A few years ago a local bookstore was going out of business and I bought several fat hard-bound books; books I might not ordinarily have chosen for reading matter.
I just finished reading one of those books, The House that Roone Built: the Inside Story of ABC News. I'm not sure why I picked up this book, except that I had happened to catch the funeral service for Roone Arledge on C-Span. The book published in 1984 describes the highlights of Roone's career at ABC and in the process, as the title indicates, give you an inside view of ABC news.
Did I have any particular interest in ABC news? Well, yes. For one, I had a sort of celebrity crush on Peter Jennings, and too I have watched a good bit of ABC news. Certainly much more than CBS or NBC news.
At one time I watched only PBS news. This was because I didn't have cable and I could only get two stations with my rabbit ears (yeah, with the coat hangers and foil). And it was a hassle to change between the two stations and realign the antennae. I usually stuck with PBS. I think ABC may have been the other channel, I don't remember for sure.
As for PBS's Newshour: one thing I really liked then and still appreciate is that there are no commercial interruptions. Among other things this means that they have time to go into stories in depth. On the other hand maybe I'm not really that deep! I find my mind often wanders listening to "talking heads" on PBS (or anywhere). Sometimes I would try really hard to make myself focus; only sometimes successfully.
Since I'm discussing news, I could mention that I also used to have a subscription to Time Magazine at the time. In the beginning I tried to read it from cover to cover. I found that this required that I have a dictionary at my side. That's cool, beef up my vocabulary. However, I finally realized even armed with a dictionary there was no way I could keep up reading all of the stories. The longer stories sometimes seemed to be not that substantial once I had deciphered the big words. Some interested me but didn't seem so important. I think I liked most the editorial posts. They were generally short and unambiguously biased.
And I used to get the Sunday paper too. I would save all of the issues of all of my magazine subscriptions (non-news varieties as well) and the Sunday papers (well I am a pack-rat of long-standing). And I would try to stay informed about the news. I don't think I was very successful really. I always read the funnies first. I would look at the pictures, generally scan the headlines and read what interested me. I'm not sure how much "news" I was really taking in.
In truth I fear I may have just the sort of short attention span that most of the news broadcasts seem to pander to.
If on the one hand, I do find myself getting frustrated when I hear a short blurb about something, maybe one or two sentences and on to another subject. It often seems I'm still wondering about the last story and then miss the next one. For one thing, I'm thinking why did they even mention that; I don't really know much more than before I heard the blurb.
On the other hand, I have a hard time trying to keeping track of the facts of stories, who is who and what is what and listening to long discussions about stuff I can't quite follow. To be fair this is true no matter what news source I'm using.
I have thought sometimes I have some instinct for what will make a good story subject, what local stories will make the national news. I don't know what this amounts to but I do have some kind of curiosity or fascination with the whole news making process. So I guess after all that it makes sense that I would read this book.
I've been trying to figure out what kind of job I would be good at. As I was reading this book I joked to myself, maybe I should have been a network president! (Ha!)
It seems that Roone was a man with many faults. One that irritated many people was that he would not return people's phone calls. (I do that! I'm afraid I'm apt not to return phone calls. I don't even have the excuse of getting many.) He let problems go, blamed other people and was indecisive. (I can relate to that.) He had a tendency to make everything about himself. (Um well, yeah I do that pretty often). He tried things that were a big flop. He sometimes went for the showy and the sensational. In the end perhaps it was his extravagant expenditures of money that led to his being pushed into a role of figurehead. As the book describes it, that is what his being named chairman amounted to. (Spending extravagantly sounds like fun, but it hasn't been my experience). Roone retired about 4 years before he died in 2002. So, the book doesn't cover the last 4 years of his career.
He had faults and failures. But he also tried some things that worked and he recognized talent. He went after the major stories and if he spent a lot of money, he often delivered. At his funeral I recall that people were saying that he pushed people to become more than they thought they could.
