Webdiary - Founded and Inspired by Margo Kingston

Hi Margo. It looks like The Australian is moving to registration of writers to its blogs, using the convention of a user-name and password. This makes sense to me, as it extends the privilege of submitting as Another Nobody to everyone. 

Margo: Hmmm. Would you want to be on the Oz's list?  Me, I don't trust Murdoch's men.

See the ACCC's press release here.

Margo, there's an extract from Michael Gawenda's book ('American Notebook', due Jul 30th) in The Age Saturday July 21st.

At the bottom of the page is a box of text titled 'A shouting match desperately in need of some doubt'.

THE debate in Australia in the lead-up to the war in Iraq was dispiriting - not so much a debate as a shouting match between the usual suspects.

On one side were the war's most trenchant opponents - Robert Manne, Phillip Adams, Terry Lane - whose contributions were overlaid by what can only be described as hatred for John Howard.

On the other side were the Howard boosters, such as Greg Sheridan, Andrew Bolt, Piers Akerman and the editorial writers of The Australian.

It was perhaps my greatest failure that in seven years as editor I had not discovered enough fresh talent for the op-ed pages. This failure was not mine alone: by and large, the academics who we tried out couldn't write op-ed to save themselves. Finding conservative columnists was particularly hard. Newspapers, to a certain extent, are reflections of their editors, and I wanted an op-ed page on which at least some of the columnists wrested with their doubts, were not sure they were right and did not see those with different views as morally and ethically less worthy. I sometimes wished I could be a shouter, but I lacked the certainty of religious or ideological conviction. I believed doubt was the best way to avoid the awful consequences of certainty.   

The body of the article is hot stuff of the inflammatory kind. It's not available on-line, I think. The book will sell.

Craig

I wanted to respond to your post sooner, but I don’t tend to have much time to make regular WD posts.

Despite all the op ed angst in the Murdoch press, the argument that the ABC’s treatment of the Great Global Warming Swindle is supposed to be proof of its (left-wing) bias does not stack up. If the ABC were really as biased as is claimed, then it would have either not shown the documentary at all (the more common fate given to REAL left-wing polemics) or screened it in an unwatchable timeslot so that it would just slip under the radar of public opinion.

On the contrary, the ABC gave the documentary the benefit of a prime timeslot, plenty of advance publicity, a panel discussion representing both sides of the debate, and a question session with a studio audience – something that, as you rightly claim (but arguably for the wrong reasons) is not accorded most other documetaries. This would, and should, indicate that the ABC was giving GGWS an unusual level of respect.

I do agree with some criticisms levelled at Tony Jones’ heavy-handed attack on the filmmaker over supposed inaccuracies in the film’s graphs. However, this probably had more to do with his taking a conservative line on the prevailing orthodoxy among the world scientific community – which at this point (and rightly or wrongly) favours a causal relationship between greenhouse gases and climate change.

As for your digs at my supposed prejudices, you may be interested to know that I am actually sceptical about climate change and that my views fit more closely with the GGWS panel member who represented the coal industry. Her plea was for the pursuit of scientific accuracy, something that is hard to achieve if both sides of politics divide the climate change issue into one of competing culture war ideologies.

Craig,

Nothing like dragging out the good old 'biased-ABC' smoke-and-mirrors trick to take the heat off the rising groundswell of criticism against the Murdoch press in general, and The Australian newspaper in particular, for their howling pro-Howard, pro-right wing, pro-free trade bias and their not so subtle attempts to influence the outcome of the coming federal election in their editorials and opinion pages.  

Long before the airing of the Great Global Warming Swindle - in fact, as far back as May – Murdoch’s op ed scribes were building straw barricades against what they promised its readership to be one giant left-wing beat-up of a bunch of plucky little scientists who dare to criticise the monolithic environmental lobby. All this pre-emptive paranoia ensured that even the innocuous convention of a TV panel discussion was made to look like a full-on, left-wing steamroller attack. Even the simple disclaimer that the documentary did not reflect the views of the ABC was made to look more like the ‘great ABC warning swindle’.   

At the same time as the Murdoch scribes were laying out their game plan to ‘out’ the ABC yet again on accusations of bias, The Australian was busily dropping its most vocal critic from its News.com blog and screening out all the blog posts that agreed with him. In addition, it was writing huffy editorials defending its ridiculously manipulative interpretation of recent opinion polls - in particular, its calysthenic attempts to make Howard’s electoral chances look a lot stronger than they really are.  

