Last week’s leak of a secret copyright pact between nations, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, confused a lot of people, including me.
Posted in Technology | Tagged ACTA, Copyright Law | Leave a Comment »
Twenty-two American CIA agents can now not leave the country without the threat of being arrested. That’s because an Italian court today convicted 23 Americans, all but one of them CIA agents, of the 2003 kidnap of Abu Omar, a suspected terrorist, from Milan, sending him to Egypt where he was allegedly tortured.
Under it’s extraordinary rendition program, the CIA has shuttled suspects from countries with established anti-torture laws to countries where torture is mildly tolerated, without following any legal process. Setting aside the criminality of torture for a moment, the rendition itself might be criminal.
Posted in Politics | Tagged Abu Ghraib, Arar v. Ashcroft, Torture | Leave a Comment »
Today, a story I’ve been working on for a couple weeks about nanotechnology – specifically, about some new research into carbon nanotube technology – ran on Green Technology Daily.
The relevant global angle, and one that the story didn’t even try to touch, centers on trade.
Posted in Energy | Tagged Carbon Nanotubes, Environmentalism, Technology Development | Leave a Comment »
Can anyone tell me why some really smart people are still discussing financial regulatory reform as though all of the current regulations have actually been enforced in recent memory?
Posted in Banking | Tagged Derivatives, Regulation, Risk | Leave a Comment »
The difference between Fox and news, the way in which one of these things is not like the other, is that only one of these organizations is organizing anti-government street protests.
I’m happy that Maddow is taking the lead on pointing out this important difference. The problem with Fox News is not that it opines on the news it covers or has partisan leanings. Many news outlets behave in these ways without creating too many problems.
The problem with Fox News is that it originates and promotes events designed to create a type of news that wouldn’t otherwise be available. It’s committing public relations – and there isn’t anything wrong with transparent PR that looks, feels, and smells kinda like journalism.
There are some great reasons for PR departments to take this approach because it’s both good communications and helpful to actual journalists. But call it what it is. PR people aren’t going around expecting a sit-down with the President or any other external newsmaker. Fox’s pleas to be included make it hypocritical.
And it’s not too self-promotional to mention that a month ago I wrote about the point Maddow is making, is it?
Video and quote via Anthony De Rosa’s Tumblr.
Posted in Media | Tagged Communications, Corporations, Fox News, Journalism, Media Personalities | Leave a Comment »
I’ve been busy this week on some of my own bylines, which is unusual – most of my work involves writing things for companies – and a welcome change of pace.
This piece, “Companies caught in the commission of journalism,” uses a recent report on the outlook for journalism to dive into how companies ought to react to a press that is transforming. The firm I work for posted the commentary in its newsroom.
And this one, “The meat of the matter,” is a Q&A with a vegan advocate, Marisa Miller Wolfson of Kind Green Planet, that I had a lot of fun writing.
Posted in Writing | Leave a Comment »
The Wall Street Journal reported this morning on increasing investments in biofuels by large commercial oil companies, pointing to a flood of low-carbon policies being enacted across the developed world as what are driving more corporate funds into the sector.
But it’s worth pointing out that the companies mentioned in the article – BP PLC, Royal Dutch Shell, Exxon Mobile Corp. – aren’t awfully big players in the oil sector. The top 13 oil companies, measuring by oil reserves, are owned and operated by governments, not corporations. And, as Ian Bremmer points out in an article about this type of state capitalism, these state-owned companies control the production of more than 75 percent of the world’s oil reserves.
Of course, state-owned oil companies have drastically different goals than do commercial ones. Countries nationalize oil reserves in order to create political power and strengthen their national security, while commercial oil companies seek financial returns only. Policies that affix a cost to carbon emission might not change the behavior of organizations that aren’t terribly focused on financial profits in the first place.
No one seems to know what the state-owned oil companies think about biofuels.
* Disclosure: The article quotes an executive at one of my corporate clients.
Posted in Energy | Tagged Biofuels, Environmentalism, Oil, State Capitalism | Leave a Comment »
Apparently, last week was deemed Mental Illness Awareness Week and aimed to raise awareness about mental health issues and raise funds that would pay for research.
I missed hearing about the week until now, and in fact the only reason I learned about it late was because of a friend’s e-mail alerting me to this column on the Huffington Post, which states just how misguided the whole idea is and with which I thoroughly agree.
That’s not the reason for this post.
Posted in Media | Tagged Jean Baudrillard, Mental Health, Mental Illness Awareness Week, Quotes | Leave a Comment »
The other night, a discussion with a friend about cap-and-trade policy began to devolve into screamy partisan arguing before we came to our senses. Which does tend to happen when two people on different ends of the political sphere talk environmentalism. When two people can’t talk about environmentalism in a reasonable matter, national discourse on global warming, et al, doesn’t stand a chance.
It was timely, then, to find this useful web site today: “How to Talk to a Climate Skeptic: Responses to the most common skeptical arguments on global warming.” First read says it’s full of links to authoritative material about climate change. I wish all lawmakers were in the business of sourcing facts in this manner.
(Link via Nikolas Pekari’s Twitter.)
Posted in Environmenalism | Tagged Climate Change | Leave a Comment »
Whether intentional or not, a question posted on LinkedIn by a senior vice president at lobbying firm IRG Group wins an award for linkbait.
The question:
The President was a guest today on 4 out of the 5 Sunday news shows; the 4 that generally advocate for his Presidency / programs. He did not go on the more critical Fox News. If a goal was to reach out beyond his base, shouldn’t Fox News have been included?
The answers are worth reading because they reveal important questions about how mainstream broadcast outlets cover politics and global affairs.
Posted in Media | Tagged Fox News, Journalism, Media Strategy | 2 Comments »