I guess those are the main things I got out of reading the book. There was a lot of competitiveness and politics behind the scenes--surely no surprise. And I suppose reading this book just reinforced the reality of the humanity of our news people; those on screen whose names and faces become familiar to us, the anchors and reporters, and all of those people off-screen, the little people and the big-wigs who are behind the scenes, all of those people who are responsible for bringing the news to us.
As a sidenote:
I have had this idea for news, now that news can be kept up with on the Internet. It's kind of vaguely in my head. Someway to help people know what they really would like to know about the news, get caught up on stories they've missed. But then again maybe that's already being done. Perhaps a person can find out about just about anything that they really want to, hm, well to a certain extent anyway.
Showing posts with label news. Show all posts
Showing posts with label news. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
The state of the economy and me
I'm liable to write just about anything in this blog.
Yesterday I attended an event in Chattanooga hosted by the local Moody Radio station. The event was called a "Town Hall Meeting" and featured Howard Dayton and Chuck Bentley of the Christian financial ministry called Crown Financial that has a radio show called MoneyLife.
The meeting was set up so that if people wanted to ask a question, they would raise their hands and then a lady would come and see what your question was and write down your name. When it was time to ask your question she would give you the mike. I already had in mind before I got to the meeting what I wanted to ask about.
I asked about the economy and the value of the dollar. I also had several less significant, perhaps even trivial questions, coming to mind that I might have asked. Later, during a commercial, they asked the audience members to introduce themselves. They started on my side of the room, and I was seated so that I was the second person to speak. I guess having been bold enough to ask my first question, I was bold enough to say something about myself. I said my name and said I am unemployed and haven't worked for a long while and I need to get a job. And that was how I ended up being offered the to do the career direct program as their guest. What a blessing!
When I was in college (30 years ago), I took a class in economics, and I did well in the class. I think I did well because during the summer I had read a book, I can't remember the name of the book, but it was one that I picked up after my Mom had read it. It was about economics and had gotten me thinking already about supply and demand, how the global dimensions of economics, things like that. So, the professor ended up inviting me to take part in an honors class for non-majors. I was one of - I think it was - five students in the class which was taught by a local businessman.
It was very interesting. There were several people in the class who were more talkative and able to put thoughts into words than I was. There was this one guy that I always liked having in my classes because he asked such good questions. He was in my astronomy, existentialism, and religion in American history classes. He just brought out the wonder in the astonomy class. I think I might have missed it if it weren't for his being the class. So anyway, somehow I managed to pass the class which was based largely on class participation. I remember that I did a written report on the car industry.
What I remember learning and thinking about in regards to the car business is the difficulties of planning for mass production. For car companies to make a profit, they have to correctly anticipate what consumers will want to buy in the future. By the time a car comes to market it may have been through several years of planning. Market conditions can change over few years time, so they have to try to project the future. And it takes a great deal of time and capital to design and produce a new model car. It also takes a good deal of capital to continue to produce cars. Not too long ago I read the autobiography of Lee Iacocca who was president of Ford and then went to Dodge as their president. He is probably fairly well known and recognized because he was in a bunch of commercials. His book is a good read. He writes in a way that is accessible to anybody and tell how he rose in the ranks of the car business.
So, one thing I am trying to do is figure out what my areas of talent are.
I know I have a hard time remembering details. I tend typically to remember the broad picture, maybe very generalized. I am not very impressed with my ability to reel off facts and explain stuff about stuff without saying "stuff". I so often can't think of the right terminology.
I occasionally listen to the PBS newshour program, and I noticed that I find it difficult to keep listening to people talk about stuff I don't already know about. How do news people stay caught up? I guess they know stuff already. Or they refresh their memories often by rereading about stuff. Maybe this is just something I could work on - the remembering and being about to explain things thing.
