Cheap? You Judge

So, the opossum Heidi made it on the main page of YLE News tonight. Why is Heidi the opossum special, you might wonder - well, she's not, her eyes are crooked and that is all.

Actually, I feel doing this cheapens my own site. Every time YLE picks up something completely useless for their main page and I post about I feel like picking on a retard. We've long since established they don't know any better and they can't help it. Also, it feels like a cheap outlet if I don't have a serious news post to point out, like the last one on Haiti

Now there might be a counterpoint or two floating around. First, you might claim the joke at the end of a news reel serves a purpose and that there's a long history for it and that it increases the amount of viewers for the actual news. This held true in the age of television, but not the Internet, why?

Today a newsreader selects a news website because he or she is interested in the news. They do not necessarily seek cute-animals-on-demand, as they can do that any time on youtube or any number of other sites. When you go to a news website you want news. If you play the tradition card, you need to understand how the Internet is not the television and that readership and content is not necessarily dependent on the same factors. Think about it - the news reel at 22:00 ends in a joke and you feel good at the end because you watched the whole thing. Reading Internet news you don't have a single cohesive transmission, you pick and choose, and this brings us back to the first point; news websites should offer news instead of cutesy crap.

I also realize some viewers might want to see animal shenanigans amid news. There are various online sites making their livelihood out of it, so why shouldn't news providers do it too? Because our main national news provider should not aim for the lowest common denominator, they should aim to bring us quality news. The yellow press exist to fill that function, entertainment news.

Afghani Birth Control

According to this report from YLE (in Finnish,) the women of Afghanistan can now utilize family planning services. This includes advice, high quality information, birth control methods and training for local religious leaders. This helps improve attitudes and prevent unwanted pregnancies. Nothing wrong with this.

But, according to the report, Finland is the only outside funding country. This is what made me look for more background information. The big questions were why only one donor instead of multinational support, and why only Finland. The website of the organization in question, Marie Stopes International, provided me with a basic profile on Afghanistan and a release about the work in question.

The release, Making a Difference in Afghanistan provides confirmation for the numbers used in the YLE report and some extra information. Currently there are 15 clinics and 2 mobile units, with 52 community health workers in Afghanistan. For a nation with the highest maternal death rate in the world, this is a valuable service.

But then, as usual, we run in to problems. First of all, while less efficient, MSI offered valuable services already in 2003, not mentioned in the news. That's not the big problem however, which is that in the Afghanistan overview MSI reports they have 4 major donors: "Government of Finland; Direct Relief International; Jersey Overseas Aid Commission; Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA)."

This is a problem in that YLE reported Finland as the only funder, but MSI reports Finland is working together with MSI, mentioning nothing of exclusivity. It's frustrating that YLE has no source available, no link to a press release or any lead to follow up on besides the organization's name, which provides contradicting information.

I hope the point of the report wasn't as much comment on how great Finland is than to bring up the current situation in Afghanistan, as for the latter the inconsistency doesn't detract from the article. But if YLE simply wanted to write a "go us" story they could've been more honest going about it.

Sources, Please

I've talked of this before, but I think online news should include links to source material when convenient. The links don't really detract from the story, and if your goal is to inform someone they might help you do just that.

My point is the very well circulated memo by U.S. Congressmen Waxman and Stupak which was released here:
http://energycommerce.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2017:committee-releases-details-of-bps-internal-incident-investigation&catid=122:media-advisories&Itemid=55
With a direct link to the PDF:
http://energycommerce.house.gov/documents/20100525/Memo.BP.Internal.Investigation.pdf

It's been read and commented on extensively, but that's not exactly my point. I would just like it for online news media who use it to link to it. It's not much effort at all. There are potential problems you can avoid when you cite sources.

YLE, mimicking Reuters reported today that a report said BP had cut corners, ignored safety concerns and specifically mentioned falling behind schedule and failing to do proper cement sealing of the well. They mention the report was written by Waxman and Stupak, but they don't link to it.

