It would have been much more fair to call it an "anti affirmative-action memo". Framing it as an "anti-diversity screed" is a pretty biased move, not to mention how they removed his supporting content as well. Certainly there are many who hold the opinion that "anti affirmative-action === anti diversity", which is a point worth debating separately, but I still find the framing used by most of the news articles very misleading.
The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
11–20 of 161 posts
Re: The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
#12Seriously, it sounds like the author of this article is the first journalist who actually read the article in full and reflected on its contents. Unfortunately, it's a few days too late - the rest already spread wrong summaries, the misinformation has been spread, and the author of the memo fired.
Agree. In my opinion the memo author was definitely hurt by the length of the memo. There's simply not enough fair minded people in the world who have the time to read such a lengthy missive, or folks are just too lazy these days when they are used to consuming their information in 140 characters or less.
Re: The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
#13What pains me is before reading this article I was slightly biased because of previous articles.
Actually it doesn't pain me... it really pisses me off that so many journalist are fooling people... particularly me.
When I read the bloomberg article (which I submitted to HN and now I want to just bang my head on the table for doing it) I was actually slightly siding with Google. Even though I was constantly telling myself "lets see the memo before judging" I could feel myself making a biased assumption.
I'm so annoyed with myself.
Re: The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
#14All major Canadian media called the memo anti-diversity. So unprofessional and biased.
[1] https://www.google.ca/search?q=anti-diversity+canada+google
Re: The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
#15Regardless on your opinions of the memo, this article nails it right on the head; Gizmodo and other major news outlets handled this very irresponsibly, posting their version that had no citations, and leading the reader, even at the very beginning, into forming the opinion that this was simply a guy being "anti-diversity". Whatever your thoughts on the subject are, it needs to be pointed out that this type of journal…
One of the things that really irked me was not only their editorialization of the entire thing to paint it like he was wrong, but also reformatting it, and then having circular links back and forth to motherboard like they were both in on it to misrepresent the entire thing. It was poorly laid out and intentionally misleading.
Re: The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
#16Stop the presses. You mean to tell me the major media organizations used a misleading headline and description for something highly politicized?! I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell ya.
Re: The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
#17Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think you are giving all the click-bait writers far too much of a benefit of doubt. Let's dispel once and for all with this fiction that they don't know what they are doing. They know exactly what they are doing, and what they are doing is creating outrage and profiting from it in this eyeball-click-ad driven journalism economy. Very few are going to have the wherewithal to forego hundreds or thousands of dollars i…
Yep, and sadly even major news orgs like CNN are doing this now. Case in point: "Google CEO cuts vacation short to address controversial memo that argued women aren't biologically fit for tech jobs " https://twitter.com/CNN/status/894904419766108161 "A Google engineer argued that women aren't biologically fit for tech jobs." https://twitter.com/CNN/status/894951392779141120
That is truly depressing. CNN used to be one of the last places to get non-ideological journalism. Looks like non-partisan journalism really is dead, as is the principle of charity.
Re: The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
#18> He wants to use different means to address “the problem,” he insists, and doubts that the tradeoffs of getting to a staff of 50 percent men and 50 percent women would be worth it A lot of people are rushing to give this guy bonus points for saying "I'm not against diversity" and acknowledging some women should exist at Google. (Just as long as they're fewer than men, apparently.)
There are at least 3 other HN threads where people are deliberately misrepresenting what he wrote and implying malicious intent where none existed. Can we at least keep this one for substantive meta-commentary?
Implicit in your comment is that any suggestion of malicious intent by the author is not substantive. That doesn't seem reasonable, given the context.
Re: The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
#19Seriously, it sounds like the author of this article is the first journalist who actually read the article in full and reflected on its contents. Unfortunately, it's a few days too late - the rest already spread wrong summaries, the misinformation has been spread, and the author of the memo fired.
I think you are giving all the click-bait writers far too much of a benefit of doubt. Let's dispel once and for all with this fiction that they don't know what they are doing. They know exactly what they are doing, and what they are doing is creating outrage and profiting from it in this eyeball-click-ad driven journalism economy. Very few are going to have the wherewithal to forego hundreds or thousands of dollars i…
> Let's dispel once and for all with this fiction that they don't know what they are doing.
> They know exactly what they are doing...
Because you referenced one of the most oft-quoted blunders[1] of Rubio's 2016 primary campaign I can't tell if you're serious or not. It really detracts from the point you're trying to make.
[1] “And let’s dispel once and for all with this fiction that Barack Obama doesn’t know what he’s doing. He knows exactly what he’s doing.”
Re: The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo
#20What pains me is before reading this article I was slightly biased because of previous articles. Actually it doesn't pain me... it really pisses me off that so many journalist are fooling people... particularly me. When I read the bloomberg article (which I submitted to HN and now I want to just bang my head on the table for doing it) I was actually slightly siding with Google. Even though I was constantly telling my…
I've been there. Anybody who says that they've never been blinded by biased journalism or fallen for an internet hoax is lying to you, and possibly their own egos as well.
That being said, this episode is an excellent example of why it is always best to avoid taking "sides." When someone takes a "side", the newspapers, data brokers, social media companies, advertisers, and everyone else rejoice in the profits of "engagement." Meanwhile, precious time in this life is wasted on a trivial concern, forgotten within a month.