Sinclair Made Dozens of Local News Anchors Recite the Same Script - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/02/business/media/sinclair-news-anchors-script.html <comment><USER2> It seems like the issue is a lack of competition, if I don't like what Sinclair is saying I can not watch it, but if they own all the stations then I don't have that choice. The FCC did all this while everyone was distracted with net neutrality, so even if it came up again there the FCC knows how to distract people already. I'm just not sure what I as a viewer/voter can do about except wait for the next election, and even then, there's no guarantee that the candidate who wins is going to do anything about it.

But... looking at the list of stations Sinclair owns[0]... where are the markets that they control all the stations, defined as ABC+NBC+FOX+CBS? I honestly don't see any. Is this more of a concern if they do manage to get all of these, or if the merger with Tribune Media goes through?

0: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stations_owned_or_oper...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stations_owned_or_operated_by_Sinclair_Broadcast_Group)

</comment><comment><USER3> FYI, the article seems to be linking to a reupload of the original video for some reason.

This is the original: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWLjYJ4BzvI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWLjYJ4BzvI)

<comment><USER4> Nah, they've just linked to another upload -- if you want to know the account, the link under "social media" points to the same video as the embed one.

Besides, the original is Deadspin's article[1]. The video was downloaded and posted on Youtube. The Reddit user said that oneself. Deadspin, of course, also got the idea and news elsewhere, e.g., the linked ThinkProgress video in the article.

[1] [https://theconcourse.deadspin.com/how-americas-largest- local...](https://theconcourse.deadspin.com/how-americas-largest-local-tv- owner-turned-its-news-anc-1824233490)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> For anyone interested, I'm always open to PRs for the "Media Literacy for Engineers" doc I put together:

[https://github.com/nemild/hacking- engineers](https://github.com/nemild/hacking-engineers)

Examples like this are what I include, about how third-parties can manipulate media sources for their own ends.

</comment><comment> cirrus-clouds Charlie Brooker did an excellent spoof video of the way news is reported. The video is 8 years old (made in 2010) but it still rings true today:

How to report the news:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHun58mz3vI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHun58mz3vI)

Every TV news report on the economy in one:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HN2iVe8_Ato](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HN2iVe8_Ato)

</comment><comment><USER6> It is important to reinforce the wholesomeness, and trustworthiness, of your brand or product when that product faces the significant risk of potential legislative regulation in light of growing aversion to its decades-long embrace of lies, manipulation, and 'fake news' in the pursuit of ratings and shareholder value.

Sinclair has taken up the mantle of PR Firm to engage in some preemptive damage control. 15 years ago all you had to say was "Fair and Balanced."

<comment><USER7> You are way way way way too optimistic... It is clear by the current state of our politics that there is no repercussion for lying.

The fact that Sinclair has been growing is evidence of that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's kind of sad to see a potentially important discussion here devolve into a: off-topic threads about policy (DACA), or partisan trolling about #fakenews to derail the subject away from Sinclair.

That said, something I'm curious about... how many people still get their news primarily from local tv broadcast in this day and age? And what are the age ranges of those people? Lacking any actual data, I'd suggest by complete conjecture that it's not that many, and they skew _much_ older than the general population. I'd be surprised if anyone under the age of 30 watches local tv news regularly at all.

I know that personally, I watch so little local news that when I do, the cognitive dissonance is kind of jarring. And when do I watch it? Mostly, when visiting my Baby Boomer in-laws...

<comment><USER9> I watch morning news in the Chicago market for weather and traffic. I suppose I also get local news. And I get irked because I don't think cute Youtube videos are news but regardless of the station I can't seem to escape that. I'm getting tired of the transplant doctor that dresses up as a Star Wars character (the big furry thing) to deliver good news. Maybe I'm getting too old or just not enough of a Star Wars fan. (Wookie. That's the thing that the doctor impersonates.)

I looked for Sinclair station ownership in this market and according to The Book of Knowledge (Wikipedia) there is none.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> So, this explains the creepy video I saw over the weekend, of numerous news stations reciting the same canned speech, verbatim. When I see one station doing it, or similar sentiment from multiple stations in their own words, that might slightly temper my cynicism about the (lack of) objectivity and truthfulness of the news. But when I see shit like this, it only serves to harden my cynicism.

<comment><USER11> >So, this explains the creepy video I saw over the weekend, of numerous news stations reciting the same canned speech, verbatim.

Local news stations receive packages and content with scripts pre-written from national networks and other sources all the time. It's not a conspiracy, and it shouldn't cast doubt on the truthfulness of a story.

Television news is a scripted medium, and most stations don't have the time or talent to write a completely unique script for every newscast from scratch.

<comment><USER12> When it's the introduction to a news package, fair enough.

When it's a politically charged attack on competitors, it crosses a pretty uncomfortable line.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The branding of those stations is the core problem, no?

Says ABC/NBC/Fox - but actually that's just a logo.

Why not have them clearly labeled as Sinclair, then consumer would know. And maybe still be fine with it.

This way it's indeed shady.

</comment><comment><USER14> Nothing new. I worked in a newsroom as an intern and most major news stations rely (maybe, relied, it's been a few years) on a tool like ENPS. It's made by the Associated Press and has a "wire" feature where new stories come into. So, e.g., if there was a plane crash, that message would be pushed out to all newsrooms that rely on ENPS.

The news producers were lazy, too. They'd literally take the script that ENPS pushes out, tweak a few words, and put it on air. I was working in a minor midwestern market (Toledo, Ohio). If you watched the evening broadcasts in the same market and nationally, you'd frequently see the same stories and similar verbiage popping up.

Being surprised by a broadcast group like Sinclair was forcing a narrative is like being surprised that the sky is blue. The "news" is highly filtered and easily controlled. To think otherwise is deliberate ignorance.

The broadcasting industry is corrupt and untrustworthy as all hell. My father worked in it at a high level (owning licenses and stations) and he'd frequently come home from trips either stone faced or frustrated beyond belief: [https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/22/business/media/22spectrum...](https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/22/business/media/22spectrum.html) (he's the stately looking black fella throwing a fit in this piece).

To trust anything the mass media tells you is to severely handicap your intelligence. Unfortunately, large swats of the general public do exactly that.

/rant

<comment><USER15> Where do you suggest people go to get their news instead ?

<comment><USER16> One must try to find points of view from all "sides", and then apply critical thinking to everything that one reads/hears. Every source is very biased and full of a lot of (mostly, really) shit, but the facts can be discerned if personal biases give way to objective analysis.

<comment><USER8> That's the logical failing of the moderate - to reduce everything to opinion and bias, and ignore the existence of fact.

If one side says 2+2=4, and the other side said 2+2=6, the truth is _not_ that 2+2=5 and everyone needs to stop being so partisan.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> What better way to drive home the point that news is bought to influence people, then to buy a bunch of local news channels and use it to tell people that? There is some beautiful symmetry here, even if it was unintentional.

</comment><comment><USER18> The actual video they talked about is linked on this [1] page... It's mildly haunting to watch...

[1]: [https://theconcourse.deadspin.com/how-americas-largest- local...](https://theconcourse.deadspin.com/how-americas-largest-local-tv- owner-turned-its-news-anc-1824233490)

</comment><comment><USER19> I do see this as a bad thing, but I also know that everyone under 40 gets their news from the web. The target audience for these channels are older people who don't read news online or on mobile phones.

In a way, Sinclair is becoming a TV streaming service.

I sense the badness, but I also think they run the risk of spending a lot of money on a wasted effort.

You can only influence people if they're dumb _and_ watching your news programs. Seems like a dwindling market if you ask me. People already have FOX News and they've reached their ceiling (35% of the population). Sinclair is going to run into the same demographic problem.

<comment><USER20> I have gotten my news from web for 25 years but I still watch local news 2 night s a week - to see coverage of some local issue, to check on the weather or see a bit of a baseball game, or just by default.

And while people over 40 are generally in the second half of their lives and heading for the demographic exits, that doesn't mean they're politically irrelevant. They're far more likely to vote, more likely to be homeowners/property tax payers (with the political heft that that gives), and have greater financial and political heft than their younger counterparts. You're naive if you think they're just bumbling along without thinking of much of anything. Just because you find that demographic boring and personally irrelevant doesn't mean they can't exert political power over you int eh aggregate. Many such people are willing to have their opinions shaped or validated by broadcast media and act accordingly.

Take Fox News; it's easy to make fun of their audience, because who int heir right mind would take people like Sean Hannity seriously? And yet millions do, and their existence and hostility cannot be wished away.

Incidentally, just "getting your news from the web" is no guarantee of objectivity either. Come on, we live in a society where people in high places tweet links to Infowars or Qanon conspiracy theories non-ironically.

