Episode 46: The Calendrical Imperative

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Along with the calendar change every year, too many people take the opportunity to look back on the year, and to perhaps look forward with promises and platitudes. I thought, Why not join them?

So here we have Episode 46: The Calendrical Imperative. I made a big boo-boo in Episode 45 that I here correct. The correction quotes both Terry Gross and author Kevin Kruse from an episode of Fresh Air. I also give some inside scoop to my forced house-guest hiatus last Spring. It's interesting, at least, and will be the topic of at least one episode in the coming year, quite likely.

There is also the backlog of episode topics. Believe it or not, I have no shortage of episodes. It's hard for me to believe that, when I first started Attack Ads!, I was worried about not having something about advertising to say.

I today play the theme for the 1966 television sci-fi series The Time Tunnel, and open the show with Dmitri Orlov and KMFDM.

Episode 45: A Season Stuffed With Reasons

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Have two Holiday Seasons passed since I launched the Attack Ads! Podcast? Time flies when you're ranting against forces over which you have little control, I guess. Remember: Time flies like an arrow; but fruit flies like a banana.

This, the podcast's second late December episode, is Number 45: A Season Stuffed With Reasons, where I give you Dear Listeners a book report on Kevin M. Kruse's One Nation Under God: How Corporate America Invented Christian America (Basic Books, 2015). I do hope to introduce you to Mr. Kruse's material, all about the money and effort that went into redefining the American religious tradition into one more business-friendly, with the appropriate amount of head 'splodey-ness.

In that light, I play selected portions of Tenacious D's "Master Exploder", a song from the movie Tenacious D and the Pick of Destiny. I also open and close this holiday episode with two pieces from the Vince Guaraldi Trio, "Skating" and "Linus and Lucy", both from the soundtrack to A Charlie Brown Christmas. Very briefly you will also hear the National Anthem for the former Soviet Union. KMFDM and Bernie Sanders open the show.

Episode 44: Total Annihilation

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What happens when warring parties place full efforts on winning their personal battles, but not a lot of attention avoiding pissing off a third party? Or worse, takes advantage of the third party, treating them as the prize to be won? Expect the title of Episode 44: Total Annihilation. The warring titans will find their battlefield prize turning against all of them, with collateral damage rampant and a change to the entire conflict.

Largely because this phase of battle through technology is new and emergent, this episode focuses on articles rather than books. We hear me reading: Ben Thompson's article Why Web Pages Suck from his blog "Stratechery"; Nilay Patel's Welcome to hell: Apple vs. Google vs. Facebook and the slow death of the web from The Verge; John Gruber's Safari Content Blocker imore from Daring Fireball; and Marco Arment's The Ethics of Modern Web Ad-Blocking.

Today's music is exclusively from the Cave Dog game from which I gleaned the title to today's episode. Music written by Jeremy Soule. (I miss that game.) I introduce the show with Jan Wong backed by KMFDM.

My Plea For Graphics Help

Hey, Listeners,

Jim here, with a problem. As I outlined in the Post Script to Episode 44, I need a logo, specifically one that will conform to the iTunes submission requirements.

Here's the skinny on format: Cover art "must be in the JPEG or PNG file formats and in the RGB color space with a minimum size of 1400 x 1400 pixels and a maximum size of 3000 x 3000 pixels." I'd like to keep it simple (for now, at least, which for me seems to mean "I'll use it for a few years").   Though I had some very different, very catchy ideas in the past, my need to just get this done has overwhelmed my desire to make it perfect (which has been the impediment all this time). 

Here's the text I'm leaning toward:

The

                 Attack Ads! 

                                              Podcast 

                           Reasons to live Free 

                                 of Commercial Media

All of this is, of course, in a box the size specified in the link above. The "The" above and the "Podcast" after "Attack Ads!" should be in a smaller font, as should the tag below.  For colors, I've played around with a few, but have decided to keep this simple as well, with just an off-yellow background and black lettering.

Again, if you can help—and have additional ideas you can throw into the mix—I would be very appreciative.

Thanks!

-Jim

Addendum, a couple days later: D'oh! I guess providing a place to send those graphics would enable those who wish to help to, well, help. Please email anything you come up with to AdAttacker (at) Gmail (dot) Com. Sorry I missed that necessary step earlier.

