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Science Shafted Again
Dec. 5th, 2008 07:42 pmVia John Cole at Balloon Juice, this sad news:
Aside from losing the reporter with the most appropriate name on the air, this is yet another move by CNN away from actual news and towards the cult of personality perfected by Faux Noise. Despite their claim that they will now integrate those stories into the main news stream, I'd bet that CNN will find fewer and fewer minutes for pure science stories, except for the blockbusters they have to feature, and continue to increase the time they devote to commentary and pseudonews.
Science and technology are increasingly the stories of the day, both because they are a daily more dominant segment of our lives and because we, in the US at least, are apparently getting worse at teaching and learning science in our schools. Dismissing people who are conversant with them in favor of feeding copy to talking heads strikes me as a poor way of making the subjects interesting and accessible, both of which are necessary for young people to want to get into the nitty gritty of it for life.
CNN, I say you blew it.
CNN, the Cable News Network, announced yesterday that it will cut its entire science, technology, and environment news staff, including Miles O’Brien, its chief technology and environment correspondent, as well as six executive producers. Mediabistro’s TVNewser broke the story.
“We want to integrate environmental, science and technology reporting into the general editorial structure rather than have a stand alone unit,” said CNN spokesperson Barbara Levin. “Now that the bulk of our environmental coverage is being offered through the Planet in Peril franchise, which is produced by the Anderson Cooper 360 program, there is no need for a separate unit.”
Aside from losing the reporter with the most appropriate name on the air, this is yet another move by CNN away from actual news and towards the cult of personality perfected by Faux Noise. Despite their claim that they will now integrate those stories into the main news stream, I'd bet that CNN will find fewer and fewer minutes for pure science stories, except for the blockbusters they have to feature, and continue to increase the time they devote to commentary and pseudonews.
Science and technology are increasingly the stories of the day, both because they are a daily more dominant segment of our lives and because we, in the US at least, are apparently getting worse at teaching and learning science in our schools. Dismissing people who are conversant with them in favor of feeding copy to talking heads strikes me as a poor way of making the subjects interesting and accessible, both of which are necessary for young people to want to get into the nitty gritty of it for life.
CNN, I say you blew it.
