ISSUES ... The Media ...
How the media covered the Meander Dam ...
The three daily newspapers were surprisingly similar in the content,
sources and context of their coverage ...
This suggests a reactive rather than proactive form of journalism where the
form of the news is created at a statewide level
by lobbying from various groups ...
NICK FITZGERALD, post-grad, Tas Uni
Scoop of the Century
... What do we do? Ignacio Ramonet, Le Monde diplomatique's director, proposes a "fifth estate" that monitors,
analyses and makes a public issue of media mono-news and monoculture
...
Scoop of the Century JOHN PILGER... Do not miss
And, Don't Miss ...
JOHN PILGER... in OxfordStudent
And, Don't Miss ...
DON WATSON ... When words hide the truth
The Wedge ... and the Fifth Estate
What better way ... to shaft the Labor Government ...
JASON LOVELL
Tasmanian Media ... A big serve ...
Having read the Tasmanian media over the past two weeks I have to say my fears keep being realised ...
JANE PURCELL, HAG
Woe to you, plagiarists ...
...
May you all be relegated to a scrolling newsbar on a long cancelled but oft-repeated late night reality TV program ...
WARREN PERSO
Piffle, present and past ...
Our journalist hero, David Meredith, a tortured soul, is totally disillusioned by what he has to churn out for his editors and the rapacious maws of the printing press ...
LEXIE KON
I don't like columnists ...
The acerbic Mr Perso takes aim ...
WARREN PERSO
When the Editor is the Defendant:
Freedom of the Press in Van Diemen's Land
Bent was sued for libel for the "Gideonite of
tyranny" editorial and the Honduras editorials.
The public saw the suit as a persecution of the
champion of the free press by a tyrannical
governor and a public meeting was called by
"Friends of the Liberty of the Press" which
raised 250 pounds for Bent. The first trial was
abandoned and another held in April 1826 before a
military jury of seven officers, all in the pay
of the Government, not surprisingly found Bent
guilty and he was sentenced to six months'
imprisonment and fined 518 pounds ...
By the 1830s the public was under no illusions to
the regime of Arthur - cronyism was rife. His
nephew, Chief Police Magistrate Captain Matthew
Forster, and Colonial Secretary John "Warming
Pan" Montagu, were hated and feared and much
resented for their blatant misuse of convict
labour and public materials ...
NICOLA GOC
Tasmania has been singled out ...
It is unacceptable to treat Tasmania with such apparent disinterest.
Judy Tierney filed regular reports to the national 7.30 Report,
bringing an important local insight and perspective to Tasmanian issues.
Since her retirement, all Tasmanian-sourced stories have
been packaged interstate by reporters a long way from the flow of events
...
THE FOURTH ESTATE
The Media Ball in absinthe ... The Gov at the Ball ...
What the Governor said about Saddam etc ...
PLUS:
But why two awards ... why couldn't they be separated. The "F"
for forestry word doesn't have anything to do with it does it, Federal????
HAG
Journalism it is NOT
...
I am an avid reader of, and occasional contributor to, your website. I find
it informative, entertaining and amusing, BUT JOURNALISM IT IS NOT.
You make no pretence to investigation, truth, balance, fairness or
independence. According to one's view, tasmaniantimes.com is an e-mail turnaround outlet
for the loony Left or the rabid Right, depending where on the political
spectrum you place environmentalism
... BRUCE MONTGOMERY, Letters
tasmaniantimes.com is one site where
(at present) the editorial policy does allow for the kind of debate where the
truth can come out in debate over a realistic timeframe, and where the balance
and fairness can be there if enough people from different movements
want to use the forum for that purpose...
It's hard to be a hack
...
In servitude to Rupert, stroked by spin doctors and pilloried by pundits at
Tasmaniantimes and guilty as charged on all counts...
JOHN BRIGGS
Read the ABC's Editorial Charter, Mr Perso
...
Huge forest rally, Hobart, March 13 ...
Where's the money coming from? (2) ...
Don't kid yourself (2)
...
It's delusion, George
...
Forum on water ...
...
THE AGORA
New Journalism, Old Journalism ... or a Lament for the Lost Estate
...
If there were environmental
reporters out there doing a superlative job of upholding the old-school
journalism standards the issue could so desperately do with, I too would be
shaking my head in disbelief that a mere homemade subjective discussion
website was not only winning its creator awards for "journalism" but also
getting quoted so often in the mainstream media ...
etc ...
etc ...
