The Media We Deserve

The News Process

Going off the reservation today, and working outside of marketing and advertising. We'll get back to it next week, I promise.

So in the past week or so, the following items have hit the news.

> There is a strong possibility of blue skies and water frozen under the surface of Pluto, of all places. If there's heat being generated under the surface, which seems likely... well, um, possibility of life? Seems unlikely, but no more than water, really.

> The Hubble Telescope is pointing at a cluster of highly unlikely matter just at the edge of the Milky Way, which is either a combination of wildly improbable geographic events... or maybe, just maybe, a massive planned structure befitting an advanced alien civilization.

> The most rigorous test of quantum theory ever carried out confirms that objects can manipulate others at a distance, which means that monumentally fantastic stuff like loopholes and teleportation just might actually be possible. No, seriously.

> There's a massive asteroid that's just going to miss the planet in less than two weeks. Ye gads.

Did you miss these stories? More likely than not.

Now, did you miss the "news" that a movie from the '80s that involved time travel hit an anniversary? Or did you miss the "news" that there is a new movie coming out that dates back to the same era, and has excited lots of people who like to dress up in costume outside of Halloween?

No, no, no, you did not.

The potential for life, and another place in the solar system that might one day be a useful way station in our eventual migration to other worlds, should be an astounding deal. I would, personally, love to hear what major religious figures would say about what this would mean for the various books. (I'm thinking that other worlds are just for practice.) Wormholes could make the game-ending distances between worlds less, well, game endish. An alien civilization would simply be the biggest news event in human history, and create a massive consideration of whether or not contact would be worth the risk. Our own history of interaction with life that has lower forms of technology is not particularly encouraging on this front. And a big damned rock entering the atmosphere would be the biggest weather story ever.

But by all means, folks... let's talk about a movie or two some more. Since those have sponsors.

There's an old saying in political science circles; people get the government they deserve.

I guess the same goes for media now as well.

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