Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/11/26

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Subject: Re: [Leica] RE: A vanishing act
From: "phong (Doan huu Phong)" <phong@doan-ltd.com>
Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 13:36:17 -0500

B.D., how can I possibly think turkey after reading
your diatribe ?  ;-)

But Hope springs eternal.   The new media (or if you prefer,
medium)  is the emerging computer communication technologies
such the Internet, the World Wide Web, etc.  Where do we get much
of our Leica knowledge from, these days ?  Not from the like of
Popular Photography, Shutterbug, etc. , but the LUG, courtesy of
the Internet, descendant of Arpa.  Amidst the chaos, pollution,
noise, there are gems of information.   We all have our favorite
Web sites where we go for information, that we hold more valuable
than any printed material.  Erwin Puts' pages on his test results,
for example,  will be, if they aren't already, the standard reference
for Leica lens performance.

So we need to keep an eye on what the government(s) and big business are
doing with respect to cyberspace.   We have to make sure they don't regulate
and carve it up to the point where the only significant presence
is that of the corporate entities.  We need to educate the public and our
legislators on the issues at hand.
Cyberspace is our current defense against corporate commercialism;
we have to be diligent to ensure that we have access to that resource, even
at the cost of putting up with pornographers, right wing (or left wing
for that matter; I am an equal opportunity discriminator ;-) conspiracy
theorists, etc.

Death to Commercialism !

- - Phong

Now, where did I put the latest Leica Program brochure ?  I am thinking
of buying myself an early Christmas gift, maybe the 100mm APO
ASPHERO SUPER ELMARIO in titanium finish ... ;-)









- -----Original Message-----
From: B. D. Colen <bdcolen@earthlink.net>
To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us <leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us>
Date: Thursday, November 26, 1998 12:24 PM
Subject: RE: [Leica] RE: A vanishing act


>Actually, Eric, the LA Times guy was the head of one of the big cereal
>companies before becoming head of Times Mirror, which of course, in
addition
>to the LA Times, includes the Hartford Current, Baltimore Sun, Allentown
>Call, Stamford Advocate, Greenwich Time...and Newsday. It also included New
>York Newsday, but the first thing the SOB did not long after taking over
>Times Mirror was shut down New York Newsday, which was inarguably the
second
>best paper in NY, and arguably the best in terms of its coverage of NYC. At
>the same time they did buyouts at Newsday, and have since trimmed staff at
>the Baltimore Sun. As you note, he only cares about one thing - the bottom
>line.
>
>Unfortunately, this seems to be the story now throughout the media - anyone
>who thinks that 60 Minutes would have run Jack Kavorkian's "song of Myself"
>five years ago has already forgotten what journalism was and standards
were.
>The Post-Dispatch may say it wants to become a "quality paper," but it's
all
>relative. If quality boosts circulation, which boosts ad rates, which
boosts
>the bottom line, it will be a quality paper. If quality doesn't boost the
>bottom line, it won't.
>
>Do I sound cynical? I am. I think that journalism as I knew it for most of
>my 23 years at the Wash Post and Newsday is dead and gone. There are still
>some papers doing good work on a consistent basis, but on the whole, the
top
>quality papers are where the mediocre ones were a decade or so ago, and the
>mediocre ones are in the toilet. Remember, when the New York Times and
>Washington Post chase stories featured in the National Enquirer, we're not
>seeing proof that the Enquirer has improved, we're seeing proof that the
top
>papers are in big trouble.
>
>And if newspapers have gone down hill, there's always television news to
>really depress us....Do you realize that there are people out there who
>think that 20/20 and Dateline are "news shows," that the Fox network
reports
>straight "news," and that Deborah Norvile is a "newswoman.."
>
>If things keep going the way we are, its leically (there - I got in
>something relevant) that there won't be a news business as we know it in
the
>next decade or so.
>
>Happy TURKEY day! :-)
>B. D.