Is the Times worse than OW MY HEAD?

jesus. the TLS wasn't always complete shit -- i think c. 1981 there was a strike and the decent people founded the LRB and the dickwads stayed on.

i was reading an excellent book by an ex-editor, john gross, 'the rise and fall of the man of letters': he would never write that kind of rubbish.

I am wondering whether the owner's business interests might affect the paper's general attitude towards China, possibly.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/men/article3707397.ece

Meanwhile, Internet Cockman speaks out.

"What a great post, Peter!"

Poor trolling value, 3/10. Should have posted it to Comment Is Free.

i've spent a lot of time reading newspapers from the 1910s. say what you like about public discourse in those days, but at least they were brief. a london evening paper rarely got to 10 pages -- including classified ads. do you need more than that?

i wasted 90 seconds of my life skimming noodle's link there. the idea of publishing it -- and presumably it's in the paper, not just the blog -- is just o_O. people take both thelondonpaper and london lite on to commuter trains. i do it too sometiimes, and i'm sitting in a room containing more books than i'll read, if i'm honest, in five years.

can we just have one giant rolling thread for moans about what the papers say?

It's all in the interests of balance, Steve.

Dude global communication has got a lot better and the world has got a lot smaller since the 1910s, 10 pages isn't that much!

maybe a secret board for broadsheet bilge

Plus wasn't the type really tiny and squashed together with no pix? So a lot of words.

(x-post)

Dude global communication has got a lot better and the world has got a lot smaller since the 1910s, 10 pages isn't that much!

-- Matt DC, Wednesday, April 9, 2008 1:41 PM (27 seconds ago) Bookmark Link

the papers did what they needed to do. they didn't have a gazillion "comment" pieces. possibly modern newspapers stand in more for magazines, with all the lifestyle stuff -- and that's also a function of "us" being richer and being able to afford useless accoutrements like cars and kitchens.

anyhoo from the pov of a researcher, the 10pp paper is ideal. i pity the grad student of 2098, going through old sunday timeses.

Plus wasn't the type really tiny and squashed together with no pix? So a lot of words.

it was smaller, and there were fewer pics -- but still.

do you need more than that?

This was the conclusion I came to when I last tried to read a newspaper with any intent or regularity, 10 years ago. At home or whilst travelling I would far, far rather be reading a book. I'm never going to read a thousandth of the books I'd like to, so I'm not going to spend unnecessary time with journalism that's become increasingly indistinguishable from a Private Eye parody.

I am wondering whether the owner's business interests might affect the paper's general attitude towards China, possibly.

-- Noodle Vague, Wednesday, 9 April 2008 12:26 (17 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

Come on now, that's a bit far-fetched, isn't it?

i pity the grad student of 2098, going through old sunday timeses

Looking for an in-depth piece on why i-Pods are the pinnacle of Western civilization.

And instead there are only lightweight pieces on why i-Pods are the pinnacle of Western civilization.

http://www.rerunvideos.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/Idiocracy.jpg

Don't read it much, but whenever i do always come away with opinion that The Times is shite

Trouble is, it's hard to get worked up about the Times when you already know it's a rightwing scumsheet and therefore you're hardly surprised or shocked. Whereas the Grauniad is supposed to be on "our" side even though we all know they're only on the side of whatever the Scott Trust shareholders decide they should think.

Re. China; well we all know whose side The Times was on back in the thirties, so again, no surprises there.

The Telegraph's a right wing scumsheet but it's a better newspaper than the Times

The Times is kind of insidious though, its whole brand values seem to tend towards 'We Are The Centre Ground' and 'We Are The Quality Option' for your unthinking right-winger who doesn't like to think he's an unthinking right-winger.

The Telegraph is for your thinking Tories a bit more, partly because its more honest about its politics.

Let's just do some impressions of Stephen Dalton TV film reviews in the Times to while away the day.

