Media or Government?

the BBC recently completed a multi-national poll of people#'s trust in the media and their respective governments.

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this is silly. on average 61% of people trust the media, and only 52% trust the government (of their particular country). there is a break down of the results (click on the averages graph on their news page).

in the UK the media looses out slightly to the government (47% to 51%). and in the US it's a much bigger gap. 59% trust the media and 67% trust the government.

notably in South Korea the trust is mutually low at 45%. what does that say a out the people's view of the government's media? .

and in most developing countries the trend is staggeringly in favor of the media (check out India for example. even though they're one of the biggest democracies in the world).

also included in the poll were people's mode of news finding... things...

South Korea was the highest for Internet, more than double any of the other countries asked. on average TV was highest. there's also a fairly good comparison of the trust and mis-trus of different sources (page 3 of the extended pup-up thing you get from clicking the graph mentioned above). more distrust in friends/family than Blogs?! wow.

I just love how only 61% of people trust the media...

the media is like the lowest source in my mind. They also happen to be the only source. And it's not that they make stuff up, but the spin things, and only report on cirtain things. Like for example. NYC has a lower murder rate then the national average, yet the media shows like 5 murders everyday because well lets face it, a city that large it's bound to happen. and these murders incite fear into people, they won't walk down a "dark alley" or harlem at night, yet the odds of a white male being murdered in the city is almost negligable.