Tag: journalism

Categories
Mystery Science Fiction

Read Emergent Properties

Read Emergent Properties

Emergent Properties is the touching adventure of an intrepid A.I. reporter hot on the heels of brewing corporate warfare from Nebula Award-nominated author Aimee Ogden.

A state-of-the-art AI with a talent for asking questions and finding answers, Scorn is nevertheless a parental disappointment. Defying the expectations of zir human mothers, CEOs of the world’s most powerful corporations, Scorn has made a life of zir own as an investigative reporter, crisscrossing the globe in pursuit of the truth, no matter the danger.

In the middle of investigating a story on the moon, Scorn comes back online to discover ze has no memory of the past ten days—and no idea what story ze was even chasing. Letting it go is not an option—not if ze wants to prove zirself. Scorn must retrace zir steps in a harrowing journey to uncover an even more explosive truth than ze could have ever imagined.

Interesting world building, especially some fun ideas about how a disembodied AI might think and act. The plot was a little hard to follow because it relied on a bunch of politics and various corporations that I couldn’t keep track of. I was never clear exactly what ze thought might be happening re: autonomy on the moon.

I don’t think this needed to be a novel but extending what was here might have made it more impactful. The relationships all relied on like one, maybe two brief conversations. I thought the denouement was too quick and didn’t grapple enough with the emotional implications of the climax.

Categories
Society

Who are the real stakeholders?

“Co-imagine the future with the people hurt by the present.”

— David Dylan Thomas as quoted by Antonia Malchik

See also: Designing a future based on the biases of the past

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To whom go the spoils by Hamilton Nolan

It is certain that AI will unleash vast productivity gains, enabling the automation of once time-intensive tasks. Now, think of all of the stakeholders of corporations: Investors, executives, employees, suppliers, the community, etc. To whom should these productivity benefits go? … Such an increase is the equivalent of profits. Profits go to investors. That’s how it works.

(I’m not sold on AI bringing meaningful productivity improvements once you consider the errors and blandness that need correcting, but aside from that, yeah.)

See also: Who does AI work for?

This is not to say that a four day work week is unachievable. It will be achievable the same way that every other meaningful gain for workers is going to be achievable: through worker power. Companies must be forced to do these things. They cannot be convinced to do these things via appeals to their better nature.

See also: Wage stagnation vs corporate profit

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Reporting on Long Covid Taught Me to Be a Better Journalist by Ed Yong (NYTimes)

In this status quo, people are expected to ignore the threat of infection, pay through the nose if they get sick and face stigma and ridicule if they become disabled. Journalism can and should repudiate that bargain. We are not neutral actors, reporting on the world at a remove; we also create that world through our choices, and we must do so with purpose, care and compassion.

See also: The Ableism of Abandoning Disabled People to COVID

The patient-centric approach is sometimes dismissed as advocacy, which is positioned as antithetical to journalism. In fact, it’s simply good journalistic practice to give weight to the most knowledgeable sources.

See also: Pro-democracy journalism

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Over 70% of Drivers Are Speeding in WA School Zones, Illustrating Speeding Epidemic by Ryan Packet (The Urbanist)

“One of the additional alarming findings is that some of those people who are speeding through school zones are actually the people connected to the school,” [Mark McKechnie, the Washington Traffic Safety Commission’s director of external relations] said. At Northwood Elementary, even out of the drivers who were specifically recorded as entering or exiting the school property, 70% were exceeding the 20 limit, with more than half going 25 mph or more.

See also: People will keep dying to cars until we decide their safety is more important than cars’ convenience

Using Positive Culture Framework for Traffic Safety

Article pairing: electric cars won’t save us

Categories
Society

Pro-democracy journalism

Bookmarked A desperate appeal to newsroom leaders on the eve of a chaos election by Dan Froomkin (PressWatch)

None of our newsroom leaders could possibly have imagined 10 years ago that fascist appeals to violence and racial hatred would be so common and effective, that the political discourse would be so awash in misinformation and disinformation, that homophobia and misogyny would make such a dramatic comeback, or that a con man who engineered a failed coup could be a front-runner for the presidency, posing a dire threat to the country’s future as a democracy.

But even as the nation faces another potentially cataclysmic election in 2024 — arguably the most perilous in American history — the mainstream news industry continues to engage in the same business-as-usual that got us here in the first place.

Maybe it’s time to change things up?

These guidelines all sound great for reporting information and supporting democracy but terrible for an ad-funded industry reliant on clickbait headlines 🫤 Except, theoretically, a fascist dictator would be worse for the journalism business in the long run?