My major in college was religion and philosophy. I think I equally enjoyed both subjects. And I have a philosophical bent, meaning I'm not sure what. It's certainly not that I can tell anyone about philosophy. Maybe it's just that I think about ideas and principles. Since school I have kept reading and learning. I am more verbal than I used to be and I'm sure I am better at pulling my thoughts together and writing than I was when I was in college. But of course those English major types and those who were verbally proficient in college and have kept reading and writing are way ahead of me still.
I adore puzzles. People are probably wired to want to figure things out.
Yesterday I attended an event in Chattanooga hosted by the local Moody Radio station. The event was called a "Town Hall Meeting" and featured Howard Dayton and Chuck Bentley of the Christian financial ministry called Crown Financial that has a radio show called MoneyLife.
The meeting was set up so that if people wanted to ask a question, they would raise their hands and then a lady would come and see what your question was and write down your name. When it was time to ask your question she would give you the mike. I already had in mind before I got to the meeting what I wanted to ask about.
I asked about the economy and the value of the dollar. I also had several less significant, perhaps even trivial questions, coming to mind that I might have asked. Later, during a commercial, they asked the audience members to introduce themselves. They started on my side of the room, and I was seated so that I was the second person to speak. I guess having been bold enough to ask my first question, I was bold enough to say something about myself. I said my name and said I am unemployed and haven't worked for a long while and I need to get a job. And that was how I ended up being offered the to do the career direct program as their guest. What a blessing!
When I was in college (30 years ago), I took a class in economics, and I did well in the class. I think I did well because during the summer I had read a book, I can't remember the name of the book, but it was one that I picked up after my Mom had read it. It was about economics and had gotten me thinking already about supply and demand, how the global dimensions of economics, things like that. So, the professor ended up inviting me to take part in an honors class for non-majors. I was one of - I think it was - five students in the class which was taught by a local businessman.
It was very interesting. There were several people in the class who were more talkative and able to put thoughts into words than I was. There was this one guy that I always liked having in my classes because he asked such good questions. He was in my astronomy, existentialism, and religion in American history classes. He just brought out the wonder in the astonomy class. I think I might have missed it if it weren't for his being the class. So anyway, somehow I managed to pass the class which was based largely on class participation. I remember that I did a written report on the car industry.
What I remember learning and thinking about in regards to the car business is the difficulties of planning for mass production. For car companies to make a profit, they have to correctly anticipate what consumers will want to buy in the future. By the time a car comes to market it may have been through several years of planning. Market conditions can change over few years time, so they have to try to project the future. And it takes a great deal of time and capital to design and produce a new model car. It also takes a good deal of capital to continue to produce cars. Not too long ago I read the autobiography of Lee Iacocca who was president of Ford and then went to Dodge as their president. He is probably fairly well known and recognized because he was in a bunch of commercials. His book is a good read. He writes in a way that is accessible to anybody and tell how he rose in the ranks of the car business.
So, one thing I am trying to do is figure out what my areas of talent are.
I know I have a hard time remembering details. I tend typically to remember the broad picture, maybe very generalized. I am not very impressed with my ability to reel off facts and explain stuff about stuff without saying "stuff". I so often can't think of the right terminology.
I occasionally listen to the PBS newshour program, and I noticed that I find it difficult to keep listening to people talk about stuff I don't already know about. How do news people stay caught up? I guess they know stuff already. Or they refresh their memories often by rereading about stuff. Maybe this is just something I could work on - the remembering and being about to explain things thing.
My major in college was religion and philosophy. I think I equally enjoyed both subjects. And I have a philosophical bent, meaning I'm not sure what. It's certainly not that I can tell anyone about philosophy. Maybe it's just that I think about ideas and principles. Since school I have kept reading and learning. I am more verbal than I used to be and I'm sure I am better at pulling my thoughts together and writing than I was when I was in college. But of course those English major types and those who were verbally proficient in college and have kept reading and writing are way ahead of me still.
I adore puzzles. People are probably wired to want to figure things out.
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
News: something good and bad to think about
I don't watch the news channels much but the last two weeks I have been for some reason.
