9 posts tagged “al-jazeera”

Sen. Hillary Clinton frequently stresses her foreign policy credentials over Sen. Obama. Today on al-Jazeera, which covered the Russian presidential election, Sen. Clinton was shown fumbling the pronunciation of Dmitri Medvedev—badly. And added a ‘or whatever’ to the end of that. This is hypocritical of Sen. Clinton and disrespectful to President-elect Medvedev (which is not a very hard word to pronounce for anyone who has had contact with Russians).
   If President George W. Bush did this, it would be all over the news, David Letterman would have it on ‘Great Moments in Presidential Speeches’, and the Democrats would be going on and on about what a dumbass Dubya is.
   I have not seen the American media showing Sen. Clinton’s gaffe, at least not as part of a news bulletin, but a quick Google search did show that it aired there in the US as part of a presidential nominee hopefuls’ debate. One blog commenter, Redmanrt, at Slate wrote this sentiment and I have to agree:

Over the last few days, Timothy and I have been discussing the objectivity of al-Jazeera, mostly on his blog. And while we disagree, I have to say that was probably the nicest disagreements I’ve had on the blogosphere.
   Too much disagreement or argument today is about slamming the other side so badly that they relent, and the victor goes, ‘one–nil. Ha!’
   After our discussion, in which he quoted his arguments, linked back to my responses here, and stayed on course providing each other with information, I wound up respecting him even more than I had done previously.
   The perspective mattered. We realized we were disagreeing on a single TV network and we agreed on bigger issues like our value systems.
   So when two people have that in common, most of the other stuff is just trivial filler.
   We were both prepared to do this openly and in an environment of civility.
   And when contrasted to politics or even the modern workplace, you wonder where the Timothys are: the people with whom you disagree on a tiny issue but you walk away respecting the other person a lot more than you did prior.
   I am blessed to work with some of them but I have had the misfortune in the past of working with some of the touchy, small-picture, negative types who lack basic ideas of human values.
   I can tell the phonies a lot more easily now, fortunately, which is what experience has blessed me with.
   And by and large, there seem to be very few phonies here on Vox, which is probably why I’ll stay blogging here.

Nice to know that al-Jazeera is already covering the lead-up to the Sir Edmund Hillary funeral, with a huge piece just now on the news bulletin live from Auckland outside the Holy Trinity Cathedral, where his body is lying in state and people are paying their respects. Nothing of the sort on TV One and TV3 at the moment, though from what I remember, one of the networks will carry the actual funeral live. Good on al-Jazeera for being truly global.

The very lovely Meenakshi Ravi, associate producer on Listening Post, invited me to contribute to the next edition of the al-Jazeera show reporting on the media. I am not sure of the air date but I’ll be watching this week’s to see if I made the cut.
   The strange thing is the reaction I get from other Kiwis—they still look puzzled when I tell them that I am occasionally on Listening Post (three times so far in 2007). This includes cities which get al-Jazeera. Yet they would not think it were odd if I said it was the BBC or CNN—so why is being part of another global news network so strange? It’s not as though we have our own global news network here in New Zealand, so we are not exactly in a position to judge.
   Still, I’m proud to be on the show and to offer sometimes an alternative viewpoint.

I caught it on a rebroadcast, rather than on the 31st, but here is yours truly, by invitation, for a second time on Listening Post on al-Jazeera’s English service.
   The first segment goes after the Murdoch Press (Fox News) and contrasting it to non-US media. My little part is, as some of you know, was fleshed out in my blog post last week. Forward to me at 7'39": I think this is the strongest reason behind any particular angle on the Iran story, rather than saying that Fox is trying to do the White House’s bidding on creating a war with Iran.

I’ve had terrible trouble finding this via Vox, but it is on YouTube: my comments on al-Jazeera English’s Listening Post programme about Tony Blair’s legacy. Sorry for the sound quality. I think I live in a magnetic field, à la Bermuda Triangle. I assume this is the correct video.

I went back to Dick Smith and swapped yesterday’s faulty webcam for a new one costing twice as much. It kind of works, and I kind of got my al-Jazeera Listening Post spot done, but the set-up remains buggy. The main problem now is that the software stops recording whenever it damn well likes. I also have not found anything on Logitech’s tech support pages about this, or about a massive black band appearing on the left of the screen in certain situations (which situations, I don’t exactly know). Maybe there is some convention that webcammers know of to prevent these automatic turn-offs—but I sure don’t, since I missed that memo.
   This was to be a shout-out to Randy and everyone at a private Vox group, but I thought it was funny where it stopped. It’s like the program knows its masters were being criticized (cue Twilight Zone music).

Video 23

I walked inside and asked if they did circumcisions, as I had recently converted to the Jewish faith. The guy there looked at me puzzled and said, ‘But this is an electronics’ store. How could you possibly get the idea that we would do circumcisions?’
   ‘But it’s on the front of your shop,’ I replied.
   ‘Show me,’ he demanded.
   So I did. Emblazoned on the front of his shop were the words, in Avant Garde Gothic Bold, uppercase, ‘Dick Smith’.

I am joking about the above, and no, I am not Jewish. But I did go to Dick Smith Electronics today and bought a Logitech QuickCam Go webcam after having been asked to appear on al-Jazeera. From there, the problems began. After all, it is the tail end of Mercury retrograde.

• Got home to find that the sealed box was missing the stand.
• Went to a nearer Dick Smith store to be told that they had sold out, but a customer return of the same product had a stand, and that was given to me.
• Began installing software. The box claims it’s very easy: install software; plug in camera; video instantly. The instruction menu warned me to not plug in the camera till prompted.
• Installation froze about three-quarters of the way through. Had to crash out of the program.
• Restarted installation. Program took four minutes to start from the time the CD-ROM was reinserted.
• Installation was slow and took nearly half an hour. At no point was I prompted to ever plug in the camera into the USB port.
• Installation program alerted me, despite the status bar having reached five-sixths of the way, that I should reboot my computer. I clicked ‘OK’. As I did so, the remainder of the installation continued while other programs were crashing around me.
• The installation completed as everything else was shutting down, in the nick of time. A second prompt about rebooting appeared. Still no prompt to plug in the camera.
• Computer rebooted. Started Logitech’s program. It complains that I have not plugged in the camera. I plug it in.
• It asks for a sound check. Lo and behold, it turns out that this device has no microphone built in. Not that there was any warning about this other than a line in the instruction manual. In other words, a regular Joe would not know that he had to buy an optional accessory to be heard. And I am not appearing on telly with my regular headphones on.
• The camera supposedly stands on top of the monitor. I’d like to see it done. Yes, I do have a flat screen. I just assumed the stand would be designed to accommodate both. It isn’t: you need a CRT for it to work. Otherwise, it’s out with the Scotch tape.

   This comedy took around an hour to see its way through, from the time the stand was supplied by Dick Smith (whose service, I should note, was excellent).
   Let’s see how they are when I take this piece of crap back.
   As with most software and hardware I have bought of late, remember the golden rule: do the opposite of what the manual tells you and all will be fine.

So, do you reckon Dick Smith sells Viagra?

Today’s lead news item on al-Jazeera: the Palestinian deal between Hamas and Fatah signed in Mecca, which means peace between the rival factions and a recognition of Israel. Today’s lead news item on Fox News: the death of Anna Nicole Smith.