; they specifically promised that in return for the right to be funded by a tax. If it wasn't for that, nobody would care anything like as much (except for the usual axe-grinders).
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@dkf said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
tax
Ah, yes. Britain, the magical land where you need a license to watch television. There are few things that make me laugh that much.
Edit: I opened the website just to laugh harder. I succeeded. You need a TV license to watch YouTube. On a desktop computer. And apparently whether or not you need to plug the device in is the deciding factor on whether or not you can be covered by your parents' TV license. What a country.
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@boomzilla said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
@hardwaregeek said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
Deadpool I understand, but what did Celine do?
I heard she sang her song from the movie on one of the morning shows (Today? Good Morning America? something like that) while someone in a Deadpool costume danced around on stage or something. Kind of silly, I'm told.
The music video for the song has a deadpool doing deadpooly things. With the usual fourth wall breaking banter.
It's at least worth a small giggle, since it's a step away from the megafamous taking themselves so seriously you'd wonder if they believe they shit gold.
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https://twitter.com/BBCWorld/status/997483794486759434
This wedding shit is ENDLESS. Between CNN and BBC I know about this random jackass's wedding than I do about my brother's. And I want to know exactly zero things about it.
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You're not alone
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@blakeyrat said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
This wedding shit is ENDLESS. Between CNN and BBC I know about this random jackass's wedding than I do about my brother's. And I want to know exactly zero things about it.
So ignore CNN and BBC. It's not that difficult. And yes, I agree that Royal Anything coverage is excessive.
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@boomzilla But I do want breaking news if it's actual news. Have a tip of a good Twitter account I could get that from? (I think I asked that in the FP.)
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@blakeyrat said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
But I do want breaking news if it's actual news.
Is there really an upside to this?
@blakeyrat said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
Have a tip of a good Twitter account I could get that from?
Have you tried https://twitter.com/BreakingNews ?
It's NBC and after a bit of scrolling everything in there seems like newsworthy stuff, even if you don't care about, e.g., bus crashes in NJ.
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@boomzilla I'll give it a go, thanks for the tip. I don't normally think of NBC as "good" in the news arena, but we'll see what happens I guess.
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They really do not even know the definition of the word "news".
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@blakeyrat said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
They really do not even know the definition of the word "news".
UK Home Office is completely shit. It should be news but isn't, because there's multiple stories on it on each of 365 days a year (with one day off in leap years for good behaviour, I guess). Underfunded, overpaid, incompetent, and malicious, all in one stinking package of not-fit-for-purpose crapness. But the BBC doesn't want to report that accurately, because they currently consider pushing propaganda for the government to be their most important task. (Also, their real local news is especially bad at the moment; it's like they've only got F-rank sports reporters on staff…)
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@dkf said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
But the BBC doesn't want to report that accurately, because they currently consider pushing propaganda for the government to be their most important task.
Based on the last few weeks, I'm pretty sure they're the royal family's personal mouthpiece.
... why does the UK have one of those "royal family" things again? Fuck, the French murdered theirs 200 years ago, and they're French. (And Washington State never had one in the first place.)
@dkf said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
it's like they've only got F-rank sports reporters on staff…
Like literally that. Including the above "story", they retweeted 4 sports things this morning, one of them was a Facebook meme video where some dude in a bus catches a little plastic horn which I guess is meme-worthy if you live in a drab, horrible country.
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@blakeyrat said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
... why does the UK have one of those "royal family" things again?
I will hazard a guess: to generate topics for news.
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@blakeyrat Oh man I posted that one before scrolling down to this one:
Wow that would be timely news, in 1986.
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Also, why did Twitter oneboxing break?
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@twelvebaud said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
Also, why did Twitter oneboxing break?
Considering nobody involved with NodeBB tests anything ever, it's more impressive when stuff isn't broken.
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@blakeyrat said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
... why does the UK have one of those "royal family" things again? Fuck, the French murdered theirs 200 years ago, and they're French. (And Washington State never had one in the first place.)
Toby Faire, this act kicked off one of the worst periods of horror and barbarism in modern-ish history, a time so dark and brutal that its own leaders referred to it as the Reign of Terror.
Given that context, I can see why their neighbors might be a bit reluctant to do the same.
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@masonwheeler said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
that its own leaders referred to it as the Reign of Terror.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hn1VxaMEjRU
Are we the baddies?
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Farm animal makes noise.
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@blakeyrat That's a good film. I'd be annoyed if a sheep interrupted it too
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@pie_flavor said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
You need a TV license to watch YouTube. On a desktop computer. And apparently whether or not you need to plug the device in is the deciding factor on whether or not you can be covered by your parents' TV license.
Wait, what? Can you link that so I can laugh also?
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@pie_flavor said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
@polygeekery
http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/check-if-you-need-one/for-your-home/students-aud1That seems to be referring to Youtube's TV service though, not just plain old youtube videos.
Live TV means any programme you watch or record as it’s being shown on TV or live on an online TV service. Find out more about watching live TV.
An online TV service is any streaming or smart TV service, website or app that lets you watch live TV over the internet. Popular services include BBC iPlayer, ITV Hub, Channel 4 Watch Live, All 4, Sky Go, Virgin Media, Now TV, BT TV, Apple TV, YouTube, Amazon Instant Video, YouTube and Roku.
It's still stupid, but not quite as stupid as you were implying. They also list Youtube twice in the list.
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@boomzilla said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
They also list Youtube twice in the list.
It generates twice the amount of traffic as the others combined
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This doesn't make sense until you remember that the UK is a garbage class-based society, so it's obviously news is a "higher" person does a "lower" person's job. Because it's always 1600 AD in the UK.
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@blakeyrat Isn't it always news when a politician does actual constructive work?
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https://twitter.com/BBCWorld/status/1004672482660507648
More social media viral video bullshit being served as "news". Sorry, I asked for "news" not "grandma's Facebook".
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"Person found dead" is approaching news. But I just have to point out how sycophantic BBC News is to royal families. WTF?
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@blakeyrat said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
"Person found dead" is approaching news. But I just have to point out how sycophantic BBC News is to royal families. WTF?
A dead fashion designer was big news around here.
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@boomzilla Frankly, I'm glad anytime suicide gets news coverage, although it would be nice if you didn't have to be famous first. Apparently a lot of people liked her purses.
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@thegoryone said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
They're all still being paid full wages and expenses.
I've long advocated for a system where we would pay politicians more if they would do less.
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@thegoryone To be fair, if I knew I could get paid my full wage indefinitely without having to do anything, I'm pretty sure my productivity would also drop to near zero.
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@thegoryone said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
We've now had no Government in place in Northern Ireland for over 500 days
Well, that's world news if I have ever heard it.
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@thegoryone said in BBC News and the case of the "why the fuck is this news?":
We've now had no Government in place in Northern Ireland for over 500 days
"That government is best which governs least..."
— Henry David Thoreau (not Thomas Jefferson, as often attributed)