Episode 43: Profundity & Profanity

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Thanks to listener feedback, I have taken the opportunity in Episode 43: Profundity & Profanity to work my pneumonia-ravaged voice a bit. Why? We are constantly judged by the quality not of our character, but of everything that projects that character, be it the voice on a podcast or the words carried by that voice. Does the tumbling gravel that was my voice during recording time ruin the message I try to convey any more than "bad" words that I might on occasion use? The answer is Yes, but I reserve the right to revisit that question for a more in-depth probing in a later episode.

I dive into the societal shift on tolerance for swearing a bit, noting my experience with unpunished public profanity and how that shifted with the turn of the decade. Witness my speeches in high school and compare that to what poor Matt "suffered" at the hands of the very same school and later the Supreme Court. (I doubt being a law student at Standford at the time of the ruling did anything bad for him.)

Bernie Sanders was eloquent enough to provide the vocals backing two new opening segments. I play both of them. Mistle Thrush's "It's All Like Today" closer once again signals the end of the episode.

Episode 42: More Self Evidence, Less Mud

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In a continuation and conclusion to Episode 41, today's Episode 42: More Self Evidence, Less Mud, I get around to doing what I suspect the folks at Planet Money failed to do, to actually read the 1930 John Maynard Keynes essay, "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren." I'm glad I did. Given the way economists today talk, his message was (if a bit confusing in ways I attempt to address) completely unexpected.

Other than Planet Money's episode #641, "Why We Work So Much," I play an ad that ran in a former episode of that show. Further, taking a lead from David Puttnam's TED Talk, "Does the media have a 'duty of care'?" I check and, sure enough, Planet Money has yet to correct the record by correcting the mistake it made way back in March of 2014 in their episode #524 "Me and Mr. Jones." I checked: their mistake stands to this day. Hey, check for yourself!

Musically, I felt the haunting music of Ga'an's "Living Tribunal" well expressed the horror of having a bank sponsor a show supposedly dedicated to teaching its audience about the workings of money. Tim Bousquet and KMFDM provided the show's opening.

Episode 41: Self Evident As Mud

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Today's Episode 41: Self Evident As Mud, deals with the historical divide between those of the upper and lower classes, specifically the prohibitions on social mixing and what tasks anyone in the upper classes could perform without denigrating themselves and being looked upon as less than genteel.

I draw from a bunch of books. Henry George's Progress & Poverty; Brian Czech's Supply Shock; Randall Keynes' Annie's Box"; and David Bodanis' Passionate Minds. I also shared details, if not exact quotes, from Peter Nichols' Evolution's Captain, the story of Captain Robert FitzRoy of the Beagle, the ship Charles Darwin sailed to the Galapagos and beyond.

I also quote Planet Money's Episode 641, "Why We Work So Much" and Stephen Colbert from a 2010 CSPAN testimony to Congress concerning immigrant labor in agriculture.

Musically, you hear Jahzzar doing "Family Tree" and the final bars of Mistle Thrush's "It's All Like Today." I opened with the Tim Bousquet/KMFDM intro.

Episode 40: Three Heaping Scoops of Irony

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Sometimes people say things that are, well, wrong. Other times, they believe things that are, as well, wrong. Here are three beliefs and the actions they precipitate that are, as the title to Episode 40: Three Heaping Scoops of Irony implies, just plain incorrect, and in the long run, perhaps very, very dangerous.

In this episode, I read from John Maynard Keynes' 1920 article The Economic Consequences of Peace, which proves a prescient look at the future Treaty of Versailles terms ending the Great War created. In my opinion, it is all to often ignored. I also read from an article from The Washington Post that describes an interview in Die Zeit, and Professor Mark Blyth's book, Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea.



I sample from two videos from the very entertaining Professor Blyth describing his work into hyperinflation and austerity and how they are viewed by various parties.

Musically, we hear Jahzzar doing "Planet Zero." Mistle Thrush's "It's All Like Today" closer closes the show. I "opened" with a new KMFDM intro featuring Mark Blyth.

Episode 39: Challenging Assumptions of Permanence

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Oh, odometer moments! Those tickings of the calendar or clock or whatever metric timey thing happens to land appropriately on a nice round number. What would journalism or any of us do without them? Episode 39, Challenging Assumptions of Permanence, uses the ten year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's landfall as just such a jumping-off point, noting how our assumptions that the way things have been in our lifetime in too many cases seems to be the way we assume the future should unfold. Sadly, our newspaper industry today struggles under the same delusion of future permanence, at least when it comes to a funding model based on advertising, that only emerged—indeed, that was only possible—in the latter stages of the Industrial Revolution. That funding model evolved to what we had, and now it is moving on, and in my opinion it ain't coming back.

