YouTube: Boo

I've read mostly positive reactions to the weird YouTube format. I was unimpressed as I write in The Guardian.

Comments

I couldn't agree more Matt. I thought the whole thing was a travesty. The good reviews can be attributed to the "Never Insult the Audience" Golden Rule. The fact is only the American public can be counted on to trivialize the process even more than cable news anchors.

"Who was your favorite teacher?"
"Say something nice about the person to your left"
"If I can get the same soy latte in every state, why can't I have the same voting machine?"
"How do we know you will bring change?"
"Will you protect my guns?"
"Will you work for minimum wage?"

And these were among the best questions submitted? I did like how Biden seemed to be disgusted by the whole thing.

Posted by felix | July 24, 2007 8:37 AM

The fact is only the American public can be counted on to trivialize the process even more than cable news anchors.

Look, the "American public" are dumb, and smart. They ask clever questions, and stupid ones. The point of Matt's article was not the stupidity of the questions asked, but the stupidity of a supposed YouTube debate that had CNN choosing questions but passing them off as questions from the people.

It could've been a fine way to ask questions. Imagine assembling quotes from Bush, Cheney, etc. Or past quotes from Clinton on the war. Or putting together data from trade in an interesting way. Or taking a clip from Sicko. Then framing those videos in the form of questions. That could've been really interested. But it won't be so long as people like Anderson Cooper get to say whether the question is asked.

Posted by Joe Strummer | July 24, 2007 9:12 AM

"And these were among the best questions submitted? "

Why would they use the best questions submitted?

Posted by Njorl | July 24, 2007 9:22 AM

Thou expecteth too much.

The format may not have been revolutionary, but was definitely better than Chris Mathews pontificating to what seemed like a group of obsequious schoolchildren and then posing a question as a second thought.

Posted by gregor | July 24, 2007 9:26 AM

I don't think this was really any different from the Politico's cherry-picking of user-submitted questions back in their earlier debate. Media outlets have a vested interest in making it appeart that they are the most "serious" source of questions and analysis; there's no way they'll ever allow users to submit and select the questions that will be asked.

Posted by Midwest Product | July 24, 2007 9:56 AM

If you'd like to send CNN a message about the questions they selected, watch and rank this 1 second video:

youtube.com/watch?v=fJC84XFmdYI

It just says "CNN's choice of questions for the debate really sucked", but the point is that if it gets enough views it might send a message.

Posted by TLB | July 24, 2007 1:32 PM

Of course you wouldn't like it. You are a self-described snob, and you live in Washington and want to grow up and be a big pundit like David Broder who you take pot shots at. So who would expect you to appreciate it when "us normal slobs" can craft a question?

Posted by jerry | July 24, 2007 2:46 PM

Jerry: speaking for me, the issue isn't that normal slobs crafted questions. It's that most normal slobs don't know how to ask real questions, and CNN didn't choose the few that would have put the candidates on the spot.

The questions from the normal slobs were almost indistinguishable from something that a normal MSM hack would have asked.

If you want to send a message, watch the 1 second spot: youtube.com/watch?v=fJC84XFmdYI

Posted by TLB | July 24, 2007 2:58 PM