<comment><USER19> I agree with your assessment, but my "gut" feeling is that Sinclair is over- reaching and the expectation won't match the spend. ESPN just announced their streaming service ESPN+. This is just another nail in cable TV's coffin. In a few years, broadcast television may be on its last legs.

We're on the verge of a Spotify for TV where you can pick your own channels, including which "local" channel you want. Some people may still pick the Sinclair run station and be influenced, but my point is that we're reading this Sinclair deal in the context of the past.

And people have an interesting habit of recognizing when they're being manipulated and they call B.S.

First West Virginia, now Oklahoma where school teachers are fed up with tax cuts that only benefit corporations and the wealthy and end up taking away from teachers and students.

We have a tragic and unexpectedly organized and mature set of Florida teenagers that are giving the NRA a run for their money. They may have knocked a Fox News mainstay off the air by forcing most of her advertisers to bolt.

My sense, and it's just intuition based on the news of the day, is that people are just starting to push back. Sinclair probably needed the FCC changes 10 years ago. I think it's probably just too late.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> _So funny to watch Fake News Networks, among the most dishonest groups of people I have ever dealt with, criticize Sinclair Broadcasting for being biased. Sinclair is far superior to CNN and even more Fake NBC, which is a total joke._ [https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/98079918342580224...](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/980799183425802240)

I think it's reasonable to conclude that POTUS likes that Sinclair compels local news anchors to recite scripts that present a favorable impression of, support for, his policies or him personally.

This is the American crony capitalism version of what Putin did with his state media in order to gain and retain control of the country, and destroy his adversaries. Trump won't have to have his adversaries poisoned. He's poisoning the ability for people to triangulate. And near as I can tell this is what people who support him want. They do not want contrary opinions. They want an autocrat.

</comment><comment><USER22> A certain conservative radio talk show host has a hobby of stringing together identical-sounding phrases from various sources in the establishment media, as if they all read from the same memo. It seemed certain someone had coordinated their talking points.

Is the Sinclair issue that much different?

Presumably the former example was performed by a group of like-minded individuals operating under some flavor of free will, who arrived at a consensus. But we can't be sure that was the process. They might have been coerced, or merely chose to parrot each other regardless of circumstance, because they found themselves so well aligned.

Sinclair, on the other hand, assumed obedience by virtue of signing the checks.

That said, I don't know if this situation is as scary as it used to be, now that we've had some experience with the power of more monolithic-appearing news sources such as FB and Google.

</comment><comment><USER23> This is extremely dangerous to our democracy.

<comment><USER24> I agree. 232 people control the news that 277 million americans are allowed to see. ([1] from 2012). Many of us have been pounding this drum for a long time, including Trump himself. I think it is this control at a national level that the Sinclair news anchors were being told to warn people about, but the NYT has flipped the narrative on them, and now they're the bad guys. Genius, but unfortunate.

[1] [http://www.businessinsider.com/these-6-corporations- control-...](http://www.businessinsider.com/these-6-corporations- control-90-of-the-media-in-america-2012-6)

<comment><USER25> > Many of us have been pounding this drum for a long time, including Trump > himself.

Can you cite that? It sounds like prime material for Reddit's /r/TrumpCriticizesTrump/

<comment><USER24> Cite it? Fake News has been his mantra for awhile. I think you'll find it.

<comment><USER25> I don't see how "fake news" relates to media monopolization. It's just a fallacious outright rejection of unpleasant news.

In fact, Trump just stated he supports Sinclair's monopolization.

<comment><USER26> Monopolization is highly beneficial to facilitating fake news, you don't see that?

<comment><USER25> It's the other way around. Fake news is selective ignorance that distracts from the cancer eating away at our formerly-educated electorate.

<comment><USER26> One entity owning multiple outlets and therefore having the ability to broadcast a consistent message, as literally shown in the video, not only does not facilitate fake news, but _can not_? It acts as an antidote to fake news, in all cases?

<comment><USER25> "Fake news" is a symptom of consumer ignorance, and beneficial for facilitating monopolization.

<comment><USER26> Please answer my question.

<comment><USER25> Which one? They looked rhetorical to me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> wu-ikkyu Isn't this pretty much the case for all corporate media? The narrative is set from the top down, and if anyone strays too far outside the Overton Window, they're punished. Example: Phil Donahue getting fired from MSNBC for speaking against the war in Iraq.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phil_Donahue#MSNBC_program](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phil_Donahue#MSNBC_program)

<comment><USER27> Phil Donahue was not a news anchor. What makes this case different is that this is scripted material posing as real local news as part of basic cable package. Most people will not treat this as crafted message from a corporation, but actual news.

<comment> wu-ikkyu Isn't most corporate cable news a scripted message read from a teleprompter?

<comment><USER28> National anchors clearly have a boss that they listen to, but they also pretty clearly have a pretty large amount of editorial control over their shows.

<comment> wu-ikkyu >they also pretty clearly have a pretty large amount of editorial control over their shows.

The case of Phil Donahue indicates otherwise.

<comment><USER29> Which, again: Phil Donahue was not a news anchor.

<comment> wu-ikkyu Did he discuss news and current events on a television show? If so he can be called a news anchor, or a news presenter. Why are you stressing the semantics if not only to euphemize?

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_presenter](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_presenter)

<comment><USER30> It might be due to Fox News getting out of a lawsuit by claiming what they broadcast isn't news but entertainment (at least in the prime time slots)

<comment> wu-ikkyu Do you have a source for this? After googling "fox news entertainment lawsuit" it appears this may be a myth

[https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fox-skews/](https://www.snopes.com/fact- check/fox-skews/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> This is a non issue for my household either way. We cut the cord a year ago and haven't missed the spin doctors and commercial breaks.

</comment><comment><USER32> You've never seen these kind of videos before? Local news stations have been gutted for at least a decade and they get just about all their non-local content in this way.

</comment><comment><USER33> Reminds me of when Trump won the Republican nomination-- a gob of stories ran with basically the same theme and spin.

There's no such thing as straight news. It's all spin, one way or the other.

Here's Politico's take on the Trump speech lockstep reaction: [https://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/trump-convention- spee...](https://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/trump-convention-speech- media-226010)

</comment><comment><USER34> The interesting thing here is the groupthink believes this methodology is unique to Sinclair.

</comment><comment><USER35> In my eyes, this is a clear set/spike play. A huge corporation, enabled by their corrupt allies in the FCC, buy up hundreds of "local" stations. They then use the local cred/reputation of these stations to suggest that fake news is rampant on other sources (not controlled by Sinclair). They then tilt the dialogue nation-wide. Meanwhile, the average citizen is unaware that their trusted local anchor is bought/sold, they lack education and resources to educate themselves, and they are pushed further towards whatever dialogue the Sinclair executives are paid to push them towards.

Does anyone from either side of the aisle consider a national corporation owning local stations and forcing scripts down their throat a good thing for the marketplace of ideas?

<comment><USER36> How is that any different from major news organizations like CNN with a national reach clearly pushing biased anti-Trump news constantly?

It's funny: Trump attacks CNN for being fake, biased news, then CNN responds by focusing all of their negative reporting on Trump, becoming exactly what Trump says they are. People would have had much more respect for CNN if they had stuck to the middle path in the face of Trump's insults.

We should not turn a blind eye towards some instances of bias in media simply because they reinforce our own values and beliefs.

<comment><USER37> > It's funny: Trump attacks CNN for being fake, biased news, then CNN responds > by focusing all of their negative reporting on Trump, becoming exactly what > Trump says they are.

CNN reporting negatively on Trump doesn't make them "fake". He's a bad president and a bad leader; reporting on that means you're telling the truth. Fake mean lying, not reporting truth you don't want to hear.

<comment><USER38> Have you read their editorials? They're so biased and poorly written that I can no longer regard CNN as a good news source.

It's a case of "two wrongs don't make a right." Lowering reporting standards because the other side lowered reporting standards means we have no good news.

Not being able to trust the media (both CNN and Faux news) is a bigger problem than electing a lousy president.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Seems like we need to get more people cord-cut immediately...

<comment><USER40> Youtube recommends far more dangerous stuff.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Last Week Tonight (John Oliver) dove into this last year. It's really frustrating that they can leverage so much political sway under the cover of "news reporting". Then forcing news stations to broadcast this garbage.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc)

<comment><USER42> "👎" to the John Oliver reference. His "reporting" is as biased as it gets. His show is written in a style that convinces the subconscious to accept presented arguments without engaging any serious logical scrutiny. Just try to remember if at any point during any of his broadcasts you actually analyzed the subject of his monologues, rather than simply furthering the thought- process that he was laying out for you. Chances are that you never have because it's written to be persuasive (obviously) and only incidentally informative. Sadly, I know this is precisely what many people now believe "journalism" to be...

<comment><USER43> Can you give me an example of unbiased reporting on television?