In this episode, I read about historic newspaper production from Eric Burns' book "Infamous Scribblers"; and an excerpt from an article from a Professor Ross, originally printed in the Atlantic Monthly in the March, 1910, edition, and quoted in Upton Sinclair's 1920 book on the newspaper business, The Brass Check (the entirety of which can be read online at the link). I also quoted Soryu Forall, a meditation and mindfulness teacher and the founder of the Center for Mindful Learning. He shared his insights into, well, assumptions and preferences on KMO's C-Realm Podcast Episode #480, "Assumptions and Preferences."

Musically, I played two pieces by Jahzzar, "Brighter" and "Become Death". I opened the show with the Jan Wong KMFDM intro.

Episode 38: Postscript

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Remember Jesse Brown, that podcaster I addressed in Episode 26, Dear Jesse? It's time to close things down in this, Episode 38: Postscript. I appreciate his attention to my correspondence, but must limit my financial and attentional (is that a word?) support for those more inclined to my view of ad-funded media. In this episode, I give reasons for that decision.

In this episode, you'll hear first a brand new KMFDM "Attak!" intro with Tim Bousquet, founder of the Halifax Examiner, as interviewed on Canadaland's Episode 88. Brooke Gladstone congratulates 99% Invisible's Roman Mars on his ability to leverage ad revenues on the backs of his contribution popularity. There's a lot of that going around. Trust me, there is at least one future episode baked into this synergistic phenomenon.

Musically, I play Podington Bear's "Can I Talk To You?" and the ending to Mistle Thrush's "It's All Like Today."

Episode 37: The Sound of One Hand Applauding

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In this Episode 37: The Sound of One Hand Applauding, I take a peek at four entities that are doing something right. Something, but not enough something to make their efforts truly applaudable. In each instance, the entities fail to complete a truly commendable and clap-worthy accomplishment, slipping in most cases to something that is just head-scratch worthy. As a result, I can only employ one hand to the applause.

Today we hear from The BGs (Ah-ah-ah-ah), Brooke and Bob, in two separate On The Media reports. The earliest interview and revelation comes from Brooke in a May 10, 2013 episode I've already extensively quoted, "Who's Going to Pay For This Stuff?" The other two, both by Bob, are quite a bit more recent, coming from a July 9, 2015 episode entitled "Polls Are Stupid." I also read quite a bit from a website as a result of Brooke's interview.

Music today comes from et doing "Tarmac." The Real Bee Gees briefly appear several times, thanks to Brooke and Bob. And Dmitri Orlov and KMFDM open the show.

Episode 36: From GAB To FNA

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It's only been two episodes since I discussed the twin phenomena of the Repetition Effect and Source Amnesia, but months have passed since that release. Time, then, to visit a comment listener L33t left concerning research on how interruptions may increase the enjoyment of media, even if those interruptions are commercial in nature. Thus, Episode 36: From GAB to FNA explores the multiple qualities of interruptions that may mitigate, thus driving people from welcoming interruption to dreading it.

In this episode, I quote: L33t from his comments; the study L33t shared; details of the organization that published the research he shared; and information from Counterspin regarding the frequency of DVR commercial skipping (something I regrettably neglected to cite in the audio).

I also played: Geddy Lee briefly singing with the Mackensie Brothers in their 80s hit, "Take Off;" some wisdom from Colonel Jack D. Ripper about communism and water; and Pink Floyd's intro to their song, "Time." Dmitri Orlov and KMFDM open this episode.

Episode 35: The McQuiston Test

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Yes, yes, I know. It was only a brief two episodes ago that I attempted to coin a new Named Bit o' Wisdom, one from Upton Sinclair. That was so much fun, I'm doing it again in this episode, The McQuiston Test. I'll explain what I mean within.

Today's episode features a bit of music from Matmos and So Percussion, a tune called "Needles."



We also hear a bunch of famous voices and the standard Dmitri Orlov intro backed by KMFDM.

Another Unavoidable Hiatus

Just as happened last March, I must once again interrupt these episodes to accommodate a house guest in what is now the production studio. Two unfinished episodes rest, as they say, "in the can" ready for completion, and many others are "in the works," sitting inchoate on my hard drive waiting for studio time to bring them to life. Once that studio is free for my use, expect a flood of episodes.

