Broadband Welfare

Streaming video in the 'Hood

Most of the mainstream media snobs are constantly harping about the validity of “news” stories that reverberate around the blogs.

They poo-poo us (bloggers) because they say that we have no “filter”—no quality control. You know—checks and balances like the work done by Mary Mapes on the discredited Dan Rather “Memogate” story about President Bush’s Texas Air National Guard service.

They seem to think that if you studied engineering or law instead of spending 5-1/2 years getting a journalism degree from Columbia University that you can’t possibly be trusted to write about and report what you see and hear with your own eyes and ears.

I’ll agree that most of the blogs are strictly personal opinion pieces harboring little intent to do any accurate news gathering or reporting. Many like Daily Kos actually try to pose as serious information sites, but if you have the time and mettle to check their sources and look at their stories you find a serious left-wing “barking moon bat” slant. Then there is Democratic Underground.

Don’t even get me started…

Whether or not a person is a blogger, the use of laymen as news sources is on the upswing and the media is having to acknowledge the trend. What began as a few grainy Betamax video images made by a lucky tourist back in the 1970’s has exploded into a deluge of digital video and still images of everything from police chases/shootings to hurricane coverage from ground zero.


The professional media recently had a conference about layman-generated news and they not only like the idea, they want to start handing out video and tape recorders and providing broadband internet service to “poor people.”

"We don't own the news any more," Sambrook said. "This is a fundamental realignment of the relationship between large media companies and the public."

…Larry Kramer, the head of digital operations at Viacom Inc.'s CBS unit, said CBS was eager for more feedback from listeners via its newly expanded online presence, but he said the company would keep a "filter" on such contributions rather than allow open posting by users.

…"This is something we do every day," Curley said. However, the emerging area of citizen-generated news was still in the "first inning," Curley said. "There are lots of opportunities--The audience is growing."

Another member of the opening panel, Farai Chideya, a correspondent for National Public Radio Inc. in Los Angeles and founder of blog called PopandPolitics.com, expressed concern that many big stories may be affecting people who don't have broadband access to the Internet, resulting in a risk that they could be excluded from citizen-generated news.

Chideya said it "breaks my heart" that many poor people and people of color may not be able to participate in the online generation and dissemination of news. The big question, she said, was how to get people "in the caboose of the digital train" involved.

Chideya suggested a "middle ground" where journalists can collaborate with non-journalists, such as distributing tape recorders to people in the area hit by Hurricane Katrina to collect sound, which could then be culled and edited by NPR journalists.

See, here is another group of idiots campaigning for “broadband for poor people.”

I can just see it now....

NPR's new show opposite FOX's Hannity & Combs: "Leroy and the Homies" with live video feeds from the projects.

Or how about "The Crackhead News Hour"?

What the heck is going on here?

Did they forget that Oprah got out of Mississippi and into a Chicago penthouse without free broadband?

I waited 45 years to get broadband access. Broadband was available in the areas in which I lived for as long as there has been consumer broadband access. I didn't have broadband for one simple reason...

IT WAS TOO DAMN EXPENSIVE.

To those not on the government dole, that means "I couldn't afford or chose not to spent MY money buying broadband internet access." Now they want me to spend MY money to supply broadband to total strangers?

I guess AFFORDING an optional service (a luxury) is a foreign concept to the "activists."

We finally bought broadband last year—all $49.99 per month’s worth. It is wonderful being off 0f a dial-up internet connection, but at nearly $600 per year it is expensive.

Before I got broadband, was I considered deaf, dumb, and blind or otherwise unable to see, understand, and report what was going on around me to anyone that cared and would listen?

No?

I did damn fine without broadband access and a digital camera. I’ve got the Polaroid pictures to prove it.

I still don’t own a video camera, but I’m not out there lobbying my congressmen and senators to have the government provide me with one.

Get this straight, people…

EVERYBODY DOESN’T NEED OR DESERVE BROADBAND INTERNET…PARTICULARLY IF THEY EXPECT ME TO PAY FOR IT...

It’s just that simple.