Categories
Activism Comics History Memoir

Read The Silence of Our Friends

Read The Silence of Our Friends

A New York Times-bestselling graphic novel based on the true story of two families–one white and one black–who find common ground as the civil rights struggle heats up in Texas.

This semi-autobiographical tale is set in 1967. A white family from a notoriously racist neighborhood in the suburbs and a black family from its poorest ward cross Houston’s color line, overcoming humiliation, degradation, and violence to win the freedom of five black college students unjustly charged with the murder of a policeman.

The Silence of Our Friends follows events through the point of view of young Mark Long, whose father is a reporter covering the story. Semi-fictionalized, this story has its roots solidly in very real events. With art from the brilliant Nate Powell (Swallow Me Whole) bringing the tale to heart-wrenching life, The Silence of Our Friends is a new and important entry in the body of civil rights literature.

I can see how this could have led to Powell working on March. There’s tension here throughout the story, as well as humanizing details.

This does a pretty good job transforming real life into a narrative story. There were a few parts I wasn’t clear why they belonged, like the blind daughter learning a braille typewriter.

Categories
Writing

Read Writing Tools

Read Writing Tools: 55 Essential Strategies for Every Writer by Roy Peter Clark

Ten years ago, Roy Peter Clark, America’s most influential writing teacher, whittled down almost thirty years of experience in journalism, writing, and teaching into a series of fifty short essays on different aspects of writing. In the past decade, Writing Tools has become a classic guidebook for novices and experts alike and remains one of the best loved books on writing available.

Organized into four sections, “Nuts and Bolts,” “Special Effects,” “Blueprints for Stories,” and “Useful Habits,” Writing Tools is infused with more than 200 examples from journalism and literature. This new edition includes five brand new, never-before-shared tools.

Accessible, entertaining, inspiring, and above all, useful for every type of writer, from high school student to novelist, Writing Tools is essential reading.

More helpful for journalists than fiction writers, but lessons suitable for both. I found it telling that the first two chapters focus on prose rather than structure, whereas my focus is on the big picture first, and then the turns of phrase. I liked the example practices at the end of each tool. Some of the tools were revealed more through example than explanation; I think he leaned too hard on examples, but then again nothing is so frustrating as hearing a tip in abstract but not knowing how to apply it. I skimmed or skipped over the tools I was less interested in.

Categories
Activism

Transparency for boring but important public meetings

Bookmarked Last Night at School Committee distills hours-long public meetings into half-hour podcast episodes by Kathryn Buchanan (Nieman Lab)

“We have created this podcast as an easy way for any parent, citizen, or interested party to get the highlights, and our take, on what happened last night at School Committee.”

Also the organization Documenters provides training for community journalists (they use the word citizen a lot on their website which makes sense from the “civic” standpoint of participation in representative government, but the word also has connotations about immigration status so I try to avoid using it outside of that definition)

This is a cool idea — but also having worked in government I know how long those meetings are 💤💤💤 More power to these reporters! I have appreciated a local reporter who live tweets local council meetings related to transportation (and am recalling they’re someone who I’m hoping has moved to another platform where I follow people?)

Categories
Business Entrepreneurship Featured Relationships Society

Build a reputation instead of a personal brand

Replied to The personal brand paradox (wepresent.wetransfer.com)

When we position ourselves as a brand, we are forced to project an image of what we believe most people will approve of and admire and buy into. The moment we cater our creativity to popular opinion is the precise moment we lose our freedom and autonomy.

But rather than manufacturing a personal brand, why not build a reputation? Why not develop our character? Imagine what we could learn from each other if we felt worthy as we are instead of who we project ourselves to be.

I think it’s interesting to look at personal brands through the lens of insecurity. I imagine many people think of it as “positioning” or storytelling, but underneath, those are needed if you’re afraid you won’t be enough on your own.

I think it can be helpful to consider personal branding as a form of self discovery, a tool to help determine what you want to do, but there can be a risk of self containment.

Continue reading “Build a reputation instead of a personal brand”
Categories
Political Commentary

Democracy requires truth; lies grow insurrection

Bookmarked Life as a Lie by Timothy Snyder (Thinking about…)

Big Lies demand violence, since they command the faith of some, but cannot overcome the common sense or lived experience of others. The smaller lies within the Big Lie, by generating distrust of institutions, create a sense that only violence can restore the righteous order of things.

[T]he deliberate generation of an alternative reality is itself incompatible with democracy.

The internet can repeat, but it cannot report.  We speak about the news all day, but pay almost no one to get out and report it.  This rewards people who lie as a way of life.

Categories
Society

Following politics on social media

Replied to Most people on Twitter don’t live in political echo chambers ��� but mostly because they don’t care enough to bother building one (Nieman Lab)

“The elite discussion on the platform is important, but it is not necessarily observed directly by the masses.”