The problem with this is that it's impossible to know whether YLE has a copy of the report or if they just assume Reuters does. I understand it's hard to scrutinize every bit of Reuters news if you want to use their material but this is a big story and has been for a while, seeing as YLE also gives special attention to it.

Now, they mention schedule issues not pointed out in the memo, which would indicate they have more material than I just linked, but I can't know for sure. Too bad, because I would have appreciated info on where to read more on this. Ooh, and the last paragraph of the news post says the accident killed 11 workers and caused significant environmental damage. That's what they have instead of background info.

YLE link, in Finnish, here:
http://yle.fi/uutiset/ulkomaat/2010/06/raportti_bpn_poraustoissa_pahoja_puutteita_1760588.html

One Every Hour

Okay, I was about to blame YLE for oversimplifying things when they said one baby with syphilis is born every hour in China. I was about to complain how there's no way how that is true, and even if it was nearly so statistically over a carefully selected period of time it still wouldn't be accurate reporting. I would say they dumbed down a medical article and how that shouldn't be done since the original writing is scientific, but I can't blame them.

Well, I can actually blame them, but not them alone.

Google "babies born every hour in china" and you get pages and pages full of the same news in English, repeated over and over. It's actually difficult to find a more intelligent point on the same subject, just the same catchy phrase repeated over and over.

Repeating catchy phrases is not news reporting.

YLE just went with the flow and copypasted the report to and from a translator. The problem with this is it's something people easily remember, it's how urban legends start. Medical texts shouldn't be dumbed down to that level.

And pay attention to how this is again China Brand news. Remeber how it works? All the news from or about China strike a very similar tone while not being very well written, and the vast majority is bad news. It's the McDonalds of news and that is our news with fries for the day.

Oh, and before I forget, the YLE original:
http://yle.fi/uutiset/terveys_ja_hyvinvointi/2010/06/kuppa_leviaa_arhakkaasti_kiinassa_1755091.html?origin=rss

Across and Back High

That there is a picture of the limit of the Finnish - Russian border zone near Imatra. As reported by YLE, it's a brisk 10 kilometer bicycle ride from Imatra to Svetogorsk, to where Finnish addicts go to inject their drugs. According to the news post there are daily visits, perhaps up to tens of regular goers, who go over the border sober but appear to be under the influence of drugs upon return.

The police can't do anything about it, as it would take the Finnish Central Police working together with the local Russian authorities to stop the visits. The border officials haven't found any drugs on the tourists.

Now, if you'd allow me to tell you how to think; please reconsider if your first thought was "that's terrible! Drugs are terrible!" This report is mildly funny and slightly badly reported with an anti-drug bias.

It's funny since the guys are hardworking enough to bicycle down that road or one similar to it sober several times a week. I bet the ride back is much better, it's downhill too. Yeah, they likely do it for cheaper drugs and maybe because of more relaxed Police control, but they certainly aren't ruining their lives with regular exercise.

And it's bad reporting because they write they go over the border to inject drugs, except they have no proof or even a quote to show there are interveinous drugs involved, the short article just uses the idea to give a negative image. It's also wrong to use a stock image of white powder in the same context for the same reason. YLE's second stock photo was of the city proper, which I don't want to copy. My image is credit to Google Maps.

Short original here:

The President's Pike 404'd

So, two useless reports and both removed, way to go YLE.

First, on Wednesday YLE reported that the usual Christmas Pike from Korppoo wouldn't be a part of the President's Christmas feast but might be back another year. The Finnish roughly translated is "The Korppoo pike isn't good enough for the President."

Then today they ran a story saying the pike is indeed going to be there and that the fish and the fisherman bringing it are both welcome.

Both of these posts are useless news, it's not like it's the favorite fishy event of the year for the nation or something, but this time they just removed both articles and you get a 404. Too bad for them their tracks aren't completely covered. The tiny picture of the fish is still there and RSS readers which picked up the stories still have the short descriptions saved.

Here you go, the very festive pike YLE just couldn't get right, we can call him Frank.

Merry Christmas Frank!