If The Australian (and Murdoch press in general) wants to continue its campaign against supposed ABC bias, then it has to level the playing field by making itself more publicly accountable for its own editorial policies. Any argument that The Australian is a commercial entity, whereas the ABC is taxpayer-funded, is a feeble excuse. The Australian is our national masthead – the newspaper that should most objectively reflect the full cross-section of Australian society. It has to stop behaving like a provincial tabloid with a sleazy axe to grind.

 Subtitle: surely, you're not being serious?

«Margo: Phil, you've had your say, now get back onto substance please. I'm DNPing posts from left and right contributors at the moment for playing the man or woman and not the ball. I don't want personal fights on Webdiary. That's what nearly destroyed her.»

After all the unsubstantiated s**t you allowed Paul Morrella to spew at me? And after banning me from a thread, merely for trying to defend myself? You have the bloody nerve, to accuse me of "playing the man or woman?"

I try to combat substance, like this: Please provide a passable substantiation for your rather unequivocal statement vis-à-vis the AusBC:

«...despite the compromise and corruption associated with their systematic, left-leaning agenda and bias»

[David Davis on July 17, 2007 - 4:58pm]

And, by your actions, Davis gets away with his slander then cop-out slither both. Bewdy again.

-=*=-

Your blog, mate; run it as you want. But kindly spare me your hypocrisy.

Margo: I've had enough, Phil. You're suspended from Webdiary for a week. And don't bother emailing me because I won't answer. There's a lot of important news at the moment. I'm not wasting any more time on you for a while. Since you don't respect my editing, please consider going elsewhere.

 .. know about the word 'hypocrisy?[1]'

-=*=-

«I know what I did when Fairfax unilaterally pulled a piece of mine. And when Fairfax ordered me to delete the archives of then Webdiary columnist Antony Loewenstein.

The big media organisations in Australia can't stand internal criticism. They can't stand it. That means journalists are compromised. And it means they get a free ride while the rest of the powerful players in public life are scrutinised. The check and balance to that is a diversity of media ownership. We've now lost that, thanks to the Howard government. So the Fairfax Board ordered the banning of a piece commissioned by the SMH on Murdoch's wife (Crikey broke the story). Few owners mean deal making between the biggies. Simple.

So support Crikey and other independent media, and independent bloggers. They've all you got.»

That's the explanation, then, for you letting HH/DD off the hook?

Like, when he directly slanders the AusBC, I challenge him, he fobs me off - and then you censor my pointing out that he squibbed it?

That's what happened. And the great MK did the censoring personally, after the post was delayed circa 12 hours by your Eds. Bewdy. Welcome to WD-lala land:

«Wilkommen, bienvenue, welcome!
Fremde, étranger, stranger
Glücklich zu sehen, je suis enchanté
Happy to see you, bleibe, reste, stay.»

-=*end*=-

Ref(s):

[1] hypocrisy n. (pl. -ies) 1 false claim to virtue; insincerity, pretence. 2 instance of this. [Greek, = acting, feigning] [POD]

hypocrite n. person given to hypocrisy.  hypocritical adj. hypocritically adv. [ibid.]

Margo: Phil, you've had your say, now get back onto substance please. I'm DNPing posts from left and right contributors at the moment for playing the man or woman and not the ball. I don't want personal fights on Webdiary. That's what nearly destroyed her.

Regardles of all the rights and wrongs, heartache and trauma of the last week (Stephen Mayne, where are you?), one thing stands out.

That the Oz  has wreaked a terrible vengeance on the reading public of  Australia by way of their new "post" dog's breakfast on line site.

How interesting Margo re Crikey.  That is exactly what I am talking about.  It is not just the media.  Government and corporations also change history.  They leave out the parts that don't match the current story and take down items without explanation.  There is a lot more of this going on than people realise.

