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Newsweek lied, people died. At least that has seemed to be the shorthand adopted by many news organizations in the aftermath of Newsweek's retracted item about alleged abuses at Gitmo. Cable news pundits have gone apoplectic over what they see as the latest in a long line of media indiscretions, even while it remains unclear how responsible Newsweek was for the violent protests. Media war... or culture war? Brooke weighs in.
Doug McGill has worked as a staff reporter for the New York Times and a foreign correspondent for Bloomberg News. But he left all that behind to take up a somewhat broader beat – the entire world. And what better place from which to cover the world than his home in southeastern Minnesota? McGill joins Bob to explain "glocal journalism" – the practice of finding and writing about the "invisible strands of mutual influence" connecting us to places thousands of miles away.
The world's smallest country is roughly the size of a basketball court, and located on an abandoned anti-aircraft deck in the North Sea. In 2000, Sealand's rulers leased its territory to HavenCo, a company that wanted to use the nation's sovereign status to evade Internet regulations. Brooke talks to Jonathan Cedar, co-director of a documentary about Sealand, and to Sean Hastings, co-founder and CEO of HavenCo.
The world does not necessarily agree on issues like cyber-crime, intellectual property rights, privacy, and free speech. So when it comes to governing the Internet, whose rules should apply? John Palfrey, executive director of the Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet & Society, talks with Brooke about the possibilities and impossibilities of Internet governance.
Last month, the Chinese government was spooked by a wave of anti-Japan street protests. Not because of what the protesters were demanding, but rather by the decentralized way in which they were organized. Using online chat rooms, text messaging, and email, the leaders appeared to be everywhere and nowhere. Bob talks to Xiao Qiang, director of the Berkeley China Internet Project, about the cat & mouse game that is China's relationship with its digital dissidents.
Google's ambition to digitize the world's books is raising the hackles of Europe's cultural guardians, some of whom fear that American control of the digital library will exacerbate American cultural imperialism. Leading the chorus is Jean Noel Jeanneney, president of France's National Library, whose call to arms inspired the European Commission to fund its own digital library. Jeanneney tells Bob that what's good for Google may not be good for the world. But Google's Susan Wojcicki explains that the nations of Europe have nothing to fear.
In the 1940's, the Motion Picture Export Association, aka "the little State Department," went forth to sell the American way of life – not to mention American products – around the world. Toby Miller directs the Program in Film and Visual Culture at the University of California Riverside. He joins Brooke to discuss Hollywood-as-imperialist, then and now.
Highlights from Past ShowsLast year, it was revealed that a number of prominent newspapers were exaggerating their circulation numbers to boost advertising revenue. Faced with a crisis, some of those newspapers assigned their own newsrooms to the story unfolding in their boardrooms. Others stayed mum. Bob speaks with media reporter James Madore of Newsday, one of the papers that chose to report on its own dirty laundry.
A year ago last week, the world was confronted for the first time with images of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib. Ever since, the American Civil Liberties Union has worked to keep the spotlight on allegations of torture at American military facilities. Unfortunately for the group, additional photos were never released by the Pentagon. Brooke talks to ACLU media relations director Emily Whitfield about what it takes to keep a story alive.
On the Media is funded by The Bydale Foundation, The Ford Foundation, The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Overbrook Foundation.