YLE Mongering H1N1 Panic

The line of reporting at YLE regarding the H1N1 here has been less than professional, and most of the news are meant to be scary. YLE isn't a company seeking advertising for profit and it should maintain a higher standard, but much like our yellow press (yesterday's headline was "People are dying in the queue" which wasn't even the case in the article, they just made the headline up) YLE's reporting has been getting more and more panic mongering and worthless.

The most recent article online is just a collection of scary stories from patients who have suffered H1N1. Just a bunch of short stories about symptoms, worse symptoms, even worse doctor visits and mental problems. This is not news, and it most certainly isn't the right way to talk about a disease which so far had failed to meet any prediction of infection rates or fatalities.

The problem lies in that the swine flu reporting has been getting gradually worse and now we are far, far from any real reporting without noticing any drastic changes in between.

If you read Finnish, take a look for yourself. The whole piece is meant to leave you feeling like there is a terrible disease looming with no help in sight. There's a wonderful short story of a pregnant woman who was prescribed Tamiflu and suffered from audible hallucinations and was isolated - it's just as scary as intended.

http://yle.fi/uutiset/kotimaa/2009/11/lukijat_kertovat_h1n1_nostaa_kovan_kuumeen_ja_tuntuu_lihaksissa_1165589.html?origin=rss

H1N1 News in Finland Are Meant to Be Scary

So far have had a single digit count of H1N1 fatalities in Finland. Reporting these is normal, albeit yearly influenza strains make much fever headlines than H1N1. Actually, any scary speculation regarding the Swine Flu makes a headline.

The most recent headline from YLE on the topic is "Some H1N1 Vaccinations End Up in the Trash" more or less directly translated. They proceed to write how the vaccinations are packaged with several shots in one container, so that once a container is opened it will stay good for 24 hours or so.

Yeah, and the more you read the less scary the article becomes. They quote Merja Saarinen, an advisor for the health ministry, who explains that the vaccinations are good for a day and if properly stored a container can be used the next morning if it's opened in the afternoon, and that usually an opened pack is used that day. She even goes as far to say as that there shouldn't be many lost units of vaccination since the 24 hours is enough for next morning.

This normal for vaccinations. Sure, some stay longer, but nobody expects individually packaged shots when you are inoculating the whole population of a country.

It's just another example of writing about a popular topic with a headline that gets the most readers. This would be fine for the tabloids like Iltalehti but YLE should hold itself to a higher standard. The thing to do is keep reading these articles and try to figure out if they are they meant to scare people or is that just a by-product of a reader grabbing headline.

The linked article is just one example - its not the first, but lets see how many more pop up.
http://yle.fi/uutiset/kotimaa/2009/11/osa_h1n1-rokotteista_paatyy_roskakoriin_1142945.html?origin=rss

Editing the Winter

It is very common here, when autumn turns to winter, to run a piece or two about how the winter snows surprised motorists and how there have been a few accidents. Cheap, easy news.

This year is no exception, YLE again turned a weather report in to a news article. Oh, they had a fact that there have been 32 (assumedly minor) accidents. Humdrum news at its finest. I wouldn't have even picked the article here, except they were in such a hurry they copy pasted the last paragraph twice.

At the time of writing, the article was written at about 5pm and then edited again at about 10:30pm. Now they need to have at least a third edit - actually, there might have been more if the time-stamp just marks the last edit.

Editing a news article lowers the bar in that you can publish earlier with less control and then correct without even noting what you changed. If they would just release a follow-up or a correction when necessary instead of just endlessly editing a post readers would not only stay updated but also see what was said in the first place.

The screen cap is for posterity, as the article will have changed by the time you can click the link.
http://yle.fi/uutiset/kotimaa/2009/11/lumi_ja_ranta_haittaavat_autoilijoita_etela-suomessa_1142012.html?origin=rss

Traffic Saf... Aww - Puppies

You are ten times more likely to die if you don't wear a reflective badge wh -

Look! A Puppy!



And that's where I stopped reading the article and so should you. This is certainly not the first time the YLE editors think it's good enough if it has a picture of a cute dog in it.

