Just a gripe... journalist covering of the beta versions

I read several articles on tech websites this week and, same as in the last few years, am amazed at how (shall I say it, yes I will…) totally dumb some tech journalists can be.

Just finished an article on ip…t.com about new safari on iPad and could not stop frowning.

It describes how safari is almost there, but not just yet…

  • In a v001 beta version
  • Of a not even for release OS
  • In a VERY specific usecase
  • for 1 person

As the summer continues I hope the journaille get a better grip on reality, with or without Apple’s help, and focus on real features and issues.

And yes, I do understand you have to make money between now and september, but really?!?

One thing I do have to be positive about:
the reporter said he was going to file a radar.

I agree with that, just a pitty his story was already published by then

I thought long and hard whether I would vent this in this way, but decided to do it anyway. Maybe it will go some way to prevent the iOS/macOS news fatigue I usually get by mid/end July

3 Likes

That’s what “journalism” has become. Opinion. Forget being circumspect and thoughtful.

1 Like

Lots of folks’ livelihoods depend on them making noise. If there isn’t much to say, no hands on, they quote press releases adding cute titles. No value added info…

But that true on forums too… write about apps and hardware that they have not downloaded/owned much less used. Welcome to the land of overvalued opinion.

Advertisements claiming… Call it puffery… not the truth.

I catch myself wanting to express my thinking and realize it based on a couple posts of unknown veracity and accuracy.

Enjoyed reading this book, slightly different topic but near enough.

2 Likes

@anon41602260 I remember when CNN began broadcasting everyone said “There isn’t enough news to broadcast 24 hours a day”. Turns out they were right.

3 Likes

My favorite is iTunes. We had weeks of ‘Apple to shut down iTunes’ and now a week of ‘Apple shut down iTunes’.

AMEN Wolfie!!! I am with you 100 % on that thought. It’s all about the money. Facts don’t matter anymore.

Nor does “fact checking” so it seems (ref: Trackers on iPhone - Disconnect Privacy Pro? ). Alarmist articles such as these, devoid from source data references, are spread religiously as single dimension truth. Sad.

Actually, we talked about that here, and I discussed how well Privacy Pro has worked for me, culling trackers from google, Facebook and many, many other ad companies. A WaPo article isn’t the place to go for footnoted references, but I’ve been very satisfied with the systemwide blocking it’s provided.

Why not? Big claims require good data/facts or we get statements like these “i think many developers blindly incorporate these trackers”. The articles this particular author writes are in general all alarmist type articles.

Remember the “big hack” article from Bloomberg? Also no references.

Because it’s a newspaper article which was extremely clear about what it was doing, and not doing. If you need more data, with footnotes, search elsewhere; this wasn’t a research paper.