<comment><USER42> I would say that hacker news is actually a fairly objective aggregator. It's also participatory, which hopefully checks bias at some level. But, as this isn't television... it's not a valid example, in response to your question. Also, hacker news isn't ad-supported, which is nice.

<comment><USER30> But there is still bias here. Bias in the stories submitted, in that they're skewed toward the I interests of white male 20-30 somethings. Not a lot of diversity of opinion and point of view here, which is another way of saying prevailing bias.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Trump recently took DACA off the negotiating table, announcing it in a tweet, citing a Fox News & Friends segment on 'caravans' of inbound immigrants: [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration/trump- say...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration/trump-says-daca- deal-for-young-immigrants-is-off-idUSKCN1H81C1)

The President is watching this same garbage and making policy decisions based on it. Let that sink in for a moment.

<comment><USER24> If you watched the state of the union, you know that Trump made a proposal about DACA that was such a huge compromise to the left, that much of his base raised hell. The left refused that compromise, and refused again, when he asked for DACA and the wall to be addressed in the latest spending bill. Since he has twice been rebuffed on his compromises, he's going the other way. That seems reasonable to me.

<comment><USER45> I was surprised Democrats didn't compromise on that, I think they are too focused on making Trump fail at any cost.

I'm all for increased immigration and amnesty, but I'm not in support of open borders, so a compromise for increased border security sounded like good policy to me.

<comment><USER30> No one is seriously proposing open boarders. Anyone on the right telling you otherwise is selling you a straw man. And let's all remember, a border without a wall is _not_ an "open" border. That's not what that means.

<comment><USER45> I consider them open now, in practice not law.

Despite also supporting amnesty, chain migration, and increased visa quotas I've been told I'm racist for wanting a secure border. Racist for not supporting border policies that create an underclass of undocumented, helpless workers.

<comment><USER46> Open boarders worked well in the early united states. I don't want to go back to closed boarders between New York and New Jersey.

<comment><USER45> Uncapped unskilled immigration works great when you have jobs available, and early America had plenty of those. Coupled with zero entitlement programs it was a perfect recipe for growth.

Doesn't work so well now, it would put enormous pressure on social programs already near their breaking point, and drive unemployment sky high as unskilled jobs are diminishing. Crime would increase as poverty is positive correlated.

However, if you make it past that initial surge, the _2nd generation_ could provide an enormous boost to the economy as long as education was prioritized.

Compare to uncapped skilled immigration and it's a much higher risk.

<comment><USER46> Rome had more than one tier of member of society, (eg citizen and non citizens) you could tie social benefits to certain social performance expectations such as military service, length of residency. I am not advocating open boarders or a multi tier citizen status structure merely showing possible solutions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Those news anchors were either OK with the contents of the script they were ordered to read, or they were gutless cowards for not resigning or allowing themselves to be fired.

<comment><USER29> The journalism job market ain't what it used to be. I find it hard to label people trying to keep their family fed and housed as "gutless cowards."

<comment><USER20> That's true, but getting paid a lot so that the personal sacrifices would be that much greater isn't greater moral ill for the news anchors. They could go and get regular jobs (ie at median pay when starting a different career, but are over-leveraged, basically. That's a tough spot to be in, but it doesn't make it OK to participate in further debasement of the system.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> Isn't that the entire model since long of the owners of multiple local news channels? It's a running joke on reddit since so many years.

<comment><USER49> The problem is that they're the single largest television broadcaster.

 _Headquartered in Hunt Valley, Maryland, the company is the largest television station operator in the United States by number of stations, and largest by total coverage; owning or operating a total of 193 stations across the country (233 after all currently proposed sales are approved) in over 100 markets (covering 40% of American households), many of which are located in the South and Midwest._

<comment><USER50> With the shift to the various 21st century streaming platforms, broadcast TV in its traditional form is rapidly becoming the bastion of the elderly. The average traditional broadcast news viewer is 50+[1] so very soon Sinclair will be dominating retirement homes everywhere in America. It's a demographic that will literally die out from under them, and seems like a poor long-term investment.

[1] [http://www.journalism.org/2016/07/07/pathways-to- news/](http://www.journalism.org/2016/07/07/pathways-to-news/)

<comment><USER49> You may not be aware of this, but typically you don't enter a nursing home at 50. Either way, Sinclair is also well into streaming services, which you could have discovered with even a cursory glance at their Wikipedia page. Of course, a huge number of people, especially people who vote, are in that same age bracket.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> Why is the part about Sinclair news reporting on "Islamic terror" and "Trump support" singled out. Do they not report on anything else at all? Or is reporting on both this stuff by default a wrong thing to do?

<comment><USER25> Sinclair does not report on anything. Local TV stations do their own journalism, but Sinclair owns the station and can order the local broadcasters to read scripts.

Those topics are likely the only ones with concrete evidence.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> How much would it cost to buy all that airtime?

</comment><comment><USER52> After making it about halfway through the comments here, I flagged TFA. It is probably "hypocritical" for me to say this, since I also have political opinions. Here it is anyway: despite the widespread understanding that "mainstream" news media leans Democrat, the fact that USA president is controversial and drives increased viewership has added tens of millions of dollars to their bottom lines. This would make a thoughtful person wonder just how committed to the Democrats (or "the truth"?) they really are. Similar observations about other media firms are left as an exercise for the reader.

</comment><comment><USER53> Why is this news? Conan covered this years ago. [https://mic.com/articles/77721/watch-conan-o-brien-bust- loca...](https://mic.com/articles/77721/watch-conan-o-brien-bust-local-tv- news-stations-for-running-the-exact-same-story#.5rRTuSPfw)

<comment><USER54> Because Sinclair just purchased more TV stations, so many in fact that it was banned under previous administrations at the FCC. At the start of 2017, the FCC just rewrote the rules allowing Sinclair to own a large swath of the US's local news capacity.

In many markets they're the sole source of local news.

[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-07/sinclair-...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-07/sinclair- said-close-to-buying-tribune-for-about-45-a-share)

<comment><USER55> They're also the most likely candidate to pick up the pieces when iHeartRadio goes bankrupt. They're going to have the strongest propaganda outlet since the times of Hearst newspapers. This is an abject failure of the FCC.

<comment><USER56> The FCC hasn't failed, here. They were intentionally hamstrung by the right wing.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCC_fairness_doctrine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCC_fairness_doctrine)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER57> I'm not clear why this is a problem. A corporation asked its broadcasters to make a statement on fake news. This statement sounds similar to others made by other corporate owned networks. Viewers are invited to comment on the website.

<comment><USER58> The problem is the corporation. Sinclair has it's own political agenda. Forcing anchors across the US to recite something is bad enough, but when that something is of questionable truth, and orchestrated to minimuze Sinclair's own propensity to push its right-ist agenda, it's downright scary.

<comment><USER59> Yeah, just about as scary as GE, Disney, Time Warner et al. pushing their left wing agendas via CNN, MSNBC/NBC and ABC.

See, everyone can play this game in the Postmodernist world.

<comment><USER60> OK but now you have to explain why pushing a "left wing agenda" is supposed to be scary.

Was it voting rights? Is voting rights scary? Or perhaps universal health care? Is that scary? Or a public education? Wooow that's REALLY scary!

Come on.. scare us! We liberals love a good scary story!

<comment><USER61> It's easy if you just blindly accept the axioms of one of the groups. You accept the axioms of left wingers, so it doesn't seem scary to you. I'm not a right winger but they could just as easily say: murdering millions of unborn children, robbing us of our right to defend ourselves, denying the right to freedom of association, infringing on our freedom of speech, infringing on our freedom of religion, etc. Those are all pretty scary.

<comment><USER62> > robbing us of our right to defend ourselves

Well, the problem with that narrative is that most of the center-left is quite happy to find a comprimise. It seems like arms dealers are too, actually. It's mostly the NRA unable to disengage its PR machine from collapsing the entire narrative to "you'll take our guns" vs "total gun freedom".

So that itself is a good thing to bring up: it's impossible to disassemble with facts because it's already counterfactual.

Similar things can be said of the freedom of association and freedom of religion arguments. They're currently fixed by a narrative of constant assault that most folks freely admit is poorly supported in their daily experience, but that they're convinced (by media groups coordinated by Sinclair) are just over the horizon coming from them.

It's certainly fair to claim left wing media has bias. We should always be watchful for bias and unfairness in our media. It's just that right now, unless you believe in hidden child porn rings in pizza shops being shut down by a secret Trump task force (the Storm, a literal extension of pizzagate), potential influence from demons/lizard people in the democratic party (Alex Jones pushes this narrative), or a global Jewish coordinated conspiracy that reaches down to the level of each individual life on the planet, and that ever Muslim is part of a coordinated global conspiracy to "end whitness"... Well you get the picture. Unless you believe in the output of this machine coordinated to spread this disinformation (and I say machine because we've got people freely admitting part of it is theirs, e.g., Cambridge Analytica), facts and uncharitable readings are sufficient from the left wing media.