Margo, your point about people writing into newspapers for the reason of wanting to be on the record applies more to the old style letters to the editor than the modern blogging format.  With blogging the reason people post is more complex.  I noticed the other day that the Australian asks people to leave a "screen name".  There is no suggestion at all that they ever ask for a real name. It's all about screen names.  I think this is great because I am interested in what people say rather than than their name address and phone number.  Speech is likely to be more free in many cases where people have that kind of flexibility.  I can see why the major newspapers have adopted such an approach. By the way, this is not a defence of their questionable approaches in relation to archives.  I am just making the point that this real name on the record thing is not a strong motivation for modern blogging.

I note the Herald now has around 40 blogs.  It's a blog factory. Quite extraordinary. I don't really read them as I prefer this site and my own blog.  Like most people I have a limited amount of time. I am not interested in going to the Herald to discuss stuff like "confused about what's healthy to eat".  I mean what nonsense.  I don't think many of us are truly confused about such matters.

I like Australian politics.  I was just thinking "where would I go to discuss this on the Herald"?  With all the clutter of 40 blogs, it's hard to know.  It looks as though the Peter Hartcher one would be a logical starting point.   This is, after all, the blog of the Herald's chief political correspondent.  Guess what though?  His most entries are May 30, June 6 and June 12.  Check it out.   That's not a blog!  For a blog to have vibrancy, it must be daily or close to it.  Margo you'd know how important vibrancy is to any website is. I certainly do as I was once in the industry.  Without vibrancy, you don't have viability.  The Herald is lacking in that department with the blogs.  More is not better. A political blog that publishes a couple of times a month is a joke. 

I have heard Webdiary protest in the past that it is not a blog. Then the other end of the spectrum is that major newspapers call everything a blog, even when it isn't!  A good political blog for a major newspaper should have a dedicated resource. Webdiary started that seven years ago, well ahead of its time.   At the Herald even the tea lady is blogging.  It's not blogging as you and I know it but they call it that.

Someone should run bots to check out when key government and corporate web sites change.  It is not just what they omit but it is what they change when we're not looking.

That Crikey aspect re the PM's site is quite instructive.  One would have thought that the PM's website would be a complete record of interviews he has done.  That is the impression it gives.

Again it is up to us and "watch dogs" like Crikey.  Any of us who have been in this game long enough know the lofty promises that were made about free speech online that never came true.  We know we got carried away but the reality remains that we all now have the freedom to publish at will.  We have the freedom to gather at will. We have the tools and the intellect to see through the trickery of the powerful.  We can report it.  Citizens can report to each other. That part of the dream remains real.

I now have broadband that works.  I got it from iinet which is benefiting from an ACCC decision. More power to ACCC!  I can watch You Tube on my large widescreen living room TV via Apple TV.  The You Tube broadcast goes wirelessly from my laptop to my Apple TV and the living room TV. See how You Tube goes to Apple TV and your living room TV here.

What's all this techno mumbo jumbo?  It is the breakdown of broadcast television and it is happening in my living room.

In the election we can make our own TV ads and political programs. I loathe Getup! as it is a lefty organisation that almost signed up John Hewson.  It is vile.  As we know though, it is holding a You Tube competition.

Big media is less important than it used to be. We're moving into an era of the Long Tail.  A total fragmentation.  It's not all bad.  Funnily enough I read the Long Tail en-route from Jacksonville, Florida to Seattle last year.  It's funny because I was reading a book about power to the little people while en-route for meetings at Microsoft world headquarters!

Remember Howard Dean, Margo?  What he did in the 2004 election will remain the stuff of internet and political legend.  It will be studied in universities for decades to come.

I remain optimistic about the power of technology to enable individuals.  Webdiary could not exist without it.  My optimism these days is tempered compared to the wild idealism of old but I still see a bright light shining high on old Internet Hill!  We need to remain vigilant though.  The price of liberty remains eternal vigilance!

Disclosure: I own shares in Apple.  I bought some in 2004 and bought some more this year.  Great company!

From today's Crikey email (subscription recommended):

At the end of May, the Prime Minister got a bollocking from 2GB's Alan Jones on the pricing policies of Australia’s supermarket duopoly. Interestingly, a transcript of that conversation has never appeared on the Prime Minister’s website, noted Crikey's Christian Kerr last Thursday.

Here are another, um, several transcripts that are missing from the PM's site according to one Crikey reader:

1. John Howard, Press Conference, Parliament House, 14 June 2007 Howard was asked 32 questions on the Liberal Party fundraiser at Kirribilli House. JOHN HOWARD: … Now, my understanding—without getting anybody else’s advice—is it’s not a gift because I do, for the moment—I chose my words carefully—control the premises in which I live and reside. And I am entitled to reside in Kirribilli House because I’m currently Prime Minister of Australia and I’m entitled to invite people and to extend hospitality.

