Internet Failure Hits Two Continents

[Frequitude]

Originally Posted by Bobblehead

Another cable has been damaged in the middle east.

This is the 5th one in about a week.

How the heck is this repeatedly happening in such a short time frame???

[HotHotHeat]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

How the heck is this repeatedly happening in such a short time frame???

IMO, this news story really exemplifies how naive the public is, and how heavily we rely on corporate media.

There's a few things the major news sources have simply left out of their reporting...

First of all, try rationalizing 5 cables getting cut in one week and them all being an accident. These cable placed in 'no-go' zones of the Mediterranean, and it's common knowledge for ships in this part of the world that you simply don't use that area of the water, much less drop an anchor there.

See this news story for more: http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7993


Second, how incredibly coincidental that these 5 'accidental' tears in the internet cable come the week that Iran planned to open an Oil commodity exchange that was going to rely heavily on the internet to operate. The Iran oil bourse was the first major market that is not using the US greenback as a currency.

Here's a news report speculating on this: http://collateral.blip.tv/#653043

These events go much deeper than a simple tear in some cable. It's part of the reason Iran is the US's next target. I hate to sound like I'm crying conspiracy, but it's no secret what lengths the US will go to protect their interests.

Another thought provoking read: http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CLA410A.html

Independent news is a powerful tool.

[llama64]

Originally Posted by HotHotHeat

IMO, this news story really exemplifies how naive the public is, and how heavily we rely on corporate media.

<snip>

Independent news is a powerful tool.

Yes, we depend on corporate media. The problem isn't that the media is "corporate", it's that they are rapidly becoming conglomerated into unified media companies.

Independent news doesn't pass the litmus test for ethics and responsibility most of the time. Nor does it get peer reviewed or monitored. A large portion of it is biased bull crap and conspiracy theories.

While I agree with you that the cables being cut is curious, there is no documented proof of any subversive activities yet. Jumping to conclusions is not good journalism.

Yet another reason why "blogs" really arn't changing anything.

[HotHotHeat]

Yes, we depend on corporate media. The problem isn't that the media is "corporate", it's that they are rapidly becoming conglomerated into unified media companies.

If there's a belief that corporate America has a reliable and transparent track record, it's certainly news to me.

Independent news doesn't pass the litmus test for ethics and responsibility most of the time. Nor does it get peer reviewed or monitored. A large portion of it is biased bull crap and conspiracy theories.

The only thing leading the public to believe major media passes the litmus test is their size. Hegemonic power can manipulate the masses very effectively. If people have a problem with 'independent' news sources, replace the title with 'international' news sources.

My point is that the news reported to average Joe does not get to the bottom of the story.

While I agree with you that the cables being cut is curious, there is no documented proof of any subversive activities yet. Jumping to conclusions is not good journalism.

Definitely. I tried to stress that my viewpoint at this time is nothing more than speculation. Something about the entire story just seems to have coverup written all over it.

What is the propaganda model and how does it work? Its crucial structural factors derive from the fact that the dominant media are firmly imbedded in the market system. They are profit-seeking businesses, owned by very wealthy people (or other companies); and they are funded largely by advertisers who are also profit-seeking entities, and who want their ads to appear in a supportive selling environment. The media also lean heavily on government and major business firms as information sources, and both efficiency and political considerations, and, frequently, overlapping interests, cause a certain degree of solidarity to prevail among the government, major media, and other corporate businesses. Government and large nonmedia business firms are also best positioned (and sufficiently wealthy) to be able to pressure the media with threats of withdrawal of advertising or TV licenses, libel suits, and other direct and indirect modes of attack. The media are also constrained by the dominant ideology, which heavily featured anticommunism before and during the Cold War era, and was mobilized often to induce the media to support (or refrain from criticizing) U.S. attacks on small states that were labeled communist.

http://www.chomsky.info/onchomsky/20031209.htm

[Bobblehead]

And in response to the conspiracy theorists out there...

The former wasn't even a cut -- it was a power failure, but you can't keep a good conspiracy theory down; some news sites are even reporting incorrectly that Iran is cut off from the internet, and claiming that there's a fifth cut, which turns out to be an unexceptional cable failure from weeks ago.

"Cable cuts happen on average once every three days," Beckert said. There are 25 large ships that do nothing but fix cable cuts and bends, Beckert adds.

While any severed cable is a "cut" in the parlance of telecom, most often they're the result of cables rubbing against sea floor rocks, eventually cutting through the copper shielding and exposing the thin fiber optics inside.

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/200...t-the-cab.html

[llama64]

Originally Posted by HotHotHeat

<snip>

My point is that the news reported to average Joe does not get to the bottom of the story.

<snip>

This is true. People might be astonished to find out exactly how lazy current day journalists have become. They get spoon fed stories and content from professional public relation firms in the same way that corporate lawyers draw up governmental legislation.

That said, independent news is still not any better. Go read news rags from the 19th century to see what I mean. Most newspapers back then were truly independent and yet were completely biased spouting crap that had no basis in fact. Journalism has never been about truth. Propaganda and the manipulation of the people is nothing new and dates back to well before the times of the Greek and Roman empires.

Going on and on about the evils of corporations while spouting Chomsky only makes you come across as a second year Communications student.

Learning to receive information in many types of media in a critical manner is vital to understanding truth. I have argued before that our education system should start developing a curriculum that teaches how to receive information via news papers, television and the internet in a critical way. Currently, there still exist people that actually believes that Television and Wikipedia are 100% absolute truth.

... I think I went off topic.