News outlets suck

[fyo]

Yes, the following is a rant...

News coverage these days is horrible. At least the mainstream outlets. Even the most serious of them appear completely unable to resist the temptation of sensationalizing everything. It used to be that we had to endure the "man on the street" interviews and the lame "human interest stories", but at least these stories were accompanied by real coverage. These days, we seem consigned to "Tsunami survivor dog reunited with family" stories, while the dumping of tens of thousands of tons of radioactive water in the ocean doesn't make the front page (real example from one of the most serious news outlets I know of).

What's worse is that when you finally find that article on the radioactive water dumping, it's completely devoid of meaningful facts. Don't these guys have a "science desk"? I've completely given up on any outlet getting the units of radiation exposure even remotely right (when it does happen, my bet is on chance rather than competence). Just to get the radiation thing out of the way:

If you're using Sieverts to convey exposure dosage from an ongoing event, it's critical to include TIME. Sievert is the dose (equivalent). That is, it's a measurement of absolute exposure, not exposure over some unit of time. So if the media reports 700 miliSieverts for at some distance from the reactor core, you need to include a time component. Otherwise it makes absolutely no sense. And when you compare that meaningless number to background radiation, please consider the different units of time. Typically, you're comparing exposure of exposure per hour to exposure per year. If you're comparing to the exposure dose from some "event" like a dental x-ray or whatever, again, consider that one is exposure per hour (or whatever), while the other is the total dose from the event (dental x-ray). Oh, and please get your mili- and micro- prefixes right. It makes a pretty big difference...

If you're talking about radiation in any other way than exposure, it's beyond stupid not to include the source of the radiation. Is it cesium, iodine or uranium? (Yeah, I'll forgive you for not including the isotope / nuclear mass numbers, although you really should). The "radiative steam" from the Japanese reactors contained a buttload of radioactive Xenon and Krypton, but in a rare moment of lucidity, media completely ignored those. Their half lives are extremely short: a matter of mere minutes and seconds, respectively, so this radiation doesn't travel very far from the source before it's all but gone. Xenon and Krypton are also inert, not reacting with surroundings (other than bombarding them with radiation).

The vapor also contained iodine, which is considerably more dangerous, but still fairly short-lived (half life of 8 days). Iodine is also easily absorbed by the body through ingestion and is concentrated in the thyroid. This is why iodine pills can be helpful, since the body won't take up more iodine if the "deposits" are full.

The big risk in the vapor is Cesium (Cesium-137, with a half life of roughly 30 years). That's a bitch. Fortunately, levels of Cesium-137 in the vapor were very low, so the long-term damage from the steam venting should be minimal.

Now, getting back to the radiative water being dumped... the problem here is that the water was used to cool the core and if the fuel rods were sufficiently exposed, it could conceivably contain e.g. plutonium-139 with a half life of 24,000 years.

Given the significant difference between something with a half life measured in days and something which will be around for thousands of years, you'd think all but the most sensationalist media outlets would include the radiation source for the 10 thousand tons of water to be dumped in the ocean. Yet, none of the articles I could find from the major outlets contained this information. Not even the otherwise serious BBC mentioned the radiation source. The NY Times did mention half life of cesium-137 towards the end of one of their articles on it, but only in a semi-sensationalist manner couched as intellectualism.

After skimming dozens of articles, the (main) radiation source in the water appears to be iodine-131 with a half life of 8 days. Whew. Could'a mentioned that in some of the reporting!

/rant

[Phishfan]

Applause for the rant, but I really don't know anything on the topic and even if they include the things you ask them to I still wouldn't know any more or less myself.

[Brian Fein]

^^ That's the reason why he's ranting, I think.

fyo is pretty educated on these things.  Presumably because he wants to be and reads and studies it because its interesting.

However, the average grannie that watches CNN all day doesn't know jack about nuclear reactors, uranium cores, whatever, and doesn't care.  They just hear "radiation - we're all gonna die!" and the news gives them that.

The average Joe news watcher would be turned off by talk of the half-life of Cesium-137 - most people don't even know what half-life means!  So the news provides a watered-down version of the story, leaving the technical details for the scientists.  The public doesn't need to know all that.

However, you might consider that, hey, now is a great time to educate the public on the methods of nuclear power.  That's not the job of the news media.  They might bring in some scientist to explain (in layman's terms) what's happening and what it means to you, but that's as far as that goes.

[Dave Gray]

^ True.

I love when news outlets bring on scientists to actually explain these things.  (And when Nancy Grace then disputes them.)

[bsfins]

For me the problem is this...(My apologizes for hijacking this into my own little rant)

I have Local news at 5,then national/world news at 5:30,then another dose of local at 6....(This a just a general synopsis of most big news events) The local news at 5pm will run a 5 minute piece shot by the national news,then try to tie in some local connection for anther 5 minutes. 5:30P.M. then the national news runs 10-15 minutes a night on the subject. 6 pm The local reruns the story they ran at 5 P.M.,but perhaps the longer version... So if I'm watching CBS for the example...You get the same story,over and over....Night after night,after night they beat the dead horse till there is nothing left to beat...

