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July 27, 2004alhurraWell, that was weird. I was just interviewed by Daila Al-Aqidi of alhurra television. Alhurra is operated by the Middle East Television Network, a non-profit, which receives its funding from the Broadcasting Board of Governors which oversees Voice of America, Alhurra, Radio Free Europe, etc. The interview was in Arabic. A translator read questioned me in English, and my replies were translated back into Arabic. The questions were around how could the Democratic Party allow just anyone to write about the convention, and how could readers be sure that I was telling the truth. I talked about the importance of dialog, of getting as many people involved as possible, and that by having a good dialog, the reads should be able to figure out the truth. I talked about how I don’t view blogs as a threat to traditional newspapers but as a valuable complement to newspapers, making it easier for journalists to get more information. I talked about how it was easy to set up, anyone could do it, and what matters is having people that will read the blog. I talked about how I am not trained as a journalist, but as a computer programmer. I wonder how I was translated and what parts will end up in the broadcast. As a blogger, who always wonders about the bias of the medium he is dealing with, I wonder what the bias of alhurra is. It was a weird experience. Comments
Aldon-- how lucky of you; I see what I missed while taking the night off. I actually did some research on the network on civilities, see http://civilities.net/alHurra. I had looked into what kind of oversight the American people-- through the Congress-- actually had over alHurra, given that we fund it. The program is perceived to have a slight US bias, not surprisingly, and that was discussed in the congressional hearings I reviewed. The network's directors spoke how critical it was for them to be seen as objective in order to be accepted as a reliable source of news. Jon Posted by: Jon Garfunkel at July 27, 2004 11:35 PMThanks for the information. It seems to fit with a brief glance. It would be wonderful if an alhurra viewer came to the blog and commented. I would love to know more about alhurra and how the broadcast came out. I hope to write more about how blogging is being viewed overseas and more thoughts about alhurra when I get a chance. (Side comment: Your link doesn't seem to be working) Posted by: Aldon Hynes at July 27, 2004 11:56 PMThis question - "how could readers be sure that I was telling the truth?" - set off sparks in my head. I think that those of us who're blogging and who have a democratic intent can forget that most folks assume that there is one definitive "true" vision or perception, whereas the evolving vision among bloggers and other members of the "network society" is the Rashomon thing: there is no single human truth; you have to consider many perspectives and the vision is never complete. I'm at a point where I take that for granted. Posted by: Jon Lebkowsky at July 28, 2004 6:40 AMiam from sweeeeeeet iraq, baghdad Post a comment
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