No More About The Balloon Please!!

FLDave · Feb 7, 2023

Funds for news come from advertisers to networks will select the news topics and slant based on what gets the best views and financial remuneration from their advertisers. It's all about the money; it's a business.

sar104 · Feb 7, 2023

FLDave said:
Funds for news come from advertisers to networks will select the news topics and slant based on what gets the best views and financial remuneration from their advertisers. It's all about the money; it's a business.

That's certainly the narrative being pushed by many whose thought process revolves around choosing their version of reality and then looking for "news" to confirm it. If you like it then it's real, if not then it's fake, so keep looking. But it's not how real journalism works, and there is plenty of that to be found if you can handle reality.

msinger · Feb 7, 2023

sar104 said:
The sources that I support with subscriptions are those that appear to value in-depth and impartial reporting, rather than those that clearly either have an agenda or have concluded that they care more about entertaining their viewers/readers delusions than embracing reality.

In your opinion, which mainstream news sources provide impartial reporting and don't clearly have an agenda?

sar104 said:
Then it sounds like the news media is doing its job just fine, after all.

I apologize for the confusion. I didn't intend to convey that news media was not doing the job they set out to do.

TonyPHX · Feb 7, 2023

Y'all are way too serious. I for one intend to craft a few small scale size replicas of the balloon and float them over a few neighborhoods. We can all use a laugh in these uncertain and challenging times.

msinger · Feb 7, 2023

TonyPHX said:
I for one intend to craft a few small scale size replicas of the balloon and float them over a few neighborhoods

Videos or it didn't happen

TonyPHX · Feb 7, 2023

msinger said:
Videos or it didn't happen

It won't be until after the superbowl. I am too close to the TFRs and the watchful eyes. : )

MA2 317 · Feb 7, 2023

And now a brief intermission...

.

sar104 · Feb 7, 2023

msinger said:
In your opinion, which mainstream news sources provide impartial reporting and don't clearly have an agenda?

Starting with your list - most of them provided that you limit the discussion to the news desks and exclude "opinion pieces" that tend to dominate some of their websites and broadcasts.

But beyond that I would look to AP, Reuters, AJ, BBC, NPR, Economist, Atlantic, Independent, Guardian, and then a wide range of more specialist publications such as Scientific American, New Scientist etc..

And I find it useful to review aggregated news from Google and Apple to get a sense of the breadth of news on any particular topic.

Chip · Feb 8, 2023

sar104 said:
Geostationary satellites are much too far away (~22,000 miles) to get good images. Surveillance satellites start at around 100 miles. A balloon at 12 miles has a resolution advantage if they are willing to put their best cameras on it, but that seems a bit unlikely without a robust self-destruct system since there is a high probability of payload capture, as just happened.

The propulsion system is certainly suggestive that the balloon might be more than just a scientific data collection vehicle, but maybe not conclusive. And there are credible alternatives to it primarily being an imaging platform - it could also have been intended to test US capabilities and responses. Or it might even have been intended to provoke just the kind of political strife that we have seen, even though cooler heads seem to be prevailing now.

Very informative thank you. I realized I misspoke about something else. The Airforce wide area persistent or Gorgon stare cameras are mounted on UAVs like the Predator or Global Hawk not on satellites. This clip on DARPA Argus explains performance of 1.8 giga pixel camera at 15,000 to 20,000 feet. The clip has been around 6 years so could be old hat by now!

Frank Dracman · Feb 9, 2023

The press is impotent when it abandons itself to falsehood.
Thomas Jefferson

Kywon McCain · Feb 9, 2023

As long as they keep that thing OUT OF MY YARD I'm fine

sar104 · Feb 9, 2023

Frank Dracman said:
The press is impotent when it abandons itself to falsehood.
Thomas Jefferson

Yes - he was advocating a free press. Did you have a point to make, or were you just throwing out-of-context quotes at the wall?

Frank Dracman · Feb 10, 2023

sar104 said:
Yes - he was advocating a free press. Did you have a point to make, or were you just throwing out-of-context quotes at the wall?

Sorry if you're not intelligent enough to understand what he meant. He also said "The advertisement is the most truthful part of a newspaper" you want to try to twist that one as well?

Don Testme · Feb 10, 2023

Drone Master said:
Lets talk about what equipment could be on board this vessel. As we are all curious about it's technology.
We can speculate now until the truth comes out after analysis.
What type of cameras, sensors, radio and satellite transmitters, Etc.?

That's why I think they should have just punctured the balloon to save the tech and data that was hanging from it. (to cause a slow free fall) . But I am not CIA or MILITARY so, they may had another reason for vaporizing the tech.

sar104 · Feb 10, 2023

Frank Dracman said:
Sorry if you're not intelligent enough to understand what he meant. He also said "The advertisement is the most truthful part of a newspaper" you want to try to twist that one as well?

Great - another contextless quote. How about you explain the relevance of either quote to this situation rather than just dumping them in the thread as if they were evidence for something.