Yet Another “Plastic Kills” Story
20 hours ago Kip Hansen 53 Comments
News Brief by Kip Hansen — 24 December 2022
Most of the science being done today is good work – solidly done. The problem occurs when the press become involved. Let’s be frank, scientists want their work to be widely read, they want their work to be seen as ‘important’, meaningful, and, let’s admit it, popular. They want the press to cover their latest study.
The problem this causes is not all the fault of The Press – scientists tend to let their institutional press offices ‘sex up’ study results and the implications of study findings. The Mass Media (no longer being printed on presses but rather mysteriously propagating itself across the internet as bits and bytes — electronic 1s and 0s) needs to produce content that people will read – or at least headlines that the public will click on .
[Clicks produce income for digital outlets – and I will admit to having invented, with five other people, one of the most ubiquitous tracking systems ever – increasing the commercial value of websites by 80% overnight. Yes, there’s a patent, long expired now.]
Our example today comes from our old favorite The Guardian, whose journalists are easily taken in by sciencey stories. The latest one is:
“Plastic ‘nurdles’ stop sea urchins developing properly, study finds“
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/12/23/yet-another-plastic-kills-story/