I will say this: the situation that brought my house guest here is very, very unusual. Though I cannot detail what is happening without possibly bringing legal consequences, I can say the story is unusual and interesting enough to be entertaining to more than mere participants. I'm thinking about turning the story, once it reaches a resolution, into a couple of episodes, though they would have nothing to do with advertising. I might record a few such episodes and test the waters with you, Gentle Listeners, to see if more episodes would be welcomed.

That, though, is for the future. Again, I deeply regret the interruption, no matter how necessary.

Episode 34: Reiteratively Repeated Redundancy

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Episode 34: Reiteratively Redundant Repetition concerns me asking the eternal question: Why do advertisers run the same damned ads again and again and again? Won't we get sick of them, and maybe just avoid those media outlets who stoop to such echoing? I attempt to answer the question with an actual expert!

This episode includes an explanation of two very key psychological phenomena by Ray Hyman (interviewed by one of Skepticality's hosts Derek Colanduno). We also hear a short clip from Kelsey Grammer's Frasier Crane from the Cheers years, backed by Pietnastka's "Dice." That piece also closes this shorter than usual episode.

Why the brevity? Well, let's just say I started worrying that the entire sketch I included as an illustration of the Amnesia Effect might be: a) taken the wrong way, a way in which I did not at all intend; or b) taken exactly as I intended it. Either way, there might be some folks a bit grossed out by my cave men and their conundrum. I should get some listener feedback about what is and what is definitely not funny before showing my humor in all its glory and ghastliness.

Episode 33: The Sinclair Maxim

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Time to return to two of what must be my least and most favorite sources for podcast material. Episode 33: The Sinclair Maxim first dives into the bothersome wrongness of the NPR podcast and frequent Attack Ads! hobbyhorse and scapegoat Planet Money. Just when I think they couldn't get even worse, they prove me wrong and overly optimistic yet again. My seeming favorite source is in the title.

In this episode, we hear from two Planet Money co-productions made with This American Life, "The Giant Pool of Money" and "The Invention of Money." Inspiration for this episode was appropriately triggered by a glaring detail found opening Planet Money's episode #619, "The Free Throw Experiment." We also hear Planet Money top dog Adam Davidson's appearance on local Seattle NPR affiliate KUOW, on their show The Conversation, a conversation that aired May 26, 2010.

Musically, I chose Metastaz's "Skreeem" and "Miss Fortune", both of which fit frighteningly well into the theme of the show itself.

Finally, credit where due.


Spoiler!

I dedicate the title for today's episode to Upton Sinclair, specifically for his quote, details of which can be found in his 1934 book, "I, Candidate for Governor, And How I got Licked."

Episode 32: Little Brothers Are Watching You

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Episode 32: Little Brothers Are Watching You continues the saga of the Smart TV and why, as I claimed in the last episode, Smile!, the threat is even worse than I previously mentioned. I outline actual televisions that (at least at one time) peek into far more than one's face patterns and viewing information, and insert far more than the the content requested by the viewer/owner.

I open with Chris Martenson getting all down about the current business practices with his guest, the ever-insightful John Michael Greer. I read from a blog post by someone calling themselves Doctor Beet, and we hear from a Smart TV manufacturer's video promising exactly what I and (I hope) everyone listening to the Attack Ads! Podcast would rather not ever see come to fruition. The video itself was pulled, but someone reading Dr. B's blog mirrored it; you can find it at his blog. I also read from an article describing a pop ad appearing where it was most unwanted in Australia.

We also hear from On The Media's Brooke Gladstone interviewing Representative Walter Jones in 2013 on a wonderful bit of legislation he proposed, the We Are Watching You Act of 2013 that sadly died before being signed into law. And finally I played at bit of the Dude and Walter from The Big Lebowski ruminating on the difference between Nazis and nihilists.

As always, KMFDM's "Attak" opened the show, this time with Dmitri Orlov's observations, originally made on the Extraenvironmentalist Podcast.

Episode 31: Smile!

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Episode 31: Smile! starts this podcast's look into a quiet but insidious threat to our privacy: the new "smart" televisions and other appliances. Unlike those other gizmos with the "smart" designation, though, these TVs have built within them the tools of surveillance most would deem inappropriate.

