PressEthic

Al Jazeera's playful category includes news not to be found elsewhere. But are the stories just hot air, or does somebody actually believe them?

Just one video camera, or cell phone, can document what no one else sees. Those images can be posted on the web or emailed and reach an audience of global proportions. The capability, and potential, technology places in the hands of individuals can move governments.

FOX News, last night, aired a sidebar about the gap between parents and teenagers in their usage of text messaging. SMS is yet another method, and conduit, for communication but also for information and a new kind of journalism.

Yesterday, France launched its new 24-hour global news channel, which is originally entitled: France 24. The network, which was opened with an online newscast on Wednesday and will begin broadcasting on cable TV today, expects to jostle for space amongst established players such as CNN and BBC World, and the recently launched English-language Al-Jazeera.

"I'm a journalism grad student at a pretty good j-school, but I feel more and more like I've made a huge mistake.

The thing is, I'm shy. Or rather, I'm deeply afraid of people -- of talking to them, of asking them nosy questions about their lives. Left to my own devices, I'd stay in my room, do nothing and never go out," writes Scared Scribbler in a Salon piece.

Is Cosmo really so awful?

NYU President John Sexton urges Stephen Colbert to be all he can be.

Unlike many newspapers today, who are reporting favorably about the Iraq Study Group, the New York Post has a picture of the two chairman of the Iraq Study Group on the cover of the paper with their heads plastered atop pictures of chimpanzees. The caption reads, "Surrender Monkeys: Iraq Panel Urges U.S. to Give Up." The article is dripping with bias.

The two main television networks in Mexico have recently devoted a lot of air time to hard hitting news reports depicting the suffering of the poor. The motivations behind the reporting, however, are not all they seem.

No you don't

Still some money left in the biz

Media commentator Norman Solomon describes how mainstream news, especially the New York Times, may be treating the latest pull-out narrative in Iraq much like WMDs at the very beginning of the conflict.

Out with the fat, screams the city of New York. 'Trans fat gets fried,' as stated in the headline of "The Daily News." According to the article, New York City will be banning the usage of trans fat in all restaurants by July '07. Starting this trend off right, New York will be the first city in the U.S. to completely ban the 'artery-clogging' fat. What was also interesting about this article was that Krispy Kreme, and Dunkin' Donuts and other restaurants that use deep-fried dough or cakes have to July of '08 to can it. I think this is something that U.S. should be doing, we're late to jump-off the trans-fat band wagon, Europe has gotten rid of it with the substitution of lard.

Could it be that shoppers have lost their Christmas Spirit? From the looks of some of the statistics on holiday sales, it seems they might have. In a recent article published in today's "Daily News," it stated that holiday sales have declined from a 3.5 percent gain in 2005 and was the lowest since a 2 percent gain in 2002. Finally, it seems as if the rest of the world is wising up realizing that if they're savvy enough shoppers, and are willing to wait a week or two, they might be able to ge things a lot cheaper. This year's Thanksgiving statistics have show that 32 percent of the retail industry's profit and 27 perecent of the sales where derived in the November through January period.

Unlike Janet Cooke or James Frey, literary superstar Dave Eggers is taking no risks of venturing into scandal territory with his newest book, ‘What is the What.’ Although his account of Sudanese refugees is researched with journalistic dedication (the story is based on lengthy interviews with refugee Valentino Achak Deng), Eggers has told the story from the perspective of a composite character and changed the order of certain events. Consequently, the book is sold in the fiction isle.

According to Caroline Moorehead of Slate, Eggers’ novel is nevertheless contributing to the journalistic dialogue.