Utter crud.
http://yle.fi/uutiset/kotimaa/2009/10/heijastimen_laiminlyonti_kymmenkertaistaa_kuolemanriskin_1099924.html

A Nothing in the Kings' Valley

A Ticking Time Bomb in the Kings' Valley - approximately translated from our lovable YLE.

The news is that the original diggers left a time bomb in the Valley people are now trying to defuse. But let's start with the basics, who did what, when did it happen and how?

How? They dug to a fault line because the ground was easier to dig than solid bedrock.
Who? Ancient Egyptians.
When? Not stated, but studies have shown recently these are a problem.
What? Here the whole article crumbles much unlike a pyramid. The reporter writes that trough the burial chambers water can access the ground. That is all. That is f'in all. I'm no geologist, but I thought water could access the ground anyway. The article doesn't state how this might be a problem.

How water getting somewhere makes for a time bomb I do not know. And no, the pyramids are not in danger of collapsing, they would have said so. The author has no idea either. He or she does not even state the source, so the reader should accept the article is original YLE research. That is not the case, if it was, the author could explain things at a basic level.

It is obvious from the text the writer has no understanding of the issue and has either hastily translated the news from somewhere else or misunderstood an explanation overheard somewhere.

Perhaps they hope a catchy title is enough for a piece of news if the topic is even remotely interesting. They expect their readers to go "ooh" every time someone says "ancient Egyptians."

It's useless gutless reporting, and (in Finnish) can be found here:
http://yle.fi/uutiset/kulttuuri/2009/10/kuninkaiden_laaksossa_piilee_aikapommi_1093840.html?origin=rss

An Inconveniently Dubious Truth

The climate is changing - yes. We are responsible for the climate change - yes. Natural disasters increase due to climate change - maybe. Natural disasters kill women 14 times more likely than men - okay? The Asian tsunami catastrophe 5 years ago killed 75% women, 25% men in Aceh - yes. All of these can be tied together as a coherent news article - Hell no.

The article I'm talking about does not rate the claims on a scale of yes to hell no, they are all given. This failure of reporting has a single researched fact to it's credit, that women are statistically more likely to suffer more fatalities in large natural disasters compared to men, in poor countries. But this is all mixed in a nice jumble.

(Finnish article here: http://yle.fi/uutiset/kotimaa/2009/10/ilmastonmuutos_koettelee_enemman_naisia_kuin_miehia_1088146.html?origin=rss)

Actually, I'm pretty sure Sari Aro is just hoping nobody reads the post too carefully, or that if they do read it she hopes people will feel so sorry about the poor women all the other claims go unchecked.

What irks me is the link between our changing climate and the tsunami catastrophe. It was caused by an earthquake! The writer lacks the decency to select a disaster which could be even remotely linked to the introduction of the article. Why can't she choose an unseasonal torrential rain killing poor women in mudslides or talk about the droughts in central China?

Because the stock footage photos for droughts are boring. High water levels are more interesting but do not catch the eye like a woman washing her clothes in a temporary shelter tent. This is the equivalent of me posting boobs here just to get viewers.

Here, have a sad thought for her, but don't think her suffering is relevant in any way Mrs Aro would like to imply.

Missing Quality

I feel like I'm picking on a retard every time I write about YLE. It seems their feed really doesn't allow you to look at all the news with a straight face. I understand the point of having a cute animal at the end of a news broadcast, but on the Internet and especially in the feed form I don't get it.

Specifically? I'm looking at a piece where they've opened an Elf Academy in Italy to support the Santa School in Rovaniemi. Everyone should stop reading the article right at the title, but since I already started I've now learned how the school is in Noventa di Piave near Venice and ...

I'm not going to go there. The article is utterly worthless. It is not funny, it is not informative, interesting or in any way valuable. It comes with a video attachment, which is not narrated or subtitled, it doesn't have a description and it might well be Christmas stock footage from anywhere in southern Europe.

Here is the video, no Finnish language skill necessary.
http://www.yle.fi/java/areena/dispatcher/2623467.asx?bitrate=1000000

The second quality point I want to bring up is I've read of an incident where several Finnish newspapers just took an article from our largest, and when it turned out false they either didn't publish a correction or it wasn't enough to undo the damage. It's not all good in our printed media either.

