I was reading the Australian news site for Murdoch’s papers on the Internet this morning (www.news.com.au). The main story was the UN Secretary-General’s report to a conference in Valencia about climate change having an even more devastating effect on the planet than even the IPCC report had predicted last year, and that governments needed to do more about cutting emissions of greenhouse gases, and there was another story about the death toll in Bangladesh from Cyclone Sidr having risen to more than 2,000.
But what were the ‘most popular’ stories on the website? The ‘top’ story of the day was about someone called Missie Higgins announcing that she was a lesbian (apparently she is an Australian pop singer), the second most popular story was one about John Travolta having kissed Kirk Douglas, and the third was about Prince William having a bald spot on his head.
Now that’s not to suggest that readers of Murdoch’s website news are a complete bunch of dills, because the climate change story did make it into fourth spot. However, the Bangladesh story didn’t make it into the top ten because there were more important news stories like:
- First pictures of baby Borat;
- Olivier helped me to heat says Minogue;
- Dicko dumps on Idol hopefuls;
- I’m just a country girl says Kerr;
- Falzon’s nude magazine shoot; and
- Di Caprio a virgin says Crowe.
Later in the day I checked back to read the climate change story in more detail – but I couldn’t find it. Instead there was a story about Australian Prime Minister John Howard’s reaction saying the world wasn’t going to end tomorrow because of climate change.
Well, that’s reassuring.
But what were the ‘most popular’ stories on the website? The ‘top’ story of the day was about someone called Missie Higgins announcing that she was a lesbian (apparently she is an Australian pop singer), the second most popular story was one about John Travolta having kissed Kirk Douglas, and the third was about Prince William having a bald spot on his head.
Now that’s not to suggest that readers of Murdoch’s website news are a complete bunch of dills, because the climate change story did make it into fourth spot. However, the Bangladesh story didn’t make it into the top ten because there were more important news stories like:
- First pictures of baby Borat;
- Olivier helped me to heat says Minogue;
- Dicko dumps on Idol hopefuls;
- I’m just a country girl says Kerr;
- Falzon’s nude magazine shoot; and
- Di Caprio a virgin says Crowe.
Later in the day I checked back to read the climate change story in more detail – but I couldn’t find it. Instead there was a story about Australian Prime Minister John Howard’s reaction saying the world wasn’t going to end tomorrow because of climate change.
Well, that’s reassuring.