Posts tagged as:
How good is the UK Defence Ministry (the MOD) at releasing information to the public? Let’s look at its news releases for 13 May, 2008.
Army launches ‘The Pipers’ Trail’ 13 May 08 - History and Honour - British Army
Army Officer survives Taliban grenade attack 13 May 08 - People In Defence - Ministry Of Defence|British Army
Red […]
{ 0 comments }
The usefulness of diplomats has long been a mystery to me. Former British diplomat Carne Ross has an anecdote that should ring alarm bells with anyone who wants to know how valid “official” government sources really are:
I will here admit one shameful episode from my own career: when I was posted to Kabul, I […]
{ 0 comments }
Just come across a paper by two Italian economists on the social value of public information.
Post Britain’s Northern Rock banking debacle, the words of two other economists [pdf] seem a little prescient:
For a decision maker facing a choice under uncertainty, greater access to information permits actions that are better suited to the circumstances. Also, to the […]
{ 2 comments }
“The breakdown of the means of public knowledge” is a phrase coined by the great American journalist, Walter Lippmann. He used it in Liberty and the News (1920), which is about to be reissued. His argument is simple. Robert Park summarised it thus:
that political liberty, under modern conditions, is no longer guaranteed by the mere […]
{ 0 comments }
Nearly ten years ago Hal Varian wrote a paper called Markets for Information Goods. It’s none too elegantly expressed, but it has what you might call “profound” implications:
I would like to coin a “Malthus’s law” of information. Recall that Malthus noted that number of stomaches grew geometrically but the amount of food grew linearly. […]
{ 0 comments }
One of my favourite pub-bore topics is the importance of public information. And I like collecting examples. Here is one from Richard Feynman’s conclusion to the report on the disaster which destroyed the space shuttle Challenger in 1986:
If a reasonable launch schedule is to be maintained, engineering often cannot be done fast enough to keep […]
{ 0 comments }
In case you missed this little gem from the Washington Post:
Long-term memories matter most in public health campaigns or political ones, and they are the most susceptible to the bias of thinking that well-recalled false information is true.
The experiments do not show that denials are completely useless; if that were true, everyone would believe the myths. […]
{ 2 comments }
A blog about how we inform ourselves and why: journalism, the media, news, communications and information
“Let there be no doubt that whatever sacrifices we journalists make, they are not made for our own glory or enrichment: they are made for you. Whether you deserve their sacrifice is another matter.”
Lasantha Wickrematunga
