Passenger Trains > Forbes Story on HSR Around the World

If you want a good laugh, take a look at today's Forbes article on "Worlds Fastest High Speed Trains." I found it on Yahoo News. It's one of those "sponsored" articles where you have to click on "next" for each page with lots of ads in the process. Anyway, we now know how low journalism has sunk in this country.  About half the photos aren't from the country or train being discussed.  For example, for the Netherlands, a common bi level commuter train is shown when discussing "high speed."  For Russia, it gets worse. A freight train is shown. For the U.S. the Acela Express is mentioned but the photo clearly isn't. The train in Spain looks more like one of their luxury operations than a high speed set.  There are exceptions where the correct train is shown. For those interested, China is indicated in leading the pack in both speed and miles constructed. California didn't make the list :(   Exactly how hard would it be to come up with a photo of the actual train being discussed?  Lots of inaccuracies in the text as well. This sort of thing makes you wonder about the accuracy of other stores about things those of us here know little or nothing about. 

"Sponsored articles" (a euphemism for "advertisements") are not written by journalists, as no self-respecting journalist would take on such a job.  They are garbage and I would advise you to just gnore them. You won't learn anything useful from them (their actual purpose is not to inform but to harvest pageviews) and are quite likely to be misinformed by them. They certainly have no bearing on the quality of actual journalism from the publisher.  

Sponsored articles quite literally are the definition of “fake news” .

Posted from iPhone



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/07/19 06:29 by DJ-12.

Many travel section articles work the same way.  Some will have a disclaimer (The New York Times news staff did not participate in this special / promoted section), while others may be written by a person on the payroll of the sponsor.  Most of travel TV works the same way.

Just as maddening as the great quantity of worthless filler ads, they are slow to fully load which increases the reader's disdain at a proportional rate......sometimes to the extent that we throw up our collective arms and just close the window and move on to the next internet adventure........................(or is that just me??)

SANSR Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Just as maddening as the great quantity of
> worthless filler ads, they are slow to fully load
> which increases the reader's disdain at a
> proportional rate......sometimes to the extent
> that we throw up our collective arms and just
> close the window and move on to the next internet
> adventure........................(or is that just
> me??)

The "sponsored" article's primary motive is to bait the reader to click on the ads as he goes through the article. The point of the artcle is always near the end, but usually by the 2nd or 3rd page, enough information is presented where the reader can actually stop and go research the topic himself. That's what I do, on a few occasions where these "click bait" articles mention on a topic I'm curious about.

The cookies left on your computer during your Internet adventure builds a profile, where ads can be targeted. These ads can also be political, to bait you to read other articles to mold your opinion. Think about who actually benefits when HSR is being "promoted" and by golly, why is the China information "accurate" for the andersonb109's excellent adventure? :-)

andersonb109 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> For those interested, China is indicated in leading the pack in both speed and miles constructed.
> California didn't make the list.   Exactly how hard would it be to come up with a photo of the actual
> train being discussed?  Lots of inaccuracies in the text as well. This sort of thing makes you wonder
> about the accuracy of other stores about things those of us here know little or nothing about.

I don't wonder anymore.

I'm guessing that the author's point was to shame us into supporting HSR by saying China (our economic adversary) has it and we don't. That might be the reason why the China information in the article happened to be accurate. Other systems were thrown in there to "lengthen" the article, so accuracy wasn't that important.

Freedom of the press! They have the freedom to be inaccurate.

cchan006 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> andersonb109 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > For those interested, China is indicated in
> leading the pack in both speed and miles
> constructed.
> > California didn't make the list.   Exactly how
> hard would it be to come up with a photo of the
> actual
> > train being discussed?  Lots of inaccuracies
> in the text as well. This sort of thing makes you
> wonder
> > about the accuracy of other stores about things
> those of us here know little or nothing about.
>
> I don't wonder anymore.
>
> I'm guessing that the author's point was to shame
> us into supporting HSR by saying China (our
> economic adversary) has it and we don't. That
> might be the reason why the China information in
> the article happened to be accurate. Other systems
> were thrown in there to "lengthen" the article, so
> accuracy wasn't that important.
>
> Freedom of the press! They have the freedom to be
> inaccurate.



The Russian translation of the English word "advocacy" is "propaganda".

Duna Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The Russian translation of the English word
> "advocacy" is "propaganda".

I've mentioned this before on TO, but couple of decades ago, I worked with a Belarusian colleague in high tech. While waiting for our code to build, we'd look at international news outlets to compare varius "interpretations" of issues and events. He, as a survivor of USSR's Pravda and other nefarious propaganda was able to pinpoint how we do ours. His advice has been prophetic, and especially useful in recent years.

So I don't get offended when you make Russian references here on TO.

The Latin root of propaganda is to distribute or spread.

For many years, the Catholic missionary business was run by Propaganda Fidei. The office for spreading the faith.

Posted from Android