2. John Howard Interview on 7.30 Report, 15 May 2007 Where Howard suggested the polls might be the result of the Australian public having a sense of humour “Well ultimately, we'll all find out whether it's not all been a you know, an interesting exercise by the Australian public's with its innate sense of humour, and we'll find that out on election day won't we?”

3. John Howard Interview on Sky News with Kieran Gilbert, 2 May 2007 Howard refused to say whether Heffernan should apologise to Julia Gillard over his comments that she was “deliberately barren” and therefore unfit to be a leader and kept referring to the fact he was “conventionally married” and a “great supporter of conventional family arrangements”.

4. John Howard Interview, 3AW Radio, 27 April 2007 Howard defended his decision to appoint Amanda Vanstone Ambassador of Italy.

5. John Howard Interview on ABC Brisbane, 24 April 2007 Backed all three Queensland Liberal MPs, Andrew Laming, Gary Hardgrave and Ross Vasta – who are all being investigated by the AFP. Only time he has done this. John Howard: “All I can say is that I have a lot of confidence in my three colleagues.”......

And the list goes on, and on....... 

When this first happened to Tim I thought of Margo straight away. It saddened me greatly the numerous nasty cowardly attacks she was subjected to, some even by her own colleagues and so many other cowards during the early phases of this amazing project we now call Webdiary.

From my limited perspective, the worst of all was the behaviour of Fairfax and the SMH. That they ended up editorialising in support of hoWARd just before the election will condemn their ethics and actions forever.

Sometimes you can judge the quality of a person's character by the despicable lengths enemies will go to attack the person.

These kinds of precedent and the many potential conflicts of interests, did not bode well for Tim's jump into the News Limited camp.

So, is not surprising that many Road to Surfdom bloggers were very concerned for Tim and had bad expectations. We suspected Tim's involvement with the dark side might not be worth his troubles.

For some of us it was only a matter of when not if, especially in an election year.

What's worse is that when lending your credibility to dodgy characters, it might actually call your very own into question. The biggest problem is the stench of their corruption might not be easy to wash off, even if we do remain squeaky clean.

That The Australian has carried out this censorship so shamelessly and over such soft criticism, especially in the article that finally triggered it, only shows its culture for what it is: an arrogant and shameless stifling environment.

Its editors, no more than bullies and cowards.

I wonder what the opinion of the Bancroft family (currently controlling Dow Jones and the Wall Street Journal and about to sell to Murdoch) would be if they could see the quality of their future associates. (See the "Text of Editorial Agreement" between Dow Jones and News Corp   and some discussions of it on Crikey.

That's why it's crucial to openly disclose and debate the inner workings of the media machine if we ever want to repair its deficiencies. Even more so if we ever want to dismantle it!

The greatest advantage of the internet and this new medium is the sheer diversity and huge possibilities for sharing knowledge and insights. The sheer numbers of dissenting critical opinions make it too hard to silence and censor them all.

But to put into question the very role of this self-appointed media mafia, is very risky. Even more so if done from within. The gate-keepers owe their position to powerful interests, therefore to undermine either will cause nasty retributions. Right in the middle of this is where Tim is now stuck.

Therefore, to face such bullies must be done in numbers and with some minimum personal safety. Our support is crucial!

But I must ask: What else can we do about it? (any other suggestions, Margo?)

My instincts tell me to simply brazenly face their attacks, and call a spade a bloody shovel. Let's shine the strong light of public scrutiny and truth in the eyes of these bullies. Watch them melt away into dust like the cowardly media vampires they are.

The key is to face them in safety and numbers, to take away the power our own silence gives them!

We must share our experiences and insights to condemn the cowards with a powerful united voice.

The encouraging thing about this whole sad episode is that we can all learn from it. Like any crisis, it is certainly up to us to acknowledge it and then to prevent it ever happening again. Because otherwise there will certainly be more of same, again and again.

Our precarious democracy and the health of our public debate demand that we crush this cowardice now. If we can not do it in an election year then when?!