BLUE VELVET
(David Lynch, 1986)
Kyle MacLachlan and Dennis Hopper star in this iconic, seedy examination of the sinister underbelly of smalltown America. Isabella Rosselini is superb as nightclub singer Blanche Dubois who draws innocent teenager Dale Cooper into her murky netherworld.

(Actually I've overstated it there, the Telegraph is hardly the Economist).

LOVE, HONOUR AND OBEY
(Dominic Anciano and Ray Burdis, 2000)
Gangster pranks and karaoke shootings occur in this improvised comedy starring Ray Winstone, Phil Daniels and Billie Piper. It may have no plot and no point and be about as funny as 9/11 but there are still plenty of laughs to be gained from Jude Law's sidesplitting Tom Jones impressions.

LH&O is the single worst movie i reviewed in my short career as film reviewer for NME.

that sounds almost as bad as The 51st State

One of my friends bought it on DVD after deciding that Sadie Frost was his ideal woman. I'll have to quiz him next time I see him to see whether he pretends it never happened.

Not the Guardian but it might as well go here. They had to scrape me off the ceiling of the train after I read this yesterday. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article3971850.ece

-- Thomas, Thursday, May 22, 2008 5:19 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

now posted in the right thread :-)

this bit is the killer: "Most merely provides people with what they would otherwise buy for themselves, such as education, healthcare, housing, unemployment insurance and pensions. Given the enormous cost of raising funds by taxation, such government spending is ludicrous."

anyhoo from the pov of a researcher, the 10pp paper is ideal. i pity the grad student of 2098, going through old sunday timeses.

oh chist srsly.

nytimes the only newspaper worth praising consistently, imo.

A friend of mine recently moved to Hong Kong and ended up choking seriously on a bone in something he'd eaten. He then was taken, in serious distress, to a hospital where they refused to treat him until he could prove he could pay the £1000 bill such a simple operation would cost. This is what happens when you pay fuck all tax and I intend to trot out this example for a long time to come.

Also, that article totally overlooks the MASSIVE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM ie if we were paying significantly less tax then our employers would be able to get away with paying people significantly less.

I know there are some Simon Barnes fans on this board, but even by his standards this is some ripe, ripe cheese:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/columnists/simon_barnes/article5854176.ece

Got about three paragraphs in before I started searching for Kalashnikovs on Ebay.

Use of strawmen particularly egregious. Who says that terrorists "hate joy" anyway?

ok even before reading this, I know pretty much exactly what he's gonna say...you can't really blame him for being Simon Barnes tbh

LOL at the fact he takes a totally pointless digression to laud Kevin Pietersen...I mean, he's OTM, and I wholly agree, but in that context it's a little gratuitous in a sort of "THIS IS MY CAUSE CELEBRE AND I'M DAMNED IF IT'S MISSING OUT" way

ok wow, that is something of a self-parody

it's like every SB article rolled into one

It was a night on which the world discovered that there are few things better than watching a beautiful woman leap the height of a house

needs more references to the primal thrill of going on a safari

There was an article blurb on the front of the Times today that said "We're Millenials - And We're In a Sex Recession" and I laughed so hard the lady on the till in M&S looked at me funny

bonking collapse

a run on the pounding?

sorry, that is poor

Lack of interest rates. Bonking collapse is good but has surely been used.

as soon as you withdraw etc etc

millennials unable to provide small, regular deposits

Avoid Westminster Station if you can.

This doesn't convey the horror https://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/news-uk-turns-westminster-station-jungle/1663182

I wish to protest in the strongest possible terms this monetisation of our public transport infratructure. Even more irrationally infuriating than the ads for estate agents underneath south london & surrey train station names.

Lynne Fraser, head of brand and campaigns at The Times and The Sunday Times, said: "This activity has taken our political animals out of the zoo and into the jungle – something that we feel represents the shift in the political landscape since we launched the campaign six months ago.

"Reflecting the mood of the nation in a refreshing way, we want to reach out to audiences and reassure them that The Times and The Sunday Times are here to guide them through."

i for one am very reassured that the times and sunday times won't resort to tired cliches to convey a complex political reality to its audience