Town and Toronto start with a “T”. Some Townies can be like some Torontonians sometimes. Yes, yes. Settle down. Hold it down with the other “t” words, like twit, twillick, and twaddle monger. You are getting ahead of the story. Tow…
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The Sir Robert Bond Papers: CBC torques poll coverage #nlpoli #nlvotes
Think of it as another form of poll goosing. As an example of how news media can take a piece of information and make a false statement out it, consider CBC’s online version of the story about a poll released Friday by the same company that polls fo…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Do debates matter? #nlpoli #nlvotes
Debates matter but not in the way some people think. For starters they have nothing to do with knock-out blows. That’s a media invention they use along with horse-race reporting in order to cover campaigns. it’s a simple enough idea fu…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Taking your brain out of neutral #nlvotes #nlpoli
He said. She said. Claim. Counter-claim. Simple conflict. Simple news story. No problem? Problem. Well, maybe. You decide. Jay Rosen is a journalism professor at New York University. He doesn’t like “he said,she said journali…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Welcome to the Echo Chamber #nlpoli #nlvotes
Pretty simple idea, really. Opinions, beliefs and ideas move around among like minded people in what is an essentially closed space. The effect can be amazingly powerful just as it can be amazingly deceptive and distorting. President Barack O…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Some old habits must die really hard: Telly edition #nlpoli #nlvotes
In the last couple of days of the 1989 election, the Telegram featured a set of poll results done by a local company. The poll showed Tom Rideout’s Tories in front of the Clyde Wells Liberals by quite a margin. Small problem of accuracy:…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The Public Sector Pensions thing explained #nlpoli #nlvotes
People can’t understand the racket over provincial pensions, what the Liberals proposed, what the CBC reported but hasn’t explained and what the provincial Conservatives are attacking the Liberals over. Here’s a simple explanation of the math, t…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Ceeb spins story for Tories #nlpoli
Rather than correct a mistaken early report on the cost of the Liberal party’s pension proposal the CBC online decided to torque the story against the Liberals. In a story on the Liberal election pledge to give retired public servants a 2.5% increas…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Political Reporting 2011
As we slide into the fall general election’s open campaign period, some of you might find it interesting to ponder Jay Rosen’s recent post about the current state of political reporting in the United States and Australia. This is more a thought po…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Twitter Psychology Insight
Via the always insightful Neville Hobson, came a link to a wonder little diagram that summarises the results o a recent survey of Twitter users. You can find Neville’s post at the bizarrely named nevillehobson.com. And you can find the original at …
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Abercrombie offers cash for “Jersey Shore” to stop wearing brand
How valuable is a brand? Well, apparently their brand is so valuable that Abercrombie & Fitch is willing to pay the cast of “Jersey Shore” sizeable amounts of cash in order to stop them from wearing Abercrombie clothes on air, according to cnn…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Sun TV/Fox News wannabe? VOCM hits new low #nlpoli
Did they just get it wrong or is this the new standard of partisan journalism at the government-friendly VOCM? First of all, let us recall that Westcott is leaving the job as communications director in the Opposition Office of his own accord.…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The medium of the bread and circuses message
How short is a news cycle? How long is a piece of string? Give any story a couple of days and odds are you won’t be reading or watching on Day Three what you were reading about and watching on Day One. Like Bloc NDP leader Nycole Turmel who – sp…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: No thought, please. We’re Danny.
In the summer doldrums, odd things poke through to grab your attention. Like this piece in the Calgary Herald about a speech Danny Williams gave back in June. Williams said the federal government spends "too much (time) worrying about how o…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Plastic, packaged and preaching to the choir
While some people may be excited about the fact that all three party leaders in the province are on Da Twitter, a close look at how political parties in newfoundland and Labrador are using, or not using social media, shows that there is a lot less here…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Rumpole and Food for Thought
The Mighty Ceeb is at it again with another story that distorts the information they started with. “Severe crime soaring in N.L.” scrams the website headline. The second paragraph: Statistics Canada reported that while reports of crime across …
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Forecasting the fall
Pick up a sharpened pencil. Now take a clean, white sheet of paper from the computer printer. Close your eyes and make a small round mark on the paper with the pencil. Look at the black dot. You can’t real tell much about it, can you? Unles…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: And this just in from K-L-A-N News…
The headline: “Financing Announcement for Foreigners to NL This Afternoon” The little script story had less objectionable language in it that was much closer to what the official media advisory said. Even immigrants would have had a much fri…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Get me re-write!
The headline on the story is catchy: Inquiry needed on centre closure: advocate At the start of second paragraph you find out that the advocate the headline writer is referring to is Merv Wiseman. He is described as “Long-time Canad…
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