(For those who have not read it, I must recommend Clive Hamilton and Sarah Maddison's insightful book: Silencing Dissent.

Margo, I can see a book in this if you and Tim were to pool your considerable abilities and insights... :-) 

Margo: Hi Carlos. Webdiary guidelines require you to use you first and last name, or a nom de plume after advising me your name and why you want to write anonymously. My email is mlkingston@gmail.com.

UPDATE: I have Carlos's full name,. and have agreed that he can be 'Carlos' on Webdiary. 

David, I reckon the middle ground we can share is expressed in the notion of the level playing field. You correctly note "caveat emptor" and it’s also true that in the real world it might have to be accepted that some folk would lack the wherewithal to grasp the essence of a given concept even if they were spoon-fed info. As it is, there is too little spoon-feeding "journal of record "stuff going on and too much "spin", as far as I am concerned.

Yet without the level playing field notion being applied also to access to information, how do we get that happy market place of ideas that is necessary to prevent the slide into monopoly/ totalitarianism from Keynesian democratic society? Pity about the demise of broadsheet journalism/ABC/SBS.

Do we just accept that the location(s) of power have gravitated away from Keynesian post-settlement "democratic" society and diffused out to unaccountable and anonymous corporate and bureaucratic centres in a less accountable globalised world, or can we retrieve the oxygen of Aristotle's good life through the exercise of discourse of ideas and resourcefulness leading to social action? The hard yards of creating and contributing to platforms for overt reality based discourse - eg "paying rent" by expending time and energy to some good effect accessing and contributing to blog sites and the like may have to be replaced in the future by some other means of keeping the game going, but represent currently that effort required to maintain vigilance for freedom.

Does seem like a golden age is behind us and we are in a post-lapsarian world. Yet, if the urge to "be" is as great as the forces seeking to destroy humanity, maybe some sort of Fukuyamian equilibrium at least can be salvaged?

And if technology does get the better of the species in the end, who knows: somewhere in a far-off galaxy...?

PS: Noted the troubling post from Margo Kingston. Some dark stuff in there and can only surmise as to exact details, but sounds not healthy.

As to Damian Lataan and Jenny Hume, have not caught up on their ongoing debate for several days, but actually thought it was a good one going when last checked. Thought the personalities stuff had been under control and much of interest was turning up. Hope Damian has not allowed himself to get frustrated with the opposition - this is his one fault and one someone as long in the game as him should have been the last person to fall into.

It's not like Hume is a wilfully disruptive like Parsons. She does come from a particular viewpoint and, as with everyone else, prejudices inadvertently creep out when things get heated. Should we lefties have an exclusive mortgage on rusted-on beliefs and aspirations? God help us if that's the case.

Damian, if you have given up 'tis a shame: you had the intellectual muscle to make so many telling points and had a good discussion going, educational for the rest of us, in a discourse with a skilled opponent few can score easy points off.

As I noted in my last comment, the onus is really on the consumer to determine reality.  We live in a world where history is updated on a real time basis.  What someone said yesterday can suddenly disappear and reappear as something more suited to a newly desired reality today.

Should we be disturbed by this?  To be honest, it doesn't really matter.  Why be disturbed about something that is the new reality?  It makes better sense to get on with it and live with how things are today than romanticise the past.

People do need to accept that the onus is on them to believe or not believe what they see.  The last thing we need is control on these matters.

There was an interesting article in yesterday's Sydney Morning Herald on the You Tube Election.  As Australia is extraordinarily backward in high speed internet, You Tube has not caught on here as it has elsewhere.  The interesting point in this article though was not You Tube per se. I am a regular user of that anyway.

What I love about it is the total lack of control.  Old media saw themselves as gatekeepers of truth so they jealously guard that role.  Meanwhile, Generation Y never had any respect for that.  Who does now anyway?  Most of the old journalists were campaigners anyway rather than truth tellers.

The public does not believe the journalists or the politicians.  In most polls, journalists are regarded as being less trustworthy than politicians.  This being the case, what is printed in a newspaper or put online is not given much credence.  We all form our own opinion about matters anyway.  We don't need to be told.

The lack of control on You Tube is delicious.  It robs both politicians and journalists of the thing that makes them feel important: CONTROL. From the article:

There was a time when all a politician needed to keep his or her image under control was a sense of decorum, a sensible approach to alcohol and a press secretary with anger management issues. Now, it's a losing game. Stumbles and blunders aren't just played once or twice on the evening news and then forgotten; they shoot straight to YouTube and can be enjoyed again and again.

