FYI | Jul 22 2006
Reader Michael B from Spain writes us:
"There is no doubt that the internet has lead to a greater access of divergent views for those people who seek them.
"Take my situation, for example.
"I’m an Australian who makes his living trading Australia shares but lives in Spain, so I use the internet exclusively to access information on the Australian sharemarket and the general global economic situation.
"On any one day I will not only check out the business news in the SMH, The Age, and the Australian, but I’ll also check out Bloomberg and Reuters websites, the LSE and NYSE for what is happening with RIO or BHP share prices in London and New York, as well as your website and other online sources such as The Eureka Report.
"But I also have Google News Alerts putting up to 50 emails a day into my email’s inbox. The way they work is that I ‘instruct’ Google News Alerts to tell me any time key words appear in a newspaper article, for instance, ‘China’ ‘iron’ ‘ore’. It then sends me the hyperlinked headline of that newspaper article which I can either choose to read or not.
"For instance during that recent iron ore pricing dispute I was not only reading the Australian newspaper articles on the dispute, but also the English-language Chinese newspaper articles. So I was getting both sides of the argument, without having to read the Chinese point-of-view interpreted by Australian journalists.
"The News Alerts are particularly useful in getting information on micro-caps that are generally not covered in the mainstream Australian press but are covered by industry-specific news websites. A recent example was the Australian microcap Ceramic Fuel Cells. I found some information on it in the English online fuel cells news website Fuel Cell Works.
"The internet also, of course, gives investors greater access to company-produced information through their websites too.
"Even in the Australian newspaper context, I’ve found it useful to take out an online subscription WA Business News, which gives a more WA-centric view of business news. That is valuable considering that the WA economy and its businesses are booming thanks to a resources boom.
"As for other types of news, theoretically there is certainly a wider choice of outlets to choose from. As using the internet becomes more the norm, broadband speeds pick up in Australia and as younger generations start to take the technology for granted, internet content will be used more to get different views.
"Personally, I’ve always been an ABC man and always will be. And in that regard the internet also serves me extremely well here in Spain. Not only does the ABC radio broadcast over the internet, but their podcasts and Video On Demand service keeps me very well informed about Australian goings on. Actually, I can probably use ABC’s online services better than most of ABC’s Australia-based audience because my broadband connection speed in a theoretical 100Mbps, which is a damn sight faster than Australia’s third-world ‘broadband’ system.
"As for the brain-dead audiences that watch television shows like ‘Today Tonight’ and a ‘Current Affair’, the internet won’t influence their news gathering and processing ability very much at all mostly because they don’t seem to be able to distinguish between what is news and what is entertainment anyway. And if they did shift their ‘viewing’ to the internet all we would see develop would be Today Tonight-like and A Current Affair-like IPTV programs. Whether that infotainment came from the current media incumbants or somebody else would be a pointless distinction – it’s all the same sh_t.
"You can lead a moron to knowledge, but you can’t make them learn.
"Michael B,Spain
"PS.
"Thanks for your website.
"I check out your news headlines daily and find your analysis of the brokers’ forecasts invaluable. Today I found Greg Peel’s article ‘ How Do You Value An Oil Company?’ especially intriguing and informative. Its lesson, as I understand it, is when it comes to oil exploration stick with investing the big boys like WPL and BHP or those coys that have proven production – everything else is speculative.
"Muchas gracias."
All contributions to our open debate on the matter, please send to info@fnarena.com
See also "Open Invitation To Join Discussion Forum On Internet And News", published on Friday 21 July 2006.