A centrist or even a libertarian should have no problem picking their poison in the marketplace of ideas, unless they're genuinely bought into these increasingly absurd conspiracy theories that put 9/11-truther levels of weird to shame.

<comment><USER61> * Noting I'm arguing someone else's position. *

>Well, the problem with that narrative is that most of the center-left is quite happy to find a comprimise. It seems like arms dealers are too, actually. It's mostly the NRA unable to disengage its PR machine from collapsing the entire narrative to "you'll take our guns" vs "total gun freedom".

You too are collapsing the narrative to "NRA is evil." The power that the NRA has is that it can mobilize countless voters who support what the NRA does. Pretending that the NRA is a rogue organization that doesn't represent a huge segment of the population is disingenuous.

>A centrist or even a libertarian should have no problem picking their poison in the marketplace of ideas, unless they're genuinely bought into these increasingly absurd conspiracy theories that put 9/11-truther levels of weird to shame.

Tell me again how Trump is a fascist and neo-Nazis are taking over the country. And further that Trump who bombed the shit out of a major Russian ally (Syria) is under the thumb of Russia because of pee-pee tape in the same breath that you make fun of Trump for being a germaphobe (part of why he eats so much fast food).

<comment><USER62> > You too are collapsing the narrative to "NRA is evil."

I'm not sure if the NRA is evil or not. I don't think "evil" is a very good label for Atheists to use, and I count myself among that cohort.

I think the NRA's published position matches with my account. I do not think it's a helpful or reasonable position.

> Pretending that the NRA is a rogue organization that doesn't represent a > huge segment of the population is disingenuous.

Quite the contrary, I think the NRA represents a rather small segment of the population. They're trying to broaden that segment with significant cash outlay and with very misleading arguments that turn things like, "Bans on modifications that allow semi-automatic weapons to achieve >2r/s sustained fire rates" into "They hate our freedom and they're coming for our guns and it's time to strike back." That's a _chartiable_ reading of NRATV's current message.

> Tell me again how Trump is a fascist and neo-Nazis are taking over the > country.

"Taking over" is certainly not the word. "Have always been here and are increasingly more exposed." Unless of course we ignore the continued defense of openly self-labeled neo-nazi groups right out of Trump's own mouth, this is a factual reading of the situation.

> is under the thumb of Russia because of pee-pee tape

Any president would fall prey to this rumor. It's hilarious. I wish Obama had a pee-pee tape scandal. It's quintessentially American.

What's I hope less so is the direct and numerous conflicts of interest that have been poorly handled by the Trump admin, the numerous (denied) allegations of campaign finance violations that were then not only proven, but plead guilty to by Trump's cohort.

Again: you're equivocating based on utterly meaningless and boring things. Sure, some leftits are dumb. For the most part, the center-left media _ignores_ the majority of these stories after they come out (as has been pointed out in other places, Fox brings up the pee tape more over time than any other outlet). Nor have I actually ever even heard the phrase, "Trump is a germophobe" come up except as a refutation.

All this is smoke and mirrors, and an attempt to deflect from the truly frightening admissions that folk who ran the Trump campaign's media have made. They're literally suggesting the use of human trafficking to run a sex entrapment extortion game on politicans and you're like, "Well the libs believe in a peepee tape." I'm sure some libs believe in UFOs too, but this doesn't dismiss or excuse the facts at hand.

<comment><USER61> >I think the NRA's published position matches with my account. I do not think it's a helpful or reasonable position.

The NRA's position is no more unreasonable than forcing Christians to pay for what they believe to be child murder.

>Bans on modifications that allow semi-automatic weapons to achieve >2r/s sustained fire rates

Actually, after the Las Vegas shooting the NRA came out in favor of banning bump stocks. [0]

>"Have always been here and are increasingly more exposed." Unless of course we ignore the continued defense of openly self-labeled neo-nazi groups right out of Trump's own mouth, this is a factual reading of the situation.

Yep, they've always been there and while there's fluctuations the general trend is there are fewer and fewer of them. The largest neo-Nazi gathering in ages was a year or two ago and they managed to get a few hundred people to show up. The outsized media attention on these crazy people is to attempt to associate them with the approximate half of the country which happens to vote Republican. In contrast you can look at the media coverage of Antifa and other far left groups that have set fires and killed people over the last few years. It's very different and it's easy to understand why.

It's also important to look at the big picture here. Rather than condemning the alt-right he said there were "good people" on both sides of a rally where someone was killed and one of those sides was the alt-right. But do you know what that allowed him to do? He was in a position where he was able to go to Congress with a position supporting a path to citizenship for dreamers in exchange for increased funding for border control and some stupid wall funding. And there was hardly any push back from the far right. Giving them a tongue lashing might have made you feel better, but it likely would not have helped the country in any way.

>All this is smoke and mirrors, and an attempt to deflect from the truly frightening admissions that folk who ran the Trump campaign's media have made. They're literally suggesting the use of human trafficking to run a sex entrapment extortion game on politicans and you're like, "Well the libs believe in a peepee tape." I'm sure some libs believe in UFOs too, but this doesn't dismiss or excuse the facts at hand.

Some crazy right wingers have some crazy conspiracy theories like 9-11 truthers and pizzagate. Some crazy left wingers have some crazy conspiracy theories about GMOs, alternative medicine, vaccines, etc. But this isn't a discussion about who has the craziest crazies, this discussion is about how the mainstream media biases when reporting on all issues including the crazies.

[0]: [https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/top-house- republica...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/top-house-republicans- open-to-legislation-regulating-bump- stocks/2017/10/05/4580cb54-a9dc-11e7-b3aa-c0e2e1d41e38_story.html)

<comment><USER62> > He was in a position where he was able to go to Congress with a position > supporting a path to citizenship for dreamers in exchange for increased > funding for border control and some stupid wall funding. And there was > hardly any push back from the far right. Giving them a tongue lashing might > have made you feel better, but it likely would not have helped the country > in any way.

This "Trump is playing 4d hyperchess and can see externalities that by the way didn't actually pan out because not only did DACA not go through, but Trump took it off the table spitefully because he couldn't secure wall funding" argument? Unconvincing at best. I don't believe it because I don't see evidence of it. But I certainly don't think that the desire to appease conservative Americans includes calling people who publicly state their goal is to establish a white ethnostate in the ashes of American democracy "good people." They're literally opposing the institutions and laws he swore to uphold.

> Some crazy right wingers have some crazy conspiracy theories like 9-11 > truthers and pizzagate. Some crazy left wingers have some crazy conspiracy > theories about GMOs, alternative medicine, vaccines, etc. But this isn't a > discussion about who has the craziest crazies, this discussion is about how > the mainstream media biases when reporting on all issues including the > crazies.

And yet you're seemingly unwilling to quote, engage, or even acknowledge that side of the conversation?

I find that side of the discussion much more interesting.

<comment><USER61> >This "Trump is playing 4d hyperchess and can see externalities

Whether or not Trump's behavior is intentional or accidental, the outcome is the same.

>And yet you're seemingly unwilling to quote, engage, or even acknowledge that side of the conversation?

As I acknowledged multiple times in this thread, I'm not even arguing my own position. I'm pointing out that there are other ways of seeing the world, other axioms that can be accepted which make the mainstream media look very biased. I don't need to engage in an argument about whether neo-Nazis are worse than Antifa because it's irrelevant to our conversation. The topics I brought up were pretty mainstream things like abortion, gun rights, etc. You have brought the conversation to the fringe. But this isn't about the fringe. It's about the middle. Of course the bias is expressed in how the media talks about the fringe too, but again that's irrelevant. We probably agree on many if not most of these issues, but conservatives are not crazy in seeing that the mass media doesn't represent them fairly, or in many cases doesn't represent them at all.

<comment><USER62> All you're doing is deflecting and avoiding meaningful conversation about very serious issues involving data privacy and information manipulation in an effort to equivocate. I can read your other comments, and I can see how you play this game.

I'm uninterested in continuing with you in any capacity. Thank you for your time, but we won't speak again while you use this name. Goodbye.

<comment><USER61> This is my first message in this thread:

>It's easy if you just blindly accept the axioms of one of the groups. You accept the axioms of left wingers, so it doesn't seem scary to you. I'm not a right winger but they could just as easily say: murdering millions of unborn children, robbing us of our right to defend ourselves, denying the right to freedom of association, infringing on our freedom of speech, infringing on our freedom of religion, etc. Those are all pretty scary.

The whole point of the discussion is to point out that the world looks differently if you accept different axioms. I'm sorry if it bothered you that I wasn't willing to debate the merits of your views vs the views of the imaginary third party I described, but I think my intentions were clear here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER63> There are many threats to democracy, but this is not one of them.