A politician caught on camera picking his nose at noon might be on YouTube within 20 minutes. By sundown it might be the most-watched video on the globe. It's that fast and that aggressive. In cyberspace, you can't choose your friends. You can't stop people making ads for you or about you, or setting up websites where they pretend to be you, or creating links to your site so that they look like your mates.

See how it works?  It totally freaks out politicians and old media people because they can't do what they like to do most and that is regulate the dispersal of information.

I'd never want to go back to the old days.  The more chaos and the more information and misinformation that is out there, the better. Politicians and old media types always treated the people with disdain.  They always fed us misinformation anyway.

We're more likely to find out the truth in the chaos of the new but it does require us to be discerning.  We always were anyway.  The politicians and the journalists though think we are babies and can't figure out things for ourselves.

I accept that history is constantly re-invented and that words online are disposable.  It has been like that for many years now.

Someone attacked me online once in a particularly nasty way.  What did I do?  I took screen shots of it because I suspected that at some point it would be taken down and denied.  That is exactly what happened but I have the screen shots!

Times change but so too do tactics.  Download Snag-It and take your screen shots for the history denier trials. You have to keep your own archives and interpret your own truth.  No one else will do it for you.

 ..... and you know something else?  It is a fallacy to suggest in the olden days you had the truth anyway.  We were always being fed a pack of lies.  We're better off now than the bad old days because now we can publish and react ourselves in ways that old journalists and pollies can never control.

The genie of free speech online was let out of the bottle a very long time ago now. Free speech is not truth or lies.  It's just free. You decide what's truth or lies.  That's not new.

Yawn.  It seems like I have been quoting George Orwell for most of my life.  No wonder reading all of his books seems to be mandatory in all good schools.  The lessons last a lifetime.  They end up fitting in ways that you never thought possible as a youngster. Get a  load of this one from the novel of dystopia, 1984:

Day by day and almost minute by minute the past was brought up to date.  In this way every prediction made by the Party could be shown by documentary evidence to have been correct; nor was any item of news, or any expression of opinion, which conflicted with the needs of the moment, ever allowed to remain on record.  All history was palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary.

That's what we have now.  Newspapers, governments and corporations constantly update their records to suit their own ends. The technology is the enabler.  In the old days once the newspaper had been published it stood as a record by default because you couldn't retrospectively change ink on paper. You can change the record with the internet and that is why people do it.  They do it because they can.

Governments do it all the time.  Untoward words or polices are quietly removed from websites.  It's like they never existed. Corporations do it.  History is re-invented and re-published at the push of a button.

Got someone in a photo who is now out of favour?  No problem.  Crop them out of it.  Alter the image and change the text and hey presto you have changed history.  It's so easy to white out parts that don't suit.  Then after a while, no one remembers what the real history was anyway and a credible fictional history has been established instead.

What's that?  The Queen didn't  storm out of a photo shoot?  Doesn't matter, the BBC will create a fictional history by cobbling together footage out of chronological order.  No problem.  Edit here, edit there.

What's that?  In the climate change thingy a chart is put up that calls 17 years ago "now"?  Whatever.  Make it what you like.  "Now" sounds better anyway.

Newspapers are commercial organisations and they own their archives so as it is their property they are entitled to do with it as they please.  Pandora is interesting and valuable as it creates a record of the web as it really was rather than how it has been changed in periods subsequent.

Sometimes also it is possible to find things cached on Google that have been removed by site owners.  This is a more accidental way of catching out organisations seeking to change history.

The onus is on the reader / the consumer to figure out the correct history.  My memory serves me well in many cases and I notice when things change. Checking multiple sources and independent archives such as Pandora is one way of navigating the minefield of a constantly changing history.

It becomes frustrating at times when you know you saw something and then suddenly it disappears without explanation! Disappearance is common but also beware of pages that change.  Organisations not only take down pages that don't suit but they also actively alter history.