In this episode, I play a brief section from Episode #104 of the '60s cartoon "The Jetsons"; I play a selections from a BBC interview with a smart TV owner named Peter Kent; and I read from smart set manufacturer Samsung's Global Privacy Policy.

Music today comes from my KMFDM intro with Dmitri Orlov, and from "The Jetsons."

Episode 30: Maintaining Business As Usual

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I'm back! Well, at least for a bit. While I'm back, for Episode 30: Maintaining Business As Usual, I'm taking a yak at how business is not only done, but how many would prefer it continues to be done, no matter how many existing alternatives could be explored. And most of that maintenance is done through commercially sponsored media, paid for by the commercials placed by those businesses that would like this maintained.

In this episode, we hear from a commercial produced in the late 1970s by the International Ladies Garment Workers Union. They produced several of these; I chose the one with the best sound quality. Ah, the seventies! We also hear another version of the union song recorded in 1975.

We hear from Planet Money once again, this time from episode #142, "Tax Me Please," and Counterspin's Jeanine Jackson introducing an interview she aired with Laura Flanders. I read from Thomas Geoghegan, "Were You Born on the Wrong Continent? How the European Model Can Help You Get a Life" (The New Press, 2010).

And finally, the intro. I play the song on every episode, but seldom mention it. I should. It is KMFDM's "Attak/Reload" from their album "Attak." Dmitri Orlov backs the intro tuneage with comments he made on Episode 86 of the Extraenvironmentalist podcast, "Days of Destruction."

[NB: In the credits, I mention the episode of Planet Money was #104, when it is in fact #142. Long and slightly humorous story as to why that happened, but I do regret the error.]

Announcement

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A short but regrettable announcement: Due to the simple fact that I have a house guest occupying the Attack Ads! studio, I will be on a production break until, well, my house guest frees up the studio or until I can make other recording arrangements. I'm not quitting; far from it. I just won't be releasing new episodes until things can be sufficiently shuffled about. I do regret this, and will be back as soon as I am able.

Episode 29: Drinking Yourself Sober

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What's a greater threat to a society, the money collected to do something harmful, or the spending of that money? Answering that simple question should guide action when it comes to addressing and perhaps reversing the harm caused by the harmful practice.

Failing to recognize this simple dichotomy causes folks to sometimes try something helpful that might not be. This is the theme of Episode 29: Drinking Yourself Sober, where I share the exploits of one Lawrence Lessig, creator of the Creative Commons License and political activist.

We hear in this episode from two of Lessig's TED Talks; one entitled Lester Land, the other The Unstoppable Walk to Political Reform. We also hear from former Vice President Al Gore talking about what's really wrong with things today.

Music from Jahzzar doing "Listen Carefully," and Pat Boone—yes, that Pat Boone—covering Judas Priest's "You've Got Another Thing Coming." (There's a reason, trust me.)

Addendum, March 4: Listener l33t was the first in alerting me to a bad sound file. Looks like the audio editor barfed out a bad file, silent after a minute and a half, one I did not catch. I've deleted the bad file from the 'cast host and re-exported the mp3 after making sure content exists within, at least after a random file sample up to the ending. There may be gaps, but it's mostly there, under the same file name.

I apologize for the screw up.

Episode 28: Showing What The Shows Show

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No, I don't like the ads—er, the "enhanced sponsorship"—of PBS, NPR, PRI, or any of the other CPB TLA (Three Letter Acronyms, for those who haven't tripped on this trope before). But the other funding mechanisms employed also come with details worthy of attention, if not scorn. Episode #28: Showing What The Shows Show uses three PBS telly shows to illustrate problems with three funding sources other than enhanced sponsorship.





Pie Charts courtesy of L33t's link.

I read in this episode from Thomas Picketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century (President and Fellows of Harvard College, 2014, pp. 451-452.); a Wikipedia article on the history of public broadcasting in the United States; Robert W. McChesney and John Nichols' book The Death and Life of American Journalism: The Media Revolution That Will Begin the World Again (First Nation Books, 2010, p. 194 for "Banks And The Poor" details; p. 195 for the detail about fund raising.); and the article "A Word From Our Sponsor?" from the May 27, 2013 New Yorker magazine.

Music pulled from the Downton Abby Suite, and "The Money Song" by Monty Python.