Audience numbers for local TV news (not to mention national TV news) is shrinking across the U.S. Younger people in particular will not sit down to watch a 30 minute talking-heads newscast stuffed to the gills with car, telecom, and insurance ads.

See: [https://www.poynter.org/news/new-pew-study-says-local-tv- new...](https://www.poynter.org/news/new-pew-study-says-local-tv-news-viewing- dropping-fast)

<comment><USER64> Old people watch more local news and vote at higher rates than any other demographic group.

<comment><USER65> > Old people [...] vote at higher rates than any other demographic group.

Now that one is bound to change. Young people, both in the US and abroad, are discovering the powers of social media and organize to advance their causes. Trump with his backwards, racist and misogynistic rhetoric and his politics mostly serving the old, white, male population provides a perfect enemy figure to rally against.

Somewhere on Reddit I have read that from now until the elections this fall there will be 4 million young people turning old enough to vote (sounds about right, given ~4M births per year in the US). That's a _massive_ block of voters and most of them will either vote Democrat or some of the fringe parties.

<comment><USER20> I'm with you on this, but don't count your chickens. Young people are historically crap at voting and there are also structural barriers placed in the way of their doing so in many places (eg not accepting college ID as a valid form of voter ID).

<comment><USER65> > and there are also structural barriers placed in the way of their doing so > in many places

Thanks to the powers of social media, though, this won't be as much an issue as in previous elections - people can share workarounds and actually _document_ stuff happening and spreading the word - worldwide, for free and not (easily) censorable.

The "old generation" simply has accepted being more or less denied their right to vote, the current young generation has the willpower and the resources to actually fight back... where the biggest and most effective resource is creating outrage on social media.

<comment><USER20> Yes, Iused to think that as well. Here's the downside: people talking about something doesn't translate into change i the short term. Electoral shenanigans? No doubt, but the odds of that leading to action before the polls close is small. I'm not saying this to be discouraging, just to point out the strategic issues.

Suppose I am a political bad actor and want o manipulate an election. I study precinct records (and have a small army of motivated assistants) and identify key places where a small change can make a big difference. Of course, my opponents have poll watchers out looking for such shenanigans, and I suspect they may try to disrupt my shenanigans by rallying people to protest them. So I just implement shenanigans at more locations than I need, and ideally im places that are easy for my opponents to get to but where I don't actually have any hope of affecting the outcome. With luck they'll declare victory on my false target while never noticing what's going on at my real one.

The basic weakness of swarm tactics is that whoever has the best information operation can easily divide and conquer over a short timeframe.

So yeah people are more motivated and more aware than in previous elections, which is definitely a good thing, but stay alive to the fact that a political opponent is equally capable of iteration and has motivated activists of their own.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER66> They most likely had their speeches written by the same person/people/company. It goes like that in most countries: a big media outlet sells pre-made news/opinions to most newspapers which they then only adapt slightly and keep most of the taglines and significant phrasing.

<comment><USER67> _The script came from Sinclair Broadcast Group, the country's largest broadcaster, which owns or operates 193 television stations.

Last week, The Seattle Post-Intelligencer published a copy of the speech and reported that employees at a local news station there, KOMO, were unhappy about the script. CNN reported on it on March 7 and said Scott Livingston, the senior vice president of news for Sinclair, had read almost the exact same speech for a segment that was distributed to outlets a year ago._</comment></comment>


Uber Engineering's Great Data Migration: Project Mezzanine - <AUTHOR> https://eng.uber.com/mezzanine-migration/

<comment><USER2> Nice engineering work. I am wondering if it is ok to use HBase instead of MySQL to store the JSON-blob. In this way, it might be easier to operate the 'persistent' layer, without 'splitting each MySQL server in two' for load balance.

</comment><comment><USER3> Great Uber!

</comment><comment><USER4> Great to see this!</comment>


Music Sales - onreact-com http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2009/08/01/opinion/01blow.ready.html

<comment><AUTHOR> What are the sources of this numbers? What digital distributers are counted? Are they all? Are these the numbers from only sources directly represented by the RIAA? Does this count non-label record sales? Does this count revenue from sales of records like Radiohead's "In Rainbows" release? There is more that can be asked.

I am not sure what I can conclude or deduce from this graph; when there is a small nagging glare of "Source: Recording Industry Association of America" down at the bottom, tracking my gaze.

<comment><USER2> There's a box around download album sales reading $0.60 - what's that? 60c albums only? A lot of the value for units shipped comprises of the cost of the physical value of the media and its transportation. Is the comparison legitimate if it compares the value of CDs shipped VS download sales?

Too bad the gravy train has ended for the RIAA - recouping losses by suing file-sharers is like a kid throwing a violent tantrum when their toy broke.

<comment><USER3> > _There's a box around download album sales reading $0.60 - what's that?_

I think that's in millions (or billions) of dollars. Notice that there is also '1978: $8.1' next to LP/EP and '1988: $6.1' next to Cassette. I think they are trying to label the peak of sales (those black bordered sections) with the volume of revenue.

{edit} It says 'billions' at the top {/edit}

<comment><USER2> ok, well iTunes sales were $3.34 Billion in 2008. That's over double the combined RIAA figure of album and singles sales. <http://tr.im/yZ7K> I remember reading that Apple doesn't take a large cut of that amount if that even mattered here, so sounds like these figures are wrong, especially when other online music retailers are taken into account.

<comment><USER4> I think they probably consider buying a single track from an album and buying a 'digital single' (a small release with 1 or more tracks) two different things.

I doubt the former case is considered a 'single' in the traditional sense of the word in the music industry.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Unfortunately, no doubt these numbers do not count non-label/unsigned record sales as "thedark" mentioned. This is due to the fact that according to major labels and the FCC, these numbers don't count, simply because they don't receive a cut of those sales.

Once we develop a legitimate platform for unsigned musicians to use and compete with the major labels, their artists, and the money they make. Then we will begin to see some numbers that include unsigned artists. Because once they begin to make competitive noise, the labels and FCC will certainly try to begin to get involved and want to regulate as they always do. But as long as the independent artist stays technically "unsigned", there's nothing the regulators can do to control the music, or get a piece of the earnings.

Once we see this happen, those downloaded album and singles sales numbers rise dramatically. Force the RIAA to count you. Record and be heard.

<comment><USER6> There is no "dark" market worth mentioning in this context. There are simply no significant sales beyond the major labels and their subsidiaries. The four major labels account for more than 80% of ALL music sold in the USA and the 1600 members of the RIAA account for more than 90%.

The topmost performers in the indie market may achieve some success on their own, as individuals, but in aggregate the total indie market is a disaster.

<comment><USER5> "thedark", is the username of the previous poster. Not an actual reference to anything regarding this post itself. Looks like you got the wrong message.

The reason for low sales outside major labels, is the fact that there are no outlets for unsigned musicians that are worthwhile, and major labels regulate what you hear, and who is heavily promoted. And therefore, the competiton is not level. Unsigned musicians cannot afford expensive studio time to record, have little avenues to promote and sell, and therefore just cant compete. The indie market is a "disaster" as you put it, because major labels, the RIAA and FCC keep it that way on purpose. Who wants an area of business to succeed and compete, if they cannot get a piece of that revenue? No one.

Now how about Digg has done for news, and YouTube has done for music? Leveled the playing field, and taken some of the wind out of the sails of major media. And put more power in the hands of the consumer, and allow then to choose whats best in music. Not tell them what you want them to listen to.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I always really like the NYTimes graphics. They do a good job displaying info, and (not applicable to this one) their flash graphs are always more helpful than annoying.

<comment><USER8> NYT does a great job of pushing the limits in infovis, but they don't always hit the mark. This vis seems to show an approximate fixed scale on the y-axis, which is good. It means the differences in heights between the blobs are relevant. The fact that they layout multiple charts along the y-axis seems acceptable, in fact it allows for quick comparison between graphs. However, the x-axis is unlabeled and unclear. It seems to roughly represent time, but has no origin. One can sort of deduce approximate time but without a clear label I can't dive deeper into the information. This seems to be the failing of many info visualizations I come across these days. They either optimize for the "quick glace" or the "in-depth analysis" when you can get a happy medium by usually just tweaking one or two aspects of the display (in this case I would argue a labeled x-axis).

<comment><USER9> "Value of units shipped from 1973 to 2008"

<comment><USER8> I read the text. My point is there is no visual aid to help you come to definitive conclusions like "Between 1999 and 2002 we see an exponential decline in cd sales." You can guess but that's about it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Looks to me like CD sales were a bubble, and there's no reason to expect the music industry's success to continue as it has for the prior decade.

<comment><USER11> It's not a bubble, the product just became obsolete with newer technology and demand for industry slacked with internet marketing. CDs were (and still are to some extent) a fantastic media for storing music, but mp3 has huge advantages.