The media is part of it but remember that the problem of changing history is also just as significant in government and commerce.  Right now, someone in Canberra is drinking his morning coffee and updating a government website.  He's taking out a few little lines of something that was said because he's decided it doesn't sit well with current messaging. Some one might notice it.  Better fix that one up. Sip of a coffee, highlight, click, delete, republish. Yawn, consider buying donut, then update more history. Routine fixing of history.  Some one has to do it.

All while you were sleeping, history changed.  Update history to match the present.  We can't have bits that don't match! Cut out this, put in that.

Welcome to dystopia, where the history is exactly as we want it to be.  Come join the fun!  Don't let Pandora be a wet blanket!  Party on down!  It's retro-dystopia time and we're back in '84 again.

Makes you think about the role of Pandora though, doesn't it?  Box City.

Fiona: Well said, David. May I also recommend to you and other Webdiarists' attention a work in the same spirit as 1984 (and written by Al Gore's cousin), Gore Vidal's Live from Golgotha?

Thanks for interesting background info, Margo. Most of us suspected in general terms what was happening between you and those who sought to sabotage you a few years ago, without ever discovering the real specifics of much of it. I recently queried your responses to a particular issue, but it occurred to me later that I could not possibly grasp what may have been happening, beyond the "general".

 Recently, Gerald Stone has been said to have been extremely critical of the attitude and behaviour of one "JA", as maybe an example of the sort of modern management journalists and editors have to deal with in their everyday work. Reading of Stone's comments, I was left recalling your mentioning of some of these harsh-sounding characters in one of your books, too. If the sort of people you had to deal with were like the sort described by Gerald Stone, you would have me wondering along the lines suggested with recent articles on TV and in magazines about the consequences of workplace psychopaths.

Then there would have been the hate mail and organised troll intrusions from anti- discussion flying squads. You told me once that we bloggers had only the faintest inkling from the stuff included, as to abusive garbage not included.

Richard: Paul, I'll second that!

The thing with Tim Dunlop is, he is well-known by WD's for his honest and often-fascinating insights from the old days. He has gone off on his own and survived, until now. Tim Blair's attempt at refutation of Dunlop's right to present facts and make honest interpretative comment except on terms ideologically acceptable to managements' prejudices rather than as opposed to factual error, at a site designated as "free speech", is appalling!

 When capitalists invest in media, they do so on the basis that they are investing in the profitability of truth, not its manipulation, which is why it is supposed to stay OUT of the editorial room in a healthy society. You simply don't employ ditch-diggers to do brain surgery, the division of labour theory goes.

News is not a luxury, it is a necessity: Unmediated access to accurate information and unhindered interpretation and discussion of information, is the social and individual default, not for negotiation, position. How else accept by information, can civilisation and people stay healthy?

 How on earth can it help healthy discussion if one view/standpoint, say for example Blair's, on a given issue or issues is kept, but possible contestations that may uncover new insights, if held up to the first, are censored out?

Command economy? Road to Serfdom? We'll swap Brezhnev for Murdoch, are you proposing, Tim?

We all dip out because Rupert mightn' t like the "taste" of something? Sorry mate, there is a community interest when things get to this level, too.

We are repeatedly exhorted not to invoke the " Nazi" paradigm as a means for enabling the divining of explanations as to what is going wrong today in the world. But recourse to historical memory is the best way of seeking out what to do as today's problems. History teaches us that the sort of thing that occurred with Dunlop and has happened to others, is a threat to that which is necessary for our very survival – all of us.

For example, when the nation's journalist doyenne, Michelle Grattan exposed Mal Brough's rorting of aboriginal funds for purposes of self-glorification, nowhere were other media prepared to run news on the story, particularly the disgusting ABC Lateline that started up the Aboriginal vilification stories for the government, in the first place. Yet if true, the story is so crucial to a fuller understanding of the truth concerning the government's mentality as regards both its Aboriginal "Emergency" policy nonsense, and the public to whom it is accountable, that the public remains, in effect, still blindsided as to necessary information that should transcend the narrow objectives of vested interests.

 And isn't this rather what happened with the Reichstag fire in 'thirties Germany, as to its occurrence and then presentation in relation to the vilification of defenceless political and racial minorities as scapegoats, and the public consent manufactured for the regime?

Let management keep out of the editorial room. If management can't make a quid out of the truth, it becomes a nuisance and we are entitled to walk away.