Of those 2,600-plus “elites,” the vast majority are journalists, pundits, or news organizations…

If you’re not following at least one of those accounts, your Twitter use is likely bereft of news, not just political news.

🤔 They clearly don’t follow a lot of artists, writers, activists or academics if they think you see no news or politics without expressly following news accounts. I saw just one person I follow on the list but would not characterize my feed as apolitical 😂 Authors have been extremely vocal about reproductive rights and politically motivated book bans. Queer and disabled people call out problems constantly.

In our case, 59.6% of a random sample of users (856,853 of 1,437,774) were insufficiently politically interested to follow the accounts of the president, key senators, or major news media organizations.

I’m not sure you can draw the conclusion someone isn’t interested in politics because they don’t follow national level politicians or large news organizations on social media. For example, I’m more interested in local, county, and state level happenings than national policies totally beyond my influence, so I follow local policy advocates to learn about housing issues and bike infrastructure in my community. I can’t imagine I’m the only one who’s turned my attention and energy away from the national level, to my community.

Another facet is feeling unrepresented by politics at a national level. The national Democratic party is filled with old, out of touch, ineffective and spineless naifs who will fiddle us into fascism while conservatives chortle. I have little patience for moderate Democrats who are afraid to piss off racists, sexists, fascists, and homophobes. I’d wager many other progressives are likewise fed up.

I also think it’s not unreasonable that people might choose to use social media for entertainment and get their news and politics elsewhere.

Moreover, while they call this finding bleak, I’m not sure it’s such a bad thing to be disconnected from the ugliness of political spin. Frankly I consider politicians to be a terrible source for political information. The two major parties have become so antagonistic, it seems that every single thing the other side does must be condemned, even if it’s helping supply infant formula during a shortage 🤦‍♀️ (That certainly dragged the idiot politicians and pundits who have never talked to a mother in their life out of the woodwork 👀 I don’t have kids and I know that not all babies latch! Among the many other reasons “just breastfeed” isn’t a valid response.) The news often becomes an elitist form of entertainment that doesn’t necessarily inform action, but spurs hopelessness or anxiety.

Somehow it’s this minority of people that do follow politicians and news organizations who are driving the vast majority of the nasty political discourse on Twitter? If so, they’re doing enough damage to our political division as it is. We hardly need to feed more people with The Discourse of the day.

Categories
Romance

Read Seducing Mr. Knightly

Read Seducing Mr. Knightly (The Writing Girls, #4)

He’s the only man she’s ever loved…

For ages it seems advice columnist Annabelle Swift has loved Derek Knightly, editor-owner of The London Weekly from a distance. Determined to finally attract her employer’s attention, she seeks advice from her loyal readers—who offer Annabelle myriad suggestions…from lower-cut bodices (success!) and sultry gazes (disaster!) to a surprise midnight rendezvous (wicked!).

She’s the only woman he never noticed…

Derek never really took note of his shy, wallflower lady writer. But suddenly she’s exquisite…and he can’t get Annabelle out of his mind! She must be pursuing someone, but who? For some inexplicable reason, the thought of her with another man makes Knightly insanely jealous.

Will Dear Annabelle find her happy ending?

But Knightly’s scandalous periodical has been targeted for destruction by a vengeful Lord Marsden, and the beleaguered editor now faces a devastating choice: either marry Marsden’s sister to save his beloved newspaper…or follow his heart and wed his Writing Girl.

The heroine is as smart as a rock and a-quiver over the lack of attentions from the man she ‘loves’ despite never having had a conversation with him. Entertaining setup and I suppose her blundering is somewhat endearing? Unfortunately she’s also dull and a pushover who lets herself get treated like shit by her family. She is extremely proud of herself for using a slightly rude word to describe someone in print. I wish she’d had a little more going for her, because I have a hard time believing a sharp editor-in-chief is going to fall head over heels with someone for being brave when she can’t carry on an intelligent conversation, has no grasp on any higher machinations or motivations, is naive and clueless, and mostly writes articles about etiquette.

Her self sacrifice at the end is a disappointing regression in personality, and the ending serves to give him the empowering moment, not her. She just suffers more of the same treatment and gives up, when I think storywise she needed to fully embrace her new personality traits and pursue what she wanted. Her physical and personality transformation makes me think of Sophie from Howl’s Moving Castle, where she reverts back to her old lady form when she disses herself and accepts things without fighting for herself. Sophie was given power by her ending, whereas this book would be like her waiting around at the hatshop being bombed in her old lady form and never trying to help.