There's so much news about bad weather and natural disasters, around the world, and now here: tornadoes, fires, and floods. I wonder what else the year has in store (as we enter the hurricane season)?
My Mom went to school in Iowa and I have visited the area around Cedar Rapids twice. Once was as a child with my family, and later as an adult. My heart goes out to the people there and I want to go just jump up and go help them. I really enjoyed visiting there both of my visits. I thought the city of Cedar Rapids was charming, having both a city and a small town feel to it. It would be nice to go up there again.
Unfortunately, I don't think I am up to doing anything very helpful just now. When my shop closes in two weeks, I will have free time, but I think I need to be focusing on getting healthy and feeling better. But that's another subject.
Yesterday, I went to a website of a pastor who's church I visited in Cedar Rapids and I was encouraged to hear about the positive things that God is doing there. His church and others are working together to help and to pray for their community. Again today I heard on Chris Fabry Live, (Moody Radio), about the same topic and there were similar tales. I do like to hear the good news!
I myself tend to wonder, as I have noticed that others do too (from reading blog posts and comments on youtube), things like: Is this God's judgment? Are Americans too materialistic and self-focused?
And I wonder how is this fitting into the pattern of the "end times" that the Bible describes?
Yet I don't like to see people saying self-righteous stuff and blaming people for what has happened to them. Maybe Americans are too materialistic. Maybe God does want us to ask ourselves such questions, to examine our own lives. But perhaps it isn't very helpful to try to judge others and point fingers. IDK
What has happened in Iowa will affect the whole country economically. Reporters have been saying there will be an agricultural impact from the destroyed soybean and corn crops. I haven't heard it discussed, but I imagine such large scale disasters affect the cost of insurance across the country. (I wonder if we all should just expect increasing instances of disasters, back to that end times question). There are the costs of transportation interruptions, and... Somehow will it affect the cost of gas? I suppose it will affect the cost of eggs or something in China too! (lol) But should I worry about that?
I think I need to think about the good news some more!
There's so much news about bad weather and natural disasters, around the world, and now here: tornadoes, fires, and floods. I wonder what else the year has in store (as we enter the hurricane season)?
My Mom went to school in Iowa and I have visited the area around Cedar Rapids twice. Once was as a child with my family, and later as an adult. My heart goes out to the people there and I want to go just jump up and go help them. I really enjoyed visiting there both of my visits. I thought the city of Cedar Rapids was charming, having both a city and a small town feel to it. It would be nice to go up there again.
Unfortunately, I don't think I am up to doing anything very helpful just now. When my shop closes in two weeks, I will have free time, but I think I need to be focusing on getting healthy and feeling better. But that's another subject.
Yesterday, I went to a website of a pastor who's church I visited in Cedar Rapids and I was encouraged to hear about the positive things that God is doing there. His church and others are working together to help and to pray for their community. Again today I heard on Chris Fabry Live, (Moody Radio), about the same topic and there were similar tales. I do like to hear the good news!
I myself tend to wonder, as I have noticed that others do too (from reading blog posts and comments on youtube), things like: Is this God's judgment? Are Americans too materialistic and self-focused?
And I wonder how is this fitting into the pattern of the "end times" that the Bible describes?
Yet I don't like to see people saying self-righteous stuff and blaming people for what has happened to them. Maybe Americans are too materialistic. Maybe God does want us to ask ourselves such questions, to examine our own lives. But perhaps it isn't very helpful to try to judge others and point fingers. IDK
What has happened in Iowa will affect the whole country economically. Reporters have been saying there will be an agricultural impact from the destroyed soybean and corn crops. I haven't heard it discussed, but I imagine such large scale disasters affect the cost of insurance across the country. (I wonder if we all should just expect increasing instances of disasters, back to that end times question). There are the costs of transportation interruptions, and... Somehow will it affect the cost of gas? I suppose it will affect the cost of eggs or something in China too! (lol) But should I worry about that?
I think I need to think about the good news some more!
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