In that sense I would love more in depth,more technical coverage,to break the monotony.The news becomes a lot like watching the weather channel....Damn near useless.

When I watch the news,I tend to watch CBS Local @5p.m,NBC nightly news,then ABC news @6....I usually don't watch the late news (10 P.M.), unless I'm planning something,severe weather,and want to know the weather.

I tried to avoid hijack my complaints about our locals! 

[Pappy13]

The average Joe news watcher would be turned off by talk of the half-life of Cesium-137 - most people don't even know what half-life means!  So the news provides a watered-down version of the story, leaving the technical details for the scientists.  The public doesn't need to know all that.

Completely agree, but at the same time news outlets should do their best NOT to alarm the public needlessly.  Like fyo pointed out, there's a big difference between releasing water that's been subjected to radio-active plutonium and releasing water that's been subjected to radio-active iodine.  At the very least they should be clear what it is they are talking about. It could be just a lack of knowledge on the part of the news outlet and then again sometimes you get the feeling that news outlets purposely leave important information of the story out of it just to get a bigger reaction from the public.

[fyo]

I just think the media do a spectacularly lousy job. They are very light on facts and the facts they do include are often misleading or just plain wrong.

There's also the issue of "medium". It seems like the Internet has really screwed us, because the traditional media outlets completely fail to use the medium. Basically, the vast majority of outlets treat the Internet like a container for newspaper columns and the occasional TV / video clip. I'd go so far as to say that even much of what has been standard for decades in newspapers (like boxes with details that would clutter up the main text) are severely under-utilized when news is presented online.

With the radiation examples, I really do get that most people don't care / don't understand / don't want to understand / whatever the gory details, but there are ways of presenting things without using a lot of techie / sciencie terms:

"fortunately, the radioactivity of the waste water will drop to less than 5% (or one twentieth, if that's easier) over the course of a month, making the long term impact.... blah blah blah"

You don't HAVE to quote isotopes and half lives in order to convey the seriousness of the situation.

[shamrock]

I agree completely.I can remember when you could flip over to Headline News and get a quick update of what was going on in the world.Now it seems to be a tabloid gossip/entertainment spinoff much more interested with what Charlie Sheen or the Kardashian sisters are up to......and I liked the weather channel so much more when you could actually get the weather instead of some crap that "could happen tomorrow"

[bsmooth]

DO you really expect a society that craves bullshit "reality" shows to even try and stay remotely informed about anything important. They are sheep who want someone to tell them what to do or whom to vote for.

[Dolphin-UK]

I think you're assuming that news outltes are actually interested in telling you what is going on in the world. At the end of the day news outlets (especially those in the USA) belong to large corporations owned by shareholders.

The news needs to get bigger ratings to sell advertising space and make money and unfortunately telling the news in a matter of fact way doesn't make people want to watch.

I agree with you, I was also frustrated by the Tsunami/Reactor aftermath coverage having a decent understanding of radiation and half lives, nuclear power etc I found the ridiculous and sensationalist coverage to be extroadinarially unhelpful (not to mention the overreaction by US government officals seemingly reacting to press coverage rather than fact).

News outlets brought in "experts" who all had affiliation to either environmental groups or nuclear power for "unbiased" opinion.

If you want to know what's happening in the world, watch the news, if you want to understand what's happeneing in the World, don't.

[fyo]

So what's the alternative? Are there any "general news" sites that actually have timely, but accurate, news that isn't dumbed down and chock full of hyperbole?

Preferably one that is reasonably neutral in its presentation. I don't like my news with a side of political agenda.

[Dolphin-UK]

Well I'm fairly fortunate in that the BBC news site is pretty independant and a good source for news, but that's for the UK, I'm not sure how good it is for the rest of the world.

BBC World News may be a good source but it's not something I've ever really looked at apart from when I'm abroad.

[Dave Gray]

I think that skeptical journalism is all but dead.  We've been tricked into thinking that "balance" is a good thing.  Or that both sides should have even time, when they shouldn't.  When dealing with facts, one side is going to be wrong.  It's not an organization's job to present both sides of a factual story -- it's to find and deliver the truth.  That's what news used to be.  That's what news is supposed to be.

If someone makes a claim that is bunk, the journalist or organization should review that claim and call it bunk and that's the end of the story.  Instead, we have a setup where we bring one person from each side and let them both talk it out, always ending in a disagreement with no resolution. 

[bsmooth]

I think that skeptical journalism is all but dead.  We've been tricked into thinking that "balance" is a good thing.  Or that both sides should have even time, when they shouldn't.  When dealing with facts, one side is going to be wrong.  It's not an organization's job to present both sides of a factual story -- it's to find and deliver the truth.  That's what news used to be.  That's what news is supposed to be.

If someone makes a claim that is bunk, the journalist or organization should review that claim and call it bunk and that's the end of the story.  Instead, we have a setup where we bring one person from each side and let them both talk it out, always ending in a disagreement with no resolution. 

They only do this to try and "prove" they are balanced when the majority of them are just propaganda machines for the different political parties( Fox, MSNBC) or corporations( NBC, etc).