Thank the Neutered Dwarf-Gods of Journalism for the Columbia Journalism Review, which has bravely come to the defense of “responsible science reporters,” who have all become scientifically butthurt because NASA put out another bullshit press release promising “an astrobiology finding that will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life.” But what if the NASA announcement isn’t really about an impending invasion of Horrific Galactic Hell-Beasts who will destroy our world after slowly eating/digesting its 6+ billion miserable human occupants? What if a blog was irresponsible about this?
CJR posted this very serious critique of blogs mentioning space aliens:
Indeed, the embargoed Science paper, which I have also seen, is quite terrestrial in nature and will come as a disappointment to those breathlessly waiting for news that E.T. has phoned home. It’s an interesting piece of research, but certainly not one that is bound to make the front page, or perhaps any page. One science reporter I talked to (who’s also seen the paper, but didn’t want to comment on the record) felt that it was “actually quite dull.”
Regardless, the runaway speculation in the blogosphere imperils the work of trusted science reporters who respect the embargo system and may have wanted to cover the paper. Most professional science journalists have access to Science’s embargoed papers through the EurekAlert! service run by AAAS (which publishes Science) and would have been able to easily figure out that the research behind NASA’s cryptic press release did not support the hype about aliens.
“This shows how important an experienced, trained and authoritative science journalism staff of reporters and editors is,” AP science reporter Seth Borenstein wrote in an e-mail, responding to questions about the blog frenzy. “While the blogosphere has the luxury of speculating, The Associated Press seeks to be the definitive source through careful reporting and knowledge of the subject area.
Oh for fuck’s sake, get over yourselves.
But gosh, it’s a good thing the AP and other soon-to-be-bankrupt Official News Organizations never speculate or just publish Actual Lies handed to them by their taskmasters. Just imagine what America would be like today if the Responsible Adult Journalism Press printed a bunch of dangerous bullshit all the time. Oh wait …. [CJR]
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HAPPY LIFE DAY!
To this day, Carrie Fischer swears she has no recollection of filming the Holiday Special because she was so unbelievably coked out of her mind.
Whenever Sister Sarah's smug mug pops up on the teevee machine, I'm envious.
Fisher's coked-out state is extremely obvious if you watch it, too also.
If you were married to Neil Young, you'd probably seek oblivion too.
And I like MNeil Young.
No shit. Of course the kid-friendly explanation for that glazed-over look on her face is that her lines are Just. That. Awful.
From the Wikipedia. Just one more reason to love Carrie Fischer.
That picture brings back painful childhood memories.
In the same way a molestation victim has flashbacks.
E. T's phone home got misquoted.
I, for one, am proud that this nonsense was not reported on Wonkette. Only serious shit here, man.
Which camp does that awful Robert Krulwich on NPR fall in? His cutesy science pieces are always extremely irritating, everybody but him edited down to alternating one-word clips.
I love Rabiolab, but I can definitely understand why some people HATE HATE HATE it. You just have to be in the mood for it, a little acid helps.
In my experience, a little acid is a dangerous thing. Incapacitating megadoses are quite safe however.
Them's fightin' words.
You have something against acid?
Pervert
You know what would prevent rampant speculation? Just making an announcement instead of sending out a press release that you have an exciting announcement to make tomorrow without any indication of what the discovery is.
Or Bea Arthur singing in Mos Eisley Cantina. That would work too.
Needs More Wookies
That's always the answer, regardless of the question.
The space monsters will proceed directly to death panels, plz.
E.T. did, in fact, attempt to phone home. But his iphone didn't get any coverage from his location.
Or he was holding it wrong; damn alien fingers.
And, his parents had their home placed on the no-call list, so it wouldn't have mattered, anyway.
It should be required by law that all news be presented boringly. I prefer creeping realization to sudden exposure. It's sexier.
How about something large, extraterrestrial and rocky impacting Wasilla AK at high speed?
Problem with that is the Grifterina is never home.
Besides, Tawd built that awesome fence.
An icicle from a leaky airliner toilet?
The world is not nearly just enough for that to happen.
when people think of careful reporting and scientific knowledge, who doesn't think AP?!
Alan Perlis was the man – wasn't aware so many people knew his street name.
Shit, and here I was hoping for a republican-specific strain of the andromeda strain, one which would affect only republicans.
No disease. It's called reality and facts. Makes them shriek like little girls and stick their fingers in their ears.
I always assumed facts just didn't register with them, sort of like a dog whistle.
And they KNOW from dog whistles.
AfuckingMen!
Someone didn’t consult the Blogger’s Ethics Manual.
But, but, but I already bought the economy sized bag of Reese's Pieces!
Dang, I was hoping to get a job naming the Slags as they were in-processed. I know Rudyard Kipling, Humphrey Bogart, Harley Davidson, and Sam Francisco were already taken, but I am sure I would have come up with something equally clever, like James Caan and Mandy Patinkin.
Albert Yawkey.
Dammit, and just when I took all my deflated pee points and put 'em in sour milk futures.
I wonder if there's a Speak & Spell app for the iphone, that's probably what they need. Anyway, I spotted a motorcycle in Yucca Valley yesterday morning with a pair of Trucknutz hanging off the back pulling into the gas station on Sage and 62, Ken?
For shame. Now don't you feel like a slug – next time they needlessly hype what they knew was a non-story all along, you'll ignore it, not try to have fun with it.
wonkette's responsibility is neither to science nor to journalism, so far as i can tell–it is, first, last, and always, to the undying spirit of buttsex in all its manifestations.
ain't it?
"Assfucking," sir, Wonkette has and is dedicated to gratuitously using the term "assfucking." Commit to it, go the full monty, or GTFO.
in for a dime, in for a dollar, assfucking it shall be.