THE DEBATE
Jim Bacon and the media debate
...
Was it right for Tasmanian media to delay publication
of the terrible news of Premier Jim Bacon's battle with lung cancer?
THE DEBATE
What you think
...
Reader opinion on the decision to delay
publication of the terrible news of Premier Jim Bacon's battle with lung cancer.
THE LETTERS
Controlling the Pack
...
Journalists are herd animals. Conventional wisdom
sometimes turns on a dime, even though the basic
facts were hidden in plain view all along. Robert Kuttner, writing in American Prospect
...
LINDSAY TUFFIN
How Entertainment Hijacked Journalism
...
As a besieged media fights for survival,
the first casualty is editorial integrity ...
ERIC BEECHER
Hard Truths
HILARY McPHEE, former publisher and Chair
of the Australia Council, is Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow at the University of Melbourne. She recently spoke about Hard Truths at the Age Melbourne Writers’ Festival.
Cry Freedom
After 20 years of Freedom of Information are
Australians freer and better informed? MATTHEW RICKETSON
The power of words...
On the face of it, the creative written word might also not be expected to hold sway over the power politics of economic might ...
DAVID OWEN
A win for the little guy
Gordon Craven 1, State Government 0...
A cry from the heart (4)
LIBBY LESTER was way ahead of every other journalist or media outlet
in recognising the significance of the burning of Australia's biggest tree ... an extraordinary failure of
care which drew this emotional
response from botanist
Alan Gray: ``I have a particular feeling about Eucalyptus regnans, which are second in
size only to Californian redwoods, and I take it almost as a personal
affront to see this happen to a tree of such magnitude. I consider things like this should be a national monument, anywhere else in
the world it would be a glorified monument ...." But in Tasmania...
A little encouragement
How A FEW PEOPLE reacted to the State Government's threat of legal action on tasmaniantimes...
Big story
LIBBY LESTER asks a highly-relevant question about news values...
The Truth About Monty
A PRESS RELEASE reveals where veteran Tasmanian journalist and former Tasmanian
bureau chief for The Australian
Bruce Montgomery is heading ...
Here we stand
While readers in New York, London and Paris can read about the tragedy
of Tasmania in major articles in the New York Times, the Observer and Le Figaro,
you won't read about it in Tasmania if Tasmanian Premier Jim Bacon has his way.
LINDSAY TUFFIN
Legal threat on ....How France's Le Figaro sees Tasmania
The State Government threatens legal action against tasmaniantimes.com for running
the Le Figaro article LINDSAY TUFFIN
The greedy Right
Recent claims of bias at the ABC are wrong. Worse, they're
frightening ... ROBERT MANNE
tasmaniantimes ... self-absorbed and garbled
GREG BARNS takes the lash to tasmaniantimes.com... and gets some responses
Letters
Tasmanian media ... on the outside looking in ...
The issue is this: can our island democracy harness its small
but vibrant pool of intellectual, media and policy commentators in such
a way that they can make a real contribution to debate within the state, or will the pursuit
of political power and the enticements of the corporate world leave us with a small elite of insiders
amongst a host of exiled outsiders? RICK SNELL responds to Michael Lester's “Tasmanian media … a defence”,
Tasmanian media ... a defence
Michael Lester wields his broadsword in defence of Tasmanian media, and government...
MICHAEL LESTER ...
From Dark Victory to faint hope - letting go of spin
...What happens when you add to this diluted mixture a government that is overly sensitive
to criticism and prefers a take-no-prisoners approach to public discourse? What happens when
the media corps becomes dependent on hand feeding and quickly distils the lessons from when the attack dogs
are occasionally set free barking their threats of defamation, loss of access and no more invitations to cosy get-togethers?
What happens when media managers squeeze the margins on space, time, costs and support?
RICK SNELL ...
Censorship and suppression in Australian media...
While
tasmaniantimes.com has had its own experience of oppressive responses to freedom of debate and freedom to dissent
Here we stand, Threat... the issue of censorship has been exercising
the creative minds at the Sydney Writers Festival. Here's the link to Crikey.com.au's account of the incredibly
important debate...
Journalism ... fourth estate of crisis?
We have to convince news organisations that there is more to journalism than
just profits and share price. Slick accountancy and cost-cutting are not going to win
an editor or a proprietor a place in the history books.
PHILLIP KNIGHTLEY (Required reading)
LINKS ...