The late 90s was also the end of the pre-internet era, where the dominant way to market music was radio, TV, and print. In 1995 you had to try hard to discover music outside the mainstream. In 2005 you could go to MySpace and listen to an hour of music without ever hearing a top 40 song.

<comment><USER12> Well, there was a period when CD's were the cool new thing and everybody was buying all their record collection on CD again.

So, not only the labels were selling music by new artists at their usual pre- Internet levels, but there was also a big demand for old music in CD format. I suspect many older people that would not usually buy new music ended up buying many of their old albums again.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> What does 'value of units shipped' mean?? I'd beg the question that all they put out now is crap anyway, so I'd agree that the value is nothing compared to the old days.

I don't think I like that it's in billions of current dollars, seems a little misleading since they didn't actually have $8.1 billion in LP/EP sales in 1978.

Finally, the difference between CD and other digital media versus LPs and cassettes is that they don't wear out. You only have to buy it once, and if a bunch of your friends borrow it its not a big hassle.

</comment><comment><USER14> Gross sales is irrelevant. A download costs virtually nothing. No CD to make, no shipping, no store front, not cover printing. The RIAA is misleading people with these types of numbers, no doubt they have lost money, but really, it isn't as bad as they pretend.

<comment><USER6> Total manufacturing/distribution costs for a CD are around $2.20 with a wholesale price of $6.50.

The labels still get the $6.50 more or less for a digital album (although that's falling) but they no longer have to worry about manufacturing a portion of their products (CDs are still 80% of the market.. digital is 20%) so at best they knocked off 20% of their manufacturing costs thus far.

So now for an equal numbers of units shipped the total cost is $1.76 per unit.

The labels also have to pay mechanical royalties to the artists.

So prior to the internet: $6.50 x 250,000 units minus royalties would net them around $700,000 gross profit.

But they would have paid $250,000 as an advance to the artists.

Net profit would be something like $450,000 on the initial $250,000 investment plus ongoing manufacturing and marketing costs.

If they hit it big, they get rich, but a dud might be a money loser or at best barely profitable.

The digital sales would boost their net profit by $110,000 for the same number of units sold, all else being equal. They would get a 2.24x return on their investment.

Keep in mind 250,000 units is now pretty good for a successful artist now.. the biggest album last year only sold 2.8 million copies.

Artists don't get the shaft anymore than any other business person does.

Labels are just VC.. they risk investing a small amount of money in a very large number of artists (a few hundred thousand) on a hunch that it might pay off. Most don't work out, but the ones that do make up for the rest.

80% of sales come from 50,000 albums pulled from the entire history of recorded music.. not very good odds.

The real problem is that nobody is buying music anymore. Period. Unit sales are dropping off a cliff.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I'd be more interested to see a graph of _net_ revenue (minus costs) over time by format. Straight revenue for online music might be smaller, but their media and distribution costs are much smaller as well.

</comment><comment><USER16> So, CDs are still outselling downloadable content by as much as 3-5x?

<comment><USER6> CD sales accounted for 80% of the 428 million units sold in 2008 (from all media).

In comparison there were just under a billion units sold in 1999 and the backstreet boys had the biggest album with over 16 million copies. Last year the top seller, Lil Wayne only sold 2.8 million. It took the b-boys just over a week for comparable sales at the peak of the market.

If I'm not mistaken, Norah Jones first album was the last to break the 10 million barrier.

Total units sold started dropping at an annual compounded rate of 6%/year in 1999 through 2004. With the introduction of iTunes in 2003, "album substitution" started to take hold and the decline accelerated. Albums were being replaced by single track downloads on iTunes at a rate of roughly _1.4 downloaded tracks_ per CD album. With an average of 12 tracks per cd.. that's an 88% drop in per unit sales (1.4 tracks are around $1 on iTunes vs. $16-$20 for the CD album).

The music industry is alive and well but the record industry has basically been obliterated.

<comment><USER17> I don't understand why would people en masse download only one song from album. The rest have to be a real crap.

I can sometimes listen to a single song without looking at the rest, but that account for something like 5% of my listen, the staple being albums, of course.

<comment><USER18> It is a direct result of pushing out pop crap to sell singles. The majority of the artists the industry markets are pop artists that want a hit single. That is what they push for that is what they get. If they would get behind real artists and market them and their work album sales would increase.

Look at the top charts for singles. Pick any artist in the top 10. Go somewhere you can preview the entire album and then ask yourself if you would buy it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> daniel-cussen This is skewed by bad inflation statistics.

</comment><comment><USER17> I never knew that singles sold so tiny. I don't understand why did anyone bother with them at all.

<comment><USER19> Singles were pressed for radio stations, back in the day. May as well sell 'em if you're already pressing them.

Sidenote: this is where the term 'B-side' came from. The A-side of the single had the song the music label wanted to promote, the B-side had some other song that most stations didn't play.

<comment><USER17> Oh! An interesting consideration! I didn't realize song couldn't get on air unless it was pressed!</comment></comment></comment>


The Trials of Psychedelic Therapy - <AUTHOR> https://psypressuk.com/2020/01/31/psychedelic-therapy-oram/ <comment><USER2> I've used dmt, mescaline, psilocybin, thc/cbd and impepho, all in plant form and all in nature/relaxed environments (not trance parties, or for giggles with friends) and some alone at home. As much as I want to tell everyone do it all at least once or to fix x problem (depression?), I don't recommend it and don't talk too much about it with others. The main reason is that they are very unpredictable.

You can use the exact same dose a month apart and will have wildly different reactions to it (both during the experience and afterwards (add digestive system weirdness to the list)); Nevermind trying to predict outcomes between different people, even if the dose is the same. And since the experience and some of the effects are based on your current mental landscape, it tends to bring more of what you are to the front (on top of your physical surroundings, sounds, smells). This can good or bad, and sometimes both. Point being that you can permanently alter your mind and body in unpredictable ways.

I greatly value my experiences with them but I don't touch them any more because I'm truly afraid of what they are capable of. I don't think I've been damaged by it in the long term. My own experience of course don't invalidate other's experiences or that it has helped people. I just feel that it dangerous in the same way that jamming wet fingers into a broken plugged-in toaster is dangerous. You might get lucky a few times but at some point the toaster will teach you it's ways, and you may never get to enjoy toast again. Well you might, but it might come in through a tube while you are drooling at clay in a mental hospital.

One shaman told me to never seek these things out. Wait for it to call you. Learn your lesson and move on. He also said not to push others into it. This is YOUR journey, their time will come sooner or later (meaning different lives, if you are into that). He also said not to try and force the substances/plants/medicines to give you specific knowledge/teachings/truths - they will show you what you need to see.

Sorry if I seem conflicted - I both want everyone to do it (hoping it would make the world better via empathy) and nobody to do it (because even a single person suffering a bad trip is not worth the cost (it really is hell x1000000)).

Hope it helps the discussion.

<comment><USER3> That is essentially the main study of the today's time: set & setting.

We don't outright ban these like the way our parents did, but we don't know how to consistently trigger good outcomes for a variety of personalities. The only way to resolve that is by testing and controlling for set and setting.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Am I the only one that is extremely wary of psychoactive substances being used as magic bullet treatment method? You tend not to hear about the people that have had a permanent increase of anxiety and long lasting schizophrenia from usage. This drug does not work well for everyone and you only find out once you have taken it. A bad trip can ruin some people permanently.

<comment><USER5> A great part of the horror of a bad trip is how regular people treat someone who is experiencing one, or has been damaged by one. I would rank interactions with the police as a far greater danger than like an out of body experience into god knows what.

I have a buddy who did like 150 hits of LSD 20 years ago and there is a great sadness in him and how he can't really share that experience with most people. People, who've never played around with LSD tend to become super condescending with him like he's damaged.

The thing is, these studies or motions to incorporate psychedelics into therapy are never advocating for super human doses. I can definitely see the value in micro to moderate doses coupled with qualified therapy for non schizophrenic consenting adults. A full on like wizard trial into the nightmare heart of psycho hell with heroic doses of whatever is not what these guys are arguing for.

<comment><USER6> Nothing bad will happened when interacting with police if you do as they say.

Look at all the police videos on LiveLeak etc...you will see a common thread in all arrests gone wrong: the suspect didn't do as he was told despite repeated warnings.

<comment><USER7> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Daniel_Shaver#Shoo...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Daniel_Shaver#Shooting)

Easily debunked. The police are not absolute, they are human beings. Some of them are not suitable for the position of power and use it to abuse others.

<comment><USER6> Debunking it with a rare example?

Are you truly generelizing to all arrests based on a few shitshows?

You know how many police officers get killed by trying to arrest people peacefully?

<comment><USER8> I can't tell if your comments stem from ignorance or willfully ignoring facts but in either case kindly stop and listen because what you are saying is incorrect and wrong.

