Friday, December 16, 2005

Google News Pressure

When you visit a doctor, they take your blood pressure and that number helps to say something. Google News has an automagical way of telling you how much news pressure a story has.



So looking at Google News today we can see (screen shot)





That the Iraqi Elections have immense News Pressure. 2,716 is a lot of related articles for one news story. Being a news junkie I will usually click on a story I lack interest in if it has a news pressure of around 1,500. 1,500 is a level which already shouts that this story is circling the world. 2,716 is probably something like a tsunami type article or maybe if the leader of a major nation takes a bullet to the head.



That Google did not make it a leading story is already suspicious. Next we go to CNN:



CNN would like to tell us about a snow storm. Makes sense since a snow job would quite obscure the biggest news event of the day...News pressure? 331



Ok ok, maybe I'm reading too much into this. After all, CNN has a 'CNN International' (sounds like something from the ex-USSR...internationale) - News pressure? 694







Come on guys. News junkies need a fix of whats really in the news. Start giving us the news and stop trying to tell us what the news is....



Even Aljazeera puts it on the front page (with a suitable anti-US spin)



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