Organizations like News Ltd must understand that intelligent people seek genuine information, and that includes from other sources than News Ltd itself , because it has become demonstrably so unreliable as to necessitate this move to alternative media. News is not the sole property of the proprietor; others also may have requirements for the truth, apart from news executives trying to protect their sponsor cronies from detection. Well then, the "market" inevitably has headed off in search of more reliable sources, and if the presently available ones won't mend their ways as to presentation of facts and discussion this will only continue, since its imperative for our survival that we do ( no "market" left for Rupert, BTW, if civilisation collapses ).

And this is why people turn to blog sites, not because they are benighted, prejudiced fools who can't recognise the intrinsic self evident genius of the Milnes, Shannahans, and Ackermans of the media world. Quite the opposite. We are demonstrably alive and well at the moment for not following the implied advices of people like the above. Where would we be if we did follow the line offered by the above, over time

Six foot under, I'd say!

Margo, don't be surprised at media bias.

Murdoch confessed: "With our newspapers, we have indeed supported Bush's foreign policy and we remain that way."

See here.

The problem with the Oz is that it has no faith in its audience. I read in the editorial today, criticising Keating that: "Using George Orwell's 1943 writings to demonise Mr Howard is too difficult for many people to understand." At this I am utterly speechless. It is the worst single sentence I have ever read in a newspaper. Keating made the remarks to a group of film students. Film makers, to me, have the potential to be the apex of our younger generation. It takes courage and intelligence to study film. These will be truer leaders to the nation than any politician, by acquainting Australia with the rest of the world.

I have long argued that people should move beyond Orwell in their analysis of media/politics - but no, apparently, most people don't understand even that, and, we shouldn't worry their pretty little heads about it. No, Kevin Rudd shouldn't go to an election citing Orwell (not that it would do him any harm - no-one respects learning more than the uneducated), but he is also smart enough to know that already. I have no idea why the Australian cannot work out who its audience is. On the one hand it wants to serve a public that it looks down on, whilst at the same time trying to lecture its superiors in politics on how to win elections. Not everything is an election speech - these people are obsessed with power. I think its time they tried treating their readers as equals.

I don't agree with Keating's dismissal of popular film. He has certain, rather obvious points to make on modern film, but there is no depth to the analysis and no recognition of the complexity of the contemporary Hollywood, international and independent film scenes. To do him justice, he speaks mostly about things that he knows about: history and politics. The whole speech is at Keating.org, keyword "Film".

The distinctions made between patriotism and nationalism seem illusory to me. There are qualitative differences between types of each, but, to try and assign them a faux technical meaning seems to me to be one of the more irritating habits of philosophers and commentators. The definitions are only effectual in the context of particular treatises, and, Keating gives us another one, that nobody asked for. In reality both words have the same broad meaning. It isn't important which label is assigned to which.

This is one of Keating's worst post-PM efforts. His linguistic exertions distract from anything meaningful he might have to say. Worse, he repeats himself, but in a more vulgar fashion, with comparisons to Hitler both made and denied, leaving us with a sum total of nothing from the entire speech.

He is nevertheless broadly right on the importance of the Arts.

At present the Art Gallery of NSW is running a series on Iranian new wave cinema. I have seen portions of some of Iranian feminist (and other) films before, and, rolled my eyes at them, but now I can see their importance and vitality. I feel that as a citizen I should be a part of what the Gallery is doing. Their program on Islam acts as a counterpoint to the mainstream media coverage. Keyser Trad from the Lakemba Mosque and the Islamic Friendshp Association spoke last Wednesday and said two things that I utterly agree with, 1. that terrorism is political, not religious and 2. that we should "speak beautifully" to one another, as the Qur'an asserts.

This is not unusUal at all! The Oz regularly "pulls" or does not publish comments which are critical of the "editorial". Like most I was a little put out by yesTerday's editorial in the Oz and put forward my analysis of it (brief one) in one of DSs blogs. It was never published. I reposted with no luck and then requested some feedback directly from DS and CM - no response as yet!

Previously I have had material MPs blogs appear late at night and than mystriously disappear by mid-morning. I caught them out one time - but that's another story.

Margo: Hi Surjit. good to hear from you. Yep, the majors have no respect for the written word when it's published online. And feel no need to explain themselves to readers. They are not, then, newspapers in any meaningful sense. Words online become disposable, as and when the fashions change.