NEWS QUOTES III

quotations about the news media

The newspapers of Utopia, he had long ago decided, would be terribly dull.

ARTHUR C. CLARKE

2001: A Space Odyssey

Tags: Arthur C. Clarke


News is like fish, it should be made use of before it becomes stale.

ANNIE E. LANCASTER

attributed, Day's Collacon


In the age of technology there is constant access to vast amounts of information. The basket overflows; people get overwhelmed; the eye of the storm is not so much what goes on in the world, it is the confusion of how to think, feel, digest, and react to what goes on.

CRISS JAMI

Venus in Arms


Wars might come and go, but the seven o'clock news lives forever.

LEWIS H. LAPHAM

Money and Class in America

Tags: Lewis H. Lapham


The news isn't there to tell you what happened. It's there to tell you what it wants you to hear or what it thinks you want to hear.

JOSS WHEDON

Astonishing X-Men: Volume 2


News travels fast in places where nothing much ever happens.

CHARLES BUKOWSKI

Ham on Rye

Tags: Charles Bukowski


Newsworthy deaths had to be exceptional. Most people go unobserved.

HARUKI MURAKAMI

Dance Dance Dance

Tags: Haruki Murakami


Journalism is ... the recording of history while the facts are not all in.

THOMAS GRIFFETH

attributed, Nieman Reports, 1958


Ill news, madam,
Are swallow-winged, but what's good
Walks on crutches.

PHILIP MASSINGER

Picture


Believe it or not, I think the downfall of our press today was the show 60 Minutes. Up until it came along, news was expected to lose money, in order to bring the people fair reporting and the truth. But when 60 Minutes became the top-rated program on television, the light went on. The corporate honchos said, "Wait a minute, you mean if we entertain with the news, we can make money?" It was the realization that, if packaged the correct way, the news could make you big bucks. No longer was it a matter of scooping somebody else on a story, but whether 20/20's ratings this week were better than Dateline's.

JESSE VENTURA

Don't Start the Revolution Without Me!

Tags: Jesse Ventura


How goes it now, sir? This news which is called true is so like an old tale, that the verity of it is in strong suspicion.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

The Winter's Tale

Tags: William Shakespeare


The greatest influence over content was necessity--they had holes to fill on every page and jammed in any vaguely newsworthy string of words, provided it didn't include expletives, which they were apparently saving for their own use around the office.

TOM RACHMAN

The Imperfectionists


Seminal changes in the news media over the past three decades have also helped create a more volatile political arena. During my last year in office, I joined with Ted Turner to celebrate the birth of CNN, and this new network provided global news coverage that was accurate, comprehensive, and objective--standards that were later partially sacrificed to meet intense competition from other channels. To gain viewers, the twenty-four-hour news channels have now come to rely on reporting that often dramatizes or exaggerates each reported rumor or fact. In addition, the more radical presentations of information or commentary have proven to be most popular, so radio and television programs, like political alignments, have tended toward extremes. An unfortunate result of the need for constant reporting--especially on Internet news outlets--has been the demise of hundreds of newspapers that have proved unable to compete, leaving major cities and towns with one merged journal, or, in some cases, none at all. The free and vigorous presentation of different opinion has been sacrificed to polarized uniformity.

JIMMY CARTER

White House Diary

Tags: Jimmy Carter


News told, rumors heard, truth implied, facts buried.

TOBA BETA

My Ancestor Was an Ancient Astronaut


Journalism is in fact history on the run. It is history written in time to be acted upon: thereby not only recording events but at times influencing them.

THOMAS GRIFFETH

attributed, Nieman Reports, 1958


Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.

A. J. LEIBLING

The Wayward Press


Where village statesmen talk'd with looks profound,
And news much older than their ale went round.

OLIVER GOLDSMITH

The Deserted Village

Tags: Oliver Goldsmith


Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

letter to John Norvell, June 11, 1807

Tags: Thomas Jefferson


Ill news is wing'd with fate, and flies apace.

JOHN DRYDEN

Threnodia Augustalis

Tags: John Dryden


News is the manna of a day.

M. GREEN

attributed, Day's Collacon