Do YOU know how many police officers get killed trying to make peaceful arrests? Do YOU know how many black people get killed by the police during peaceful arrests? Because I guarantee you that you do not. I am too tired of people like you commenting like this so I'm not going to put in the work of looking things up for you. Please educate yourself on this matter before speaking about it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I want people who think this is good to do a mental experiment.

Forget that this particular drug is LSD. I want you to imagine you are reading an article about a previously unknown drug made by a new company that is touted to have great efficacy in treating mental illness.

However, you soon learn that the side effect of this drug is serious hallucinations every time you take it, often serious enough that people recommend that you only take it in the presence of a licensed professional able to deal with the fallout of a hallucinatory episode going bad.

Not only this, there is the potential of long lasting and fundamental personality change from it. Not just getting you back to a functional state, but changing who you are as a person. To the point where recreational users take this drug to find quasi-mystical experiences and make themselves a better person.

Would you guys really be gung ho about this drug if it were not called LSD and was made by Pfizer in a lab?

I'd honestly be scared enough to only even consider it as a last resort to cases where it was impossible to function otherwise. But LSD gets touted way too much as a miracle drug here, even though if any other drug had these side effects, people would try everything but it first.

<comment><USER10> Before I did LSD I had heard about the hallucinations, the potential for personality alteration and the possibility of long lasting effects.

Those are the exact reasons I dove headfirst into trying it a few times over a summer!

If I had heard that it was made by some pharmaceutical company I probably would have stayed far away from it. None of my friends and family where talking about pharmaceutical drugs and even at a young age I already knew that corporate culture did not value my best interests.

<comment><USER11> > If I had heard that it was made by some pharmaceutical company

I mean, it was, it's just they had to stop and it gets made by underground chemists these days. But it absolutely was the product of a pharmaceutical company.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Given the number of people who did these or similar drugs in the 60s and 70s and the absolute lack of evidence that these people's mental health is any better than their peers who did not do these drugs, it seems like any therapeutic role for these drugs is likely to be incremental, rather than revolutionary.

Anecdotally, the people I know who talk the most about how helpful psychedelics have been for them are less well adjusted than the average person I know.

</comment><comment><USER13> I believe these drugs are meant to be taken a few times, over a period of a few months, with professional oversight. I mention this because many commenters here seem to think you would take (say) LSD daily for the rest of your life. Or that the fact people have taken it in the past recreationally (unsupervised) and not had great improvements in mental health mean these drugs are overrated!?

<comment><USER2> YES! Most of them should definitely not be daily.

My own rules:

marijuana: not more than once per month (I don't use it as a medicine, so once a month is fine for me)

mescaline: not more than once per month (low dose, 3 to 6 teaspoons of dried san pedro powder on a saturday)

psilocybin: not more than once per month (low dose below 3 grams)

psilocybin: not more than once every 6 months (high dose above 3 grams)

dmt: not more than once every 6 months (not smoke, must be in ritual setting with a shaman person)

impepho: not more than once a month (typically once every 3 months because of the smell)

caffeine: not more than once per week

nicotine/alcohol: don't use.

All of them are better when in nature and away from work/stress. Do not try to use them to get away from stress or to make you feel better. Feel better first, then use them. I also want to say, don't cross-use them: if you've taken one of the above, wait the same amount of time to pass before using something with similar time: meaning if you use mescaline this month, wait a month before you try marijuana; if you used high dose psilocybin recently, wait 6 months before touching dmt. Reasoning: some of them take time and their effect last longer than the day or two after dosing. Sometimes it's a week, sometimes it's 6 months. I would also not recommend combining them in the same setting or using them when you are on chronic medications (from a Dr) due to unpredictable interactions that may or may not be safe.

So the idea of using LSD daily like people are popping normal pills.. probably not a good idea at all.</comment></comment>


Whatever Happened to Voice Recognition? - <AUTHOR> http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2010/06/whatever-happened-to-voice-recognition.html

<comment><USER2> He is wrong about the accuracy of speech recognition. I know he is wrong because I have actually used Speech Recognition to get real work done. AND to make it worse I have a crap Norwegian accent.

MAYBE it is as bad as he describes when you do not train the system and just start speaking. But that is like complaining about Emacs after using it for only 10 minutes. Retarded.

I wouldn't be able to code with it though, but for producing prose in English. It. Actually. Works.

(I recognize that the problems described in the post is about recognition "in the wild" and not with one person in one quiet room with one microphone like I use it)

<comment><USER3> _He is wrong about the accuracy of speech recognition. I know he is wrong because I have actually used Speech Recognition to get real work done._

As have I. The dictation capability _built in_ to Vista / Windows 7 is really quite amazing. (They both also have voice control.)

I'm an extremely fast typer, but dictating - even with time spent correcting mistakes - is quite a bit faster.

<comment><USER4> > dictation capability built in to Vista / Windows 7

I'll be ... yep, tucked well away under Accessories/Ease of Access. Who knew? (Six month old laptop w/ Win7, successor to an XP machine.)

Needs setup and the, so-far unused, built-in mic is not cooperating. It does say it allows text dictation, besides OS voice control.

<comment><USER3> _I'll be ... yep, tucked well away under Accessories/Ease of Access. Who knew?_

And try this one on for size: Microsoft Office _2003_ came with built-in voice control and dictation, which could also be used in other applications!

<comment><USER4> Thanks. I was just thinking "why don't they demo this" and then remembered - they did, back in 2006, and it went embarrassingly wrong: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Speech_Recognition#cite...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Speech_Recognition#cite_ref-5)

<comment><USER3> Yes, it did. But be careful:

" _In 2007, reports surfaced that Windows Speech Recognition could be used to remotely access and/or control a user's computer. Theoretically, playing a pre-recorded message containing Windows Speech Recognition commands could allow one to execute tasks on another computer remotely._ "

Why, that reads like a Wikipedia article about a Microsoft product!

<comment><USER4> I think that anyone who ever gave a non-rigged demo will feel a painful twinge of sympathy for the engineer in that one - "There, but for the grace of God, go I" ...

(And, yes, the "security" issue is pretty far-fetched but is factual, I remember it being raised.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The promess of Voice Recognition has never been the actual transcripting of the spoken word - although even that would be quite useful if a high degree of accuracy is achieved - but rather in the idea of controlling a computer by simply talking to it using natural language. People want the computer to behave as if it is a colleague, not a machine.

Of course we're a _long_ way from that goal. Firstly, people don't understand just how difficult it is to express clearly what it is that you want. I have a good friend that had bought an iPhone whilst she was living abroad for 6 months. On returning back home, she wanted to be able to add new songs to her iPhone without losing the stuff already on there. That's how she described the task to me, as the go-to person for computer problems. So I started asking a bunch of questions - do you still have the same computer that you were using abroad? Do you want copy the music already on the iPhone onto your computer? What about other data on the iPhone, do you need to recover that too, or can I blow it away? She got very frustrated with all of these questions and finally just snapped "Oh, you know what I mean, I just want to be able to use my iPhone normally, including adding new stuff to it!"

Sigh. She really didn't (doesn't) understand that this just isn't enough information for me to work with - and that's me, as a walking talking human being with a strong understanding of what the computer is doing. How is a computer, with problems in transcribing the spoken words, let alone understanding the underlying meaning of those words, and not having any idea of the real world context of the problem, supposed to figure out what she wanted?

<comment><USER6> There are some cases where this makes sense but there are also a lot of situations where I want my computer to be just that - not a colleague. Simply because many of the tasks that I perform on it are trivial and repetitive and easy to trigger with keystrokes and mouse clicks. It would be annoying to me and the rest of the office if I was speaking each command.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I worked with a coder about 10 years ago who had been looking into speech recognition for video games. He came up with some pretty interesting prototypes that he ultimately had to throw away. His companies legal department told him speech recognition is a legal minefield with most algorithms patented and some very trigger happy lawyers defending those patents.

In the end they went with an inferior solution from one of the big hardware manufacturers who coincidentally were also mentioned by the legal team as a patent holder.

So maybe real research is being hampered?

<comment><USER8> Some games do have voice control - Rainbow Six: Vegas on the Xbox 360 allows you to give order to your computer controlled teammates.

<comment><USER9> I remember Rainbow 6 III Black Arrow or something had very usable voice recognition for the solo game. You basically had a few commands like 'regroup,' 'go go go,' 'hold this position' which worked out better than button commands. It seemed to disappear in subsequent Tom Clancy games but glad to hear they brought it back for Vegas.

I think the key with speech recognition and natural language processing is to forget the HAL9000/StarTrek 'hello computer' nonsense, and focus on constrained domains augmented by other technologies.

Touchpad keyboards are blatantly less usable than hard keyboards but by the time you factor in a) portability and b) auto-completion of words/urls/search- strings, then they become a more than viable alternative.

