Mysteries at the Museum

[Basil]

There is a show on Netflix called "Mysteries at the Museum" which highlights the stories behind unusual objects and artifacts at various museums around the country. Some very fascinating stories. However, on one episode I had to take exception to how they introduced a segment from the "Museum of Computing History". The episode was about the creation / invention of the touch-tone phone, but in the intro, they described many of the other items housed at this museum. During that intro, they showed a picture of the Maintenance Console of the NORAD SAGE Computer system that I used to work on as an Airman. They called it a Cold-War era radar console! What? Huh? No!!

 

[number6]

AH! the control panel of the submarine Seaview. I think the show gets a lot of thing wrong. I have caught other things as well.

 

[Basil]

AH! the control panel of the submarine Seaview. I think the show gets a lot of thing wrong. I have caught other things as well.

I hadn't heard that one, but it has been on many movies and shows. When The AF finally shut down the old SAGE system and upgraded to more modern computers, Hollywood bought a lot of the stuff to use a props. I have seen this console used to control an evil robot on "6 Million Dollar Man". Also have seen it on Battlestar Galactica and Austin Powers movie (In Dr Evils lair). I have even seen it on an episode of Columbo.

 

[HealeyRick]

I spent a few years as a young reporter and really thought I had a handle on the stories I wrote. In my later career I was often interviewed by the media and got to see how many times they made basic mistakes on the stories they covered. Made me wonder how many things I screwed up in my journalism career.

It's made me think that journalists have a very small chance of getting things right and are mostly dependent on what they are fed by the person trying to influence the story. If we're lucky, we might get a journalist that's assigned to a "beat" that develops an expertise in the subject matter and can sniff out the crazy stuff. Unfortunately, we don't get that anymore and our news sources are, for the most part, too naive to recognize when smoke is being blown up their nether regions.

 

[NutmegCT]

Rick - how well I remember when the evening network news was delivered by real journalists, not telegenic readers.

Huntley and Brinkley. Walter Cronkite. John Chancellor. Edward R. Murrow.

Sadly, no one compares today.

Thanks.

 

[John Turney]

Interesting that my dear wife is now at a convention of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists (NSNC). One of the big problems journalists face today is getting paid. Everyone want their news for free (yes, me too) and it's becoming "you get what you paid for." Our local paper has laid off most of their reporting staff and it shows in the quality and relevance of the stories.

 

[Basil]

I spent a few years as a young reporter and really thought I had a handle on the stories I wrote. In my later career I was often interviewed by the media and got to see how many times they made basic mistakes on the stories they covered. Made me wonder how many things I screwed up in my journalism career.

It's made me think that journalists have a very small chance of getting things right and are mostly dependent on what they are fed by the person trying to influence the story. If we're lucky, we might get a journalist that's assigned to a "beat" that develops an expertise in the subject matter and can sniff out the crazy stuff. Unfortunately, we don't get that anymore and our news sources are, for the most part, too naive to recognize when smoke is being blown up their nether regions.

I don't want to get into a debate about journalism, but I know that of course honest mistakes happen, and that's forgivable. But sometimes I have seen reporting that was intentionally manipulated to tell a specific story that the news outlet wanted to tell, or push an agenda they wanted to push. One famous (infamous) example was when NBC Dateline, in a segment to address accusations that certain GM trucks were unsafe, rigged a crash test truck with incendiary devices to ensure it would explode under a specific crash condition. They wanted to prove the trucks were unsafe. There were other problems with the test, such as the tank being over filled and fitted with incorrect gas cap to ensure gas would spew from the filler upon impact. They also reported the impact caused the tank to be punctured, which later investigation revealed not to be the case.

I have also seen cases where a particular meme is portrayed, not by what is incorrectly stated outright, but rather by what is omitted. An example is when a network (again NBC) edited a 911 tape so as to portray what was said in a completely different light when compared to the unedited version (NBC later apologized for the edited tape, but it should not have happened). More recently, a well known journalist/ personality did a documentary on a topic that some people think is controversial. In it, the interviewer is talking with a group of people and asks what was intended (my opinion) to be a "gotcha question." After the question, viewers are treated to 9 seconds of showing the people in the group looking stumped and staring blankly, while ominous music plays. That editing was done to make the group look foolish and imply they were unable to intelligently answer the question. The maker of the documentary was not interested in telling the truth, they had an agenda and produced a show to put forth that pre-determined narrative. Fortunately, someone recorded the full audio and the interviewer was called on the deception and later apologized. That's the kind of stuff that bothers me.

Mistakes like the the one in the Museum show and just innocent mistakes.

 

[Basil]

Interesting that my dear wife is now at a convention of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists (NSNC). One of the big problems journalists face today is getting paid. Everyone want their news for free (yes, me too) and it's becoming "you get what you paid for." Our local paper has laid off most of their reporting staff and it shows in the quality and relevance of the stories.

The internet has a lot to do with that. I personally don't mind paying for news because if they don't make money they don't exist, and that would be a bad thing. There are several outlets that I subscribe to (paid) in order to access their content.

 

[George_H]

Many years ago, Growing up in NJ my parents always watched the "10 o'clock news". At some point during the broadcast one of the reporters would have a segment called "commentary" It was his (or the stations)personal views on the topic. Today you pick the station depending on your views, the competing stations can report on a topic showing opposite conclusions. "News" is no longer on TV, Its ALL commentary. If I could find news, I would gladly pay for it.

 

[mikephillips]

I grew up reading a daily paper. My father read it and I developed the habit. As of the beginning of the year I stopped buying the local paper when it doubled in price and had cut back to the point that there was actually very little state and national news but now mostly a few human interest type stories and the local sports all condensed down to about half the size, both in page dimensions and number of pages, as it had been a few years ago. I found most of it to be irrelevant to learning about what is happening in the world so now I get news from Fox, CNN, the evening nation news and radio and work out for myself what is true based on those differing viewpoints.