Once you have crossed the rubicon, yes, an apt analogy; as fellow bogtrotters (I assume) we should feel comfortable beyond the pale.
Good news, there's life out there!
Bad news, they're Vogons…..
What's more deadly: Vogon poetry or Sarah Palin's prose?
How dare you read anything sexual into my intentional double-entendres! Have you no shame? You're making me look like someone who would deliberately spout double-entendres, then passive-aggressively put on an aggrieved pose when you correctly discern my intent! You cad, you.
So they're saying it's less Independence Day, more Contact?
No, they just found some bacteria in a dead California lake that has arsnic in it's DNA. Just like Dick Cheney.
Dick Cheney has DNA? But I thought only organic life forms had that.
Um,…I think it's Jimmy Stewart and Arsenic and Old Lace,….but of course, it's just about NASA's whorish come on of Show Me the Money…..
This just means that the space aliens got to them and destroyed the original paper.
I still say the "astrobiology" announcement is gonna be that John Boner is an alien from Uranus.
Uranus, maybe. But not mine. I have my standards.
He's been boned by an alien from Ur-anus!
A message from Persei Omicron 8 ?
the runaway speculation in the blogosphere imperils the work of trusted science reporters who respect the embargo system…
Ah, yes, America needs more journalists who respect authori-tay. Look how well that worked out in Iraq.
NASA' s credibility was undermined when Dubya sent a missile trying to blow up the moon and then they said they found water. This was all staged in a movie studio around Area 51 and everyone knows there is no water around there.
Looking for liquid? Check McSame's Depend.
Damn! I was hoping for some sort of Cocoon type alien technology to be found. All I got was some irresponsible Wonkette article about Space Monsters.
Life is disappointment.
But how can an irresponsible Wonkette article of any type, more or less on Space Monsters, disappoint? Hell, that is what gets me through my day.
All this Aliens news and Evil Republicans news this week puts me in the mood, I think I'll be viewing They Live this weekend.
The "luxury of speculating" is the only one most of us can still afford.
Ok, we've learned our lesson. Eureka! + Alert!! = nothing to get excited over.
The time to get excited is when they say that there's nothing to tell – no, really nothing! We're totally being honest and not hiding information in a vain attempt to avoid causing panic.
I'm putting out an embargoed press release describing my regular morning bowel movement today, which will undoubtedly be hyped by the blogosphere as a groundbreaking discovery of an enormous poop monster poised to devour us all. Then I would love to hear some blowhard AP hack expound on the virtues of having experienced, trained and authoritative staff to cover bowel movements.
The arrogance! And people wonder why journalism is dying! Because you're all a bunch of insufferable cunts.
Please let it be the lizards, pleeze let it be the lizards, pleeeze.
Because they have come to put us out of our misery, right?
CJR and trusted science reporters should know that a story full of astrobiologists warning of impending invasion by space monsters would never be contained by an embargo.
Mostly harmless
as edited from the original "Harmless."
So long, and thanks for all the fisting.
I'm waiting for instructions from the Right-Reverand Hickabee and his faithful midget companion and bodyguard, Chuckles Norris.
Wouldn't that be to kill them now, execute them, starve them etc, you know things good Christians do when greeting strangers.
With Godly intent and in an attitude of prayer.
President Fuckabee has a certain ring to it, doesn't it?
A certain ring, indeed. The FinalDeath-Knell for America as we know it.
You know, that is exactly what you would expect the Columbia Journalism Review to say if they have already been taken over by the Aliens.
The columbia journalism review must not pay a lot of attention to CNN, MSNBC, Fox, and the rest of those shitty "news" organizations. They were hyping this shit like they were trying to sell kid cereal. Fuck you, you self-important blowhards. Try making journalism less of a joke, please.
And way to go NASA PR hacks. Once again you have pissed off the people who pay the bills.
Unfair. CJR has done their level best for years. You can blame FOX, MSNBC, CNBC, et al. on … I dunno, hormones in the water supply? Lax antitrust enforcement? Shitty pay for teachers? Just plain stupid? … whatevs. But don't blame it on CJR.
While the riots of degenerating media rage all around them, those little guys continue to write up parking tickets. Better we should give CJR howitzers, but the parking tickets is all they've got, and they're doing the best they can.
NASA, NASCAR, it's all the same to the right wing media
Some sites are reporting the announcement is the discovery of bacteria in Mono Lake whose DNA has all the phosphorus replaced by arsenic. My initial reaction is this is interesting and profound, by I'll hold off on a final judgement until I hear something from Sarah Palin.
Great, just what we need, another excuse for the Republicans to not regulate arsenic in groundwater.
While this information is scientifically significant, cue the Tea Bagger cries of "THIS IS PROOF OF WHY WE MUST DE-FUND NASA!" in 3…..2…..1…
The good news is that this makes them immune to catching teh ghey-ness from all of the mercury in Mono Lake.
In Italy, EurekAlert! is called YouDon'SmellaSoGoodaYouselfAlert!
He said it was a science paper.
Oh, I see what he meant: no mention anywhere of the triple-breasted Martian whore from Total Recall. Gotcha.
Time to put the "I WELCOME OUR ALIEN OVERLORDS" sign back in the closet.
have all become scientifically butthurt
Or metric molestation, or the great December "p" Purge, or whatever you want to call it.
Awww, it's just some little bacter-i-ay as can live on arsenic. This goes a long way towards explaining life forms such as Dick Cheney, but not extree-terrestials.
In other news, scientists are reporting there are trillions of planet earths out there that travel around red stars and contained in numerous milky ways. Trillions of Jesus, Mary & Joseph parties. The jews must be having a field day!
Klaatu barada nicto! Klaatu barada nicto!
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