People have incredibly adaptive linguistic skills, developers should harness this more IMO rather than be overly ambitious with NLP.

That said I was very impressed with the accuracy of Google's voice search app. But like Jeff Atwood says, it's easier just to search normally.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I think we get the impression at times that no matter what there is always an army of people quietly working away on this stuff and as time passes it will get better and better.

The article Jeff linked talks about how how the performance has pretty much levelled off except for small incremental improvements and most of the money and research was shifted away from the area. I guess the trend will continue, gaining small improvements through applying more and more data as training for current methods until someone comes up with a completely different approach to push it forward.

</comment><comment><USER11> Robert Fortner's article "Rest in Peas: The Unrecognized Death of Speech Recognition" was discussed recently on HN, a must read for those interested in speech recognition.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1313679>

</comment><comment><USER12> So many "new interface" ideas seem to forget that a large percentage of what people use computers for is in offices, producing documentation. Using your voice, or spinning 3D interfaces around with your hands, just isn't practical in an office environment with dozens of people working, where you are essentially outputting text.

Until that basic reality changes, I don't think mainstream computing needs will change. Along the same lines, I don't think the reverse is feasible, with computing interface changes bringing about social changes. The shifts we've seen from hand-writing to type-writing to computer-based word-processing has been happening in roughly the same environment for a very long time.

</comment><comment><USER13> Not to state that the exception proves the rule, but my company actually makes use of two racks of IVR servers on a daily basis and we love them. Speeds up the inbound call process ten fold from 2009.

<comment><USER14> I despise these things, and I don't know of anyone who disagrees. If you're seeing an improvement, then I guess most of the world treats them differently than I do.

As soon as I hear "If you want X, please say...", I start pounding the zero button. The thing is, relying on buttons is not only faster in itself, but also doesn't force me through so many "you said 'X'; is that correct?" questions.

If it were something straightforward I would already have helped myself on your website. The fact that I'm on the phone means that it's an open-ended question requiring a real human on the other end (or that your website is useless).

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I think there have been numerous acquisitions of voice/speech-recognition startups by both Google and Apple ([http://www.enterprisemobiletoday.com/news/article.php/387924...](http://www.enterprisemobiletoday.com/news/article.php/3879241/Apple- Buys-Voice-Recognition-Firm-Siri-Hints-At-Future-iPhone-Mobile-Computing- Functionality.htm)), because indeed it's very clear that it's going to be a thing of the future, with nlp.

And we're probably not much into it just because of how impenetrably tortuous it is. Almost everything related to it is variable -- culture is always evolving language, slangs die of usage over time, and there are accents to worry about. With all of these problems, there is the demand in tandem for progress in nlp areas to deal with -- where really some of the most difficult challenges lie ( [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language_processing#Con...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language_processing#Concrete_problems) ). With all that said, I have my money down on Google. They seem to be doing a lot of work in areas where the variability of these tasks is required. Presently, the voice transcription feature on youtube seems fairly impressive, and I've noticed in the past google search's nlp abilities to be curiously good, certainly more far ahead than any other search engine today.

</comment><comment><USER16> Can anyone tell me why we aren't able to progress into better levels of recognition. Am I correct to assume it has nothing to do with computing power, and everything to do with (semantic/linguistic) software?

<comment><USER17> It's more than just linguistic software. Our knowledge of linguistics itself is currently very limited; it's a nacent science and there's still a great deal of debate about how to even approach the study of language. Even leaving aside the difficulties in just _transcribing_ speech, linguists are still a long ways off from coming up with any formalism of human syntax that could help create software to syntactically parse normal human speech.

<comment><USER14> ...because most of our linguistic formalism is derived from written language, which is generally an artificial approximation of _real_ language.

Remember grade school, with parts of speech, _Conjunction Junction_ , and diagramming sentences? Well, think back to the last (non-trivial) sentence you actually said out loud. I challenge you to try to diagram that sentence.

Although there's quite a lot of research that's been done, surprisingly little of it deals with the way most of us really communicate.

<comment><USER17> Modern linguistic formalism is not derived from written language at all. I studied at MIT and UConn in the mid '90's and the separation between prescriptive grammar and linguistics is pretty clear.

That's not to say that current approaches to linguistics are correct; I don't know enough to make that judgement. But I think the problem lies more in the complexity of the domain - not because modern linguists are so foolish as to base theory on written language.

<comment><USER14> It's quite possible I'm behind the times.

 _not because modern linguists are so foolish as to base theory on written language_

That was actually what I was trying to get at. While there are clearly some rules we follow when speaking, they are much more open than those governing our writing.

It's odd, though, or at least counterintuitive, that our comprehensive of these less-structured spoken communications is higher than that of more- structured written ones.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> And I thought only us Indians and Chinese were having issues with voice recognition software..</comment>


Ask HN: What is the policy on flagged posts? - <AUTHOR> I am from South Africa and data theft is a real thing, how can this post be flagged when it contains an important message? https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/craigsilverman/cheap-chinese-smartphones-malware <comment><USER2> For that particular post, It is likely due to the political flame bait.</comment>


Where have all the MacBooks gone at Linux conferences - <AUTHOR> http://www.networkworld.com/article/3064273/linux/where-have-all-the-macbooks-gone-at-linux-conferences.html <comment><USER2> It's pretty simple really. OSX used to be pretty nice, back then. Quick, very stable, lots of features etc.

Then, the ioOSification started, and we're down to El Crapitan where the Mail.app barely works anymore. And that version is the last of a string of versions that were a lot worse as well...

On the other side, Linux has improved in bits:

\+ More stable graphic drivers; Intel & nVidia now have stable, working releases that don't require you to jump thru hoops to get the screen working, as it used to be back then...

\+ Antialiased text. Seriously, it took a LONG time to get something working properly, all the time in linux..

\+ The other major thing that happened is ... Chrome. Chrome is spotless on linux nowadays, and personally, once I have an IDE, Chrome, and a few bits and pieces I don't need a lot more these days.

I don't particularly think Linux has improved that much otherwise in terms of desktop usability; it's still the same mess as before on the desktop IMO, but at least the lower level bits have improved significantly...

</comment><comment><USER3> Perhaps the crowd is older and doesn't care about their image anymore?

Perhaps battery life or some other hardware consideration made them choose other hardware above a MacBook?

Perhaps it is less accepted by your Linux peers to run another OS?

Perhaps Linux became better in supporting the daily work of a developer?

Perhaps there is a decoupling between the OS someone uses to develop versus the OS used by their end-users due to the rise of the cloud?

<comment><USER4> > Perhaps battery life or some other hardware consideration made them choose > other hardware above a MacBook?

I have yet to see a laptop running either any variant of Linux/BSD or Win7 (I don't count W8/W10, that's not Windows, that's crap) achieving the same battery endurance as a Macbook.

Apple really can do something unique as they can completely modify the OS X kernel to squeeze every last bit of power-saving performance out of the CPU.

<comment><USER3> I currently have the Lenovo Yoga 900. It is not better than a Macbook, but with around 9 hours, there is no reason anymore to go for a Macbook. So better battery life of competing deviced might be a factor, it was for me.</comment></comment></comment>


How Facebook Made Your Birthday a Business - <AUTHOR> https://theringer.com/facebook-birthdays-business-5ddb9d73732f#.nqzi6qt41 <comment><AUTHOR> People use birthday feature almost 100 million times a day!

What other platform can boast of this scale for birthdays - Wechat, snapchat?</comment>


Has the future arrived? - <AUTHOR>

Google buys robotics companies. Drones. China lands a rover on the moon. Iran sends monkeys into space. Exciting times :-) <comment><USER2> "China lands a rover on the moon. Iran sends monkeys into space." \- previous century's achievements.

"Google buys robotics companies." \- no result yet, they still have to figure out how to add ads to robotics.

No, future has not arrived.

</comment><comment><USER3>
            "The past is never dead. It's not even past."
             -- William Faulkner

</comment><comment><USER4> The Orwellian aspects certainly seem to be here.

</comment><comment><USER5> Future will never arrive. It is present always.

</comment><comment><USER6> Bad news: it is only the present. Always.

:)

</comment><comment><USER7> > History is pre-determined by scientific laws which are sequentially > discovered by people and which, in their inexorable application, produce > technology. — Bruce Bimber. "Karl Marx and the Three Faces of Technological > Determinism" > ([http://web.mit.edu/sts/pubs/pdfs/MIT_STS_WorkingPaper_11_Bim...](http://web.mit.edu/sts/pubs/pdfs/MIT_STS_WorkingPaper_11_Bimber_2.pdf)). > 1990.</comment>


How the Pandemic Will End - <AUTHOR> https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/03/how-will-coronavirus-end/608719/ <comment><AUTHOR> This is an important and unsurprisingly sobering read. I had to lie down for a few minutes after reading it.</comment>