Helsingin Sanomat (#1 newspaper) said The Social Insurance Institution of Finland (KELA) was found guilty in the European Human Rights Court - in reality they linked the wrong judgment to the wrong case. The turd of a report then made the rounds and ended up in 4 more papers.

Helsingin Sanomat made a mistake and the other papers just copy pasted the story without checking the background.

Both of these cases are similar in that they reveal a lack of professionalism. In the case of YLE it feels like they are whipping monkeys tied to typewriters to fill a quota, while the newspaper reporters hit "Copy" when the coffee break ends. This is what passes for news around here, but it's not much better elsewhere and I'll get to that too.

Help The Swan is Stuck - What The?

The Oulu and Koillismaa area emergency centers have been troubled by people calling in, worried that the swans are stuck in the lake, frozen. Yes, that's right, they fear that a large, flight capable bird would be frozen solid.

There must be a reason when rational thinking fails, but I can't fathom why someone would think the birds wouldn't just fly away - it's a migratory bird! They have never seen a frozen swan. But that's not enough, they have to call the fire department, some people won't even call the department, they'll just dial 112, the emergency number.

Reporting this is adding failure to a failure of course, it's like failure with interest on top. Compound failure.

Yes, it's a pitiful thing when people act stupidly, but it's hardly national news. As usual, YLE fails to give a name for the reporter or editor, besides, their site has no direct feedback link, you have to go trough general site feedback if you want to let them know your opinion. They do have a picture of a swan though, alas they didn't even bother to get a picture of a swimming swan or a swan on ice.

Here's the link, but there's not much:
http://yle.fi/uutiset/kotimaa/2009/10/joutsenista_turhia_soittoja_pelastusviranomaisille_1072591.html?origin=rss

So What If It's Over a Decade Old

At the moment the big topic in Finnish news is the elections funding. There are various crises and a reported lack of trust in the government. I'll try to share some of the tidbits if I run in to any worthwhile topics.

Because of this it is very easy to release any news articles criticizing the Finnish government. Our prime minister hasn't been left alone either. Too bad the current hurry to release the "news" has lowered the bar considerably. Actually, I'm afraid to think the bar was always this low and that I'm just now noticing it.

Last week an YLE program Silminnäkijä (Eyewitness) reported that Matti Vanhanen (our PM) had received lumber from a construction company, no money involved in the transaction. This was an outright accused bribe.

This accusation is deflating very rapidly and it is making YLE look bad. Actually, YLE is making YLE look bad but this helps. Why? The accused event it more than ten years old. Some 12 - 13 years ago Mr. Vanhanen accusedly received lumber for his house. Oh, by the way, it's not a wooden house.

Vanhanen has asked for the reporters to show any evidence to the claim and they have none.

In addition, the Keskusrikospoliisi (Central Police) commented saying any possible crime has long since matured and that no criminal investigation will be conducted. The police have a standard to uphold you see, and in the case of bribes the line is drawn at 5 years. YLE possibly sees this as some sort of a limbo stick to scurry under to get the news.

Kicking It Off With a Puppy

A bit of background first. I read my news mostly in the form of an RSS feed. My feeds are mostly from Yahoo! and YLE but I follow some lesser ones too. The puppy is what is wrong with my way of following news. There is no way of automatically filtering worthless filler pages with no value from actual news.

The puppy is from the Finnish national public service news agency, our largest. Their feed titled YLE - Main News brought me a piece saying the traffic safety administration requires no safety gear for dogs but it is recommended.

Because they see fit to run this with the rest of the main news the whole feed is more difficult to follow. The posts are so numerous good posts are difficult to keep up with as it is. But this time the only thing is missing is a wide angle lens.

The reporter didn't leave his/her name with the article but the dog's name is Myntti. Way to go Myntti, you cheapen YLE. Bet the dog didn't mean to, but I wonder if the reporter did?

The original is here (in Finnish) Myntti the dog