Episode 27: Dead Merchandise

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I have been waiting almost the entire time I've been producing this podcast to bring you, Dear Listeners, this episode. For this episode contains a dramatic reading of a science fiction short story which inspired the creation of Attack Ads!

It is my privilege to offer Episode 27: Dead Merchandise, brought to you by the kind reposting permissions of both the author of the story, Ferrett Steinmetz, and the editor of the Escape Pod podcast, Norm Sherman, the podcast and publication entity that originally produced and released the audio reading you hear in their episode #396. "Dead Merchandise" is a story whose relevance to the Attack Ads! podcast should be apparent to all. Enjoy!

I will have the fortune to be able to thank Mr. Steinmetz in person, since he will be in Seattle, my home town, late in March signing his new book, "Flex."

Music opening once again from KMFDM, and closing once again from Mistle Thrush.

Episode 26: Dear Jesse

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Sometimes you just have to move the schedule up a tick to take advantage of current events. In Episode 26: Dear Jesse, I've decided to turn twenty-plus minutes of Attack Ads! into an open letter to Canadaland creator and host Jesse Brown in an attempt to plead the Attack Ads! case for creating a zero-ads environment for those that feel the need to create one for themselves. It's perfect timing, given his crowd-funding drive and the decisions about the future of his podcast and all that.



A wonderful cartoon that accompanied
J. C. McQuiston's Radio News article in 1922.

The content with both Herbert Hoover's comments and J. C. McQuiston's article from 1922 came from Tim Wu's book The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires (Random House, 2010, p. 74 for the Hoover quotes); I found Mr. McQuiston's article online. The later 1934 and 1935 quotes in connection with the Federal Communications Commission hearings also came from Mr. Wu's book, but can be found (in a poorly scanned OCR format, sadly) in a publication called "Education in Radio" from 1935.

Music over the '30s quotes comes from Jimmy Dorsey and his orchestra doing "That's A'Plenty". Ga'an soon thereafter does "Living Tribunal."

Episode 25: Shifting That Window

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I feel the need to explain myself. Well, to explain myself in greater detail. I've already revealed that I suffer an irrational hatred of commercials. That was revealed way back in the first episode. In this Episode 25: Shifting That Window, I dive a bit into what I believe is most responsible for making both commercials effective, and for what makes protest of them also effective: our human tendency to socially conform to the opinions of our peers. Further, I do feel a need to note why outrageous statements of opinion can be effective, even necessary, to discussion and debate.



The first psychological phenomenon I will address is the Asch conformity experiment results. A later refinement of Asch using the basic methodology but including an fMRI scanner for a real-time look into how the subjects' brains were working was underdone in 2005.



Next, I take most of the episode describing as entertainingly as possible a phenomenon named for its founder, the Overton Window, where opinions can be shifted with a concentration of focus of a type rarely, for me, discussed openly enough. It is from this Overton Window practice that I attempt to justify my strategic use of hyperbole and the occasional outrageous statement.

Music in this episode: Omyiga, "Confirm Friend Request"; and a few snippets, one from The Color and the Sound's "Graves"; the other a very brief "Ha Ha Ha Ha" from the Bee Gees. Closer today again from Mistle Thrush.

Episode 24: Sponsored Discontent

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Pick up the news, or tune in. Whichever. Zoom in to the content; don't just read or hear it, but really, really delve into the message. Does any element seem out of place? In Episode 24, Sponsored Discontent, I review what has become one of the only ways modern commercial newspapers (especially the newspapers, since the crash of classifieds as a near-monopolistic funding source) have been able to pay for their continued publication: sponsored or branded content. Essentially, an interested party "helps" newspapers with the content of their, well, "news," those scare quotes becoming more and more relevant.

I read a bit from two books. The first, Robert W. McChesney's and John Nichols' The Death and Life of American Journalism: The Media Revolution That Will Begin the World Again (First Nation Books, 2010, p 13); the second, Robert McChesney's Digital Disconnect: How Capitalism is Turning The Internet Against Democracy (The New Press, 2013, p. 59).

I grabbed quite a bit of informative content from Episode 37 of Canadaland, where Jesse Brown interviews Matthew Ingram about the situation at one of Canada's most influential daily newspapers. What management is asking in contract negotiations might surprise!

We also hear from The Daily Show's Jason Jones in India with an equally surprising revelation about that country's newspaper system.

Music in this episode comes from Halloween doing "Making Evil" and Teleidofusion doing "Soft Illusion."