The Bird Venusian Channel

On this trip to the island, Golem had an internet connection that worked—most of the time. It was a wireless connection to the main office. Occasionally, he would look at the news and see that there wasn’t any real “news” there. More and more one clicked on the news to see what heinous crime had been committed in the US; which babies had been stolen, what lovers had killed their partners, and which old ladies had been beaten. Today he saw an elderly World War II veteran severely beaten as the Vet fought back. Then he saw a dozen people standing around, no one took action — maybe the assailant had a gun?
Along with this news would be news of great advances in technology; stuff Golem felt to be truly spectacular. It was the sociological problems that nagged at him, self-centered politicians and a lack of any real discussion in the media of society’s social ills. They were touched upon, but rarely gone into in the depth, or with the intellect required for change. More and more it seemed the mass media offered up the same fair on a daily basis like food in a cheap canteen. He felt as if he could click on the news once every six months or so and have what he needed to know. (But then he had always felt this way about the news, he liked the world as he saw it outdoors) It seemed that mass media nowadays had so many channels and means of broadcasting that they simply had to fill the time in any way they could, even if it meant reporting events that were unfinished and not news worthy. The worse thing was that with time to fill, stories were often reported wrong and then semi-corrected later, but Golem could see that the damage had already been done. The first version came across as correct, the second wrong, and then the story was confused and sometimes never reported on in a coherent manner. This was the aspect of cable news that bothered Golem. It was great to see the other side of the story. It was just that often times stories seemed to turn into a mishmash that was presented from an angle of the moment that would attract the most viewers and then a few more details would make it apparent that that the story was unclear. Stories often ended up with no conclusion and based on ‘popular moments’ rather than prepared and presented in a rational manner. If one aspect in a real tale made the tale less than a sensation, cable news would present that aspect once and then go at it from a different angle. This represented a side of capitalism — were not these people paid by the view?—that Golem thought was unworthy of the news. Yet, it was an alternative to mindless chatter and years of Iguania being sold down the drain —