Cross-media ownership: what Paul Keating reckons ...AND Phillip Knightley
on the death of investigative reporting.
AND Martin Flanagan on reportage.
AND Wokka Hadfield
takes us to the rugby...
LINKS
Media, Hare-Clark ... and does size matter...?
Has Tasmania - and Tasmanian media - suffered from a smaller House ...?
MICHAEL LESTER
Rescuing Hare-Clark
How Tasmania’s media has suffered from a smaller House ...
RUSSELL KELLY
Sermon from the Mont (2)
...
Monty stirs passions with his exploration of the murky under-story of the Styx... MORE RESPONSES
Spinning the case for war
...
The weapons of mass destruction fiasco is a reminder
of
the lengths Western governments will go to in order to incite their
populations to war... SCOTT BURCHILL
Sermon from the Mont (1) ... Lest we forget
...
Monty goes trawling through the murky under-story of the Styx... BRUCE MONTGOMERY
PLUS:
Letters
The Court Jesters
Chris Puplick looks at the role of the court jester
in 13th century Europe and examines the governments of today
...
Radio National
Goodbye Judy (boo-hoo), hello Justin...
The redoubtable and enormously respected Judy Tierney is about to cap her pen. Hag's
special correspondent Aphrodite Drinkwater has the drum on her successor
...
HAG
Come in, Spinners
Tasmanian politicians have been an interesting bunch to observe over
the past few weeks, not the least for how they have been playing the press
gallery ... tasmaniantimes.com's Political Editor Rodney Delta-Post watches,
fascinated, from the sidelines ...
RODNEY DELTA-POST
Don't miss George and John
Top reading/listening from
George Monbiot and John Pilger ...
LINKS
The Green Factor
And talking of repetition. Note the recycling in the following ...
By THE ROVING EYE
And the winner is ...
Hag was the unseen, all-knowing fly-on-the-wall at
the recent parliamentary reporters' Chrissy shindig
at which the Corkley awards were handed out. ...
NEWSBREAKER
Peter Cundall at the National Press Club ...
What Cundall will say ...
PONCE
Give Bob a column ...
The Times needs to abandon its policy of publishing opposition media
releases and instead give this man a column immediately. Putting a rocket up
the stale buffoonery that is the state opposition under Rene Hidding is
exactly what's required. Moreover Bob's newly found Green tinge and
boosting of the state's tourism industry suddenly makes him relevant again
...
And,
When will Linz and his fellow grieving journos, cartoonists and editors at
The Mercury, The Advocate, The Age, the SMH and The Australian stop taking
their salaries from newspapers that continue to be printed on paper derived
from the Styx? ... Monty
LETTERS
Big Bob and that story ...
And, so the rest of the Fourth Estate have latched onto the story
tasmaniantimes.com posted a year ago... and posted again on Monday ...
THE UNDER-STORY
Hector's outa there ... Examiner Editor Rod Scott's logic hammered ...
This is an ugly point - but a natural progression from
the type of rhetoric utilised by Mr Scott. Carried to its
logical extent, this type of argument smacks of cultural
relativism, and would potentially throw into serious
question the actions of many internationally-funded altruistic organisations,
including the World Wildlife Fund, The Catholic Church ...
AND,
Hector the Protector is outa there...
LETTERS
Keep it secret ...
Canadians' right to access government information is being subverted,
delayed and denied by federal and provincial bureaucrats and politicians... thank heavens it's not like that in Tasmania ...
TORONTO STAR
Oh god, not Matty ...
No, Matty, say it isn't true...
the Hound Dog come to heel with The Emperor!!!
The Advocate is not without SIN ...
The Advocate has plenty of experience in
cutting, shutting and squeezing out the little bloke. Their cry of woe for jobs is rather hollow, considering all the cuts over
the past five years. Their editorial department is a shadow of the days when
they were the champions for the North-West ...
LETTERS
The Advocate ... it's getting dirty
Hag is slipped a little dirt on the Advocate takeover bid ...
HAG
The Advocate
Fears over an Advocate takeover...
THE FOURTH ESTATE
Larrikin!
A rough-edged but fiery website ... TT is arguably Tasmania's only thinking-person's media outlet ...
THE READER
Big story
LIBBY LESTER asks a highly-relevant question about news values...
Michael Moore on the loose
The Guardian's fascinating interview/extracts with/by larrikin Michael Moore...
LINKS
RAPID RESPONSE EMAIL: What do you think?
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