Comments on: Open interview with Paul Ramadge and The Age

By: David

David — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 17:57:00 +0000

I find Young’s response rather sad. But then he protests so much one wonders exactly what is his agenda.

By: Patrick B

Patrick B — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 10:07:57 +0000

Hi there,
I agree David, OLO does display a right-wing bias as the pulling of the Greens Senator’s article attests. Interesting that Young has taken the Age’s criticism so personally.
I find that often the Right attempt to portray themselves as completely free from bias so when something like this happens we see all sorts of reasons trotted out. Look at the hoax in Quadrant last year. Played up to the magazine’s bias, goes to print without vetting then when the hoax was revealed it was attributed to anything but Quadrants heavily skewed editorial policy. I think OLO is in the same position.

By: Arjay

Arjay — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 18:04:55 +0000

Expect a lot more attacks from the Corporate Media of the Fairfax ilk,since people like myself stopped buying newspapers a long time ago.
The internet is making people more aware and the Corportate community as a whole is coming under closer scrutiny.
You cannot get a comment on the major media outlets with someone vetting it.So where is the democracy there?

By: John Passant

John Passant — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 14:25:44 +0000

Graham
Interesting points and questions.
For example I hadn’t thought about the National Times angle before.
It’s interesting that the mainstream media are belatedly searching for a business model to address the democratisation of opinion that the blogosphere has produced.
Since the MSM serve a particular master and have a particularly narrow view of the world that is going to be extremely difficult for them to do.
After all what makes me buy the Age, or the Canberra Times or the Sydney Morning herald or the Fin? (The Financial review s slightly different in that it is the paper of the bourgeoisie.) Or the Australian?
Why would I sign up online for the same tedious crap that passes for news and reporting,and especially analysis and opinion, in these newspapers?
Indeed most of their opinion pieces are gossip dressed up s analysis. Who said what to whom nonsense.
The dilemma for mainstream media like newspapers is that to democratise and allow discordant and dissident views contradicts and undermines the essence of its role – to create the conditions for,as Chomsky put it, the manufacture of consent. You can’t manufacture consent if you are publishing dissent. (Or even a wider range of views than the MSM currently do.)
The Age’s nonsense attack on OLO just proves the point – the profit burghers from Fairfax (and News) are getting worried by the likes of OLO and Crikey.
Let them respond by democratising their pages too.

By: Graham Young

Graham Young — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 13:08:05 +0000

Pay attention David. No-one cares about who reads the Greens story. Malcolm Turnbull raises money from rich people? Well, he’s unlikely to do it from poor people. And he’s good at it? I’d hope so.
It’s all public domain stuff and no reason for OLO to devote its scarce resources to running it, especially as Rhiannon had already secured the Age to do it for her. And had New Matilda in reserve apparently.
You won’t find a gotcha beat-up like this on OLO. We do op-eds. Next you’ll be insisting that BRW publishes serialised Romance novellas.
You obviously fancy yourself as a publisher, and I’d be keen to help out by building the website for you. For a couple of grand we could do you a very nice WordPress site.

By: David

David — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 11:40:01 +0000

I thought the story about Turnbull’s fundraising forum in the Herald was most informative. Then when I was doing my weekly read of New Matilda I saw the excellent article by Rhiannon and Thompson. Have sent it to all my friends who know reform of our donations’ law are crucial. And of course the Libs refuse to support this in the Senate.
Only when the item came out on Crikey did I know about the Online Opinion issue. Graham Young should pull his head in. By posting all this now everyone is reading the second Age story. And a good one it is.
I still don’t know why Young pulled Rhiannon’s great article. He gives a different reason in each paragraph.
Good on you the Age reporter and editor. We need more stories about such issues.
Since Young is so defensive I bet he doesn’t publish my post. So I’m sending to everyone I know who is opposed to such big money in our American type elections these days.