Gladstone pens a visionary and opinionated work of graphic nonfiction on the media and its discontents.
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Dec 11, 2011
Nathan
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Newspapers (now broadened to "the media") influence public opinion and the course of political affairs. This deft little book tells the story of media and influence, historically and technologically, and manages to be not just readable but also extremely difficult to put down. I read it in one sitting and got a lot from it. It is easy to read because it is both well-written and well-illustrated--most of the book is in the form of a comic: panels, pictures, captions. The potentially
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Nov 27, 2011
Stven
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A lively and informative book on the history of public media. I have a few quibbles along the way, but I'm willing to ignore them because I'm learning some interesting history, competently arranged to get me from points A and B to points U and V with the dots nicely connected. The trouble is that I totally reject the conclusion Gladstone presents, that "We get the media we deserve."
That's bogus. We the people don't control journalism -- despite the nice point she makes tha More...
That's bogus. We the people don't control journalism -- despite the nice point she makes tha More...
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Oct 17, 2011
Amy
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"Everything we hate about the media today was present at its creation: its corrupt or craven practitioners, its easy manipulation by the powerful, its capacity for propagating lies, its penchant for amplifying rage. Also present was everything we admire- and require- from the media: factual information, penetrating analysis, probing investigation, truth spoken to power. Same as it ever was."
"There's a long-standing debate in the media biz over whether news outlets should giv More...
"There's a long-standing debate in the media biz over whether news outlets should giv More...
Oct 15, 2011
Alex
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I saw the author of this book, Brooke Gladstone, speak at the Brooklyn Book Festival, and after returning home I resisted the idea of reading her book: I'd felt her to be patronizing to Jennifer Pozner, author of "Reality Bites Back", which I found fantastic. However, I happened to see this book available at the library a week or so later and decided I'd check it out anyway. I'm glad I did. This is an excellent meditation on the history and role of the media, told in accessible and fun
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Aug 22, 2011
Dani
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In today's society, people are inundated with media coverage. We can have it delivered to us on our cell phones and computers 24/7. From there, we can text it to each other or tweet it to the world. It bombards us to the point that we reminisce about the "good old days" when an unbiased well-written paper was thrown on our doorstep once a week. In "The Influencing Machine", Brooke Gladstone reminds us that there were no good old days. The media has been dysfunctional and in o
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Jul 30, 2011
Gladstone writes: "Everything we hate about the media today was present at its creation: its corrupt or craven practitioners, its easy manipulation by the powerful, its capacity for propagating lies, its penchant for amplifying rage. Also present was everything we admire--and require--from the media: factual information, penetrating analysis, probing investigation, truth spoken to power. Same as it ever was" (20).
This astute observation loses none of its punch despite being situated n More...
This astute observation loses none of its punch despite being situated n More...
Jul 27, 2011
John
rated it:
To call this graphic novel a visual depiction of the history and purpose of the news media would be a vast simplification, and would not speak to the wry wit of both the author and artist as they explore the complexities of how media influence and determine the way we think. With almost up-to-the-minute research (citing books just released in paperback this year and reports still current), Brooke Gladstone (from NPR's On the Media) demonstrates the purposes, biases and motivations of the news me
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Jul 07, 2011
From:http://www.boingboing.net/2011/07/07/post-13.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+boingboing%2FiBag+%28Boing+Boing%29
Brooke Gladstone, co-host of the excellent NPR-syndicated "On the Media," has teamed up with illustrator Josh Neufeld to produce a fantastic nonfiction comic book called The Influencing Machine: Brooke Gladstone on the Media. This is one of those books that feels like the author has been working up to it for her whole life, disti More...
Brooke Gladstone, co-host of the excellent NPR-syndicated "On the Media," has teamed up with illustrator Josh Neufeld to produce a fantastic nonfiction comic book called The Influencing Machine: Brooke Gladstone on the Media. This is one of those books that feels like the author has been working up to it for her whole life, disti More...
Jul 02, 2011
Seana
rated it:
I'm not much of a radio listener, so the fact that Brooke Gladstone is a well regarded NPR managing editor did not bring this book to my radar. I happened to listen to her highly entertaining talk with our local radio host, Rick Kleffel, and resolved to read it at first opportunity. Brooke claims that she wanted to write a comic book about something even before she found her topic, and with the help of illustrator Josh Neufeld, who has previously done another comic or graphic novel about New Orl
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Nov 19, 2011
Carol
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I saw this graphic novel at my son's HS library and decided to check it out. Very readable history about newspapers and other media, with lots of thought-provoking facts.
Talking about the advent of television, on page 103, Brookes writes "The American media business is a creature of politics and technology . . . in the mid-twentieth century, national consensus is Washington's top priority. And for the first time in American history, it's the media's top priority, too." S More...
Talking about the advent of television, on page 103, Brookes writes "The American media business is a creature of politics and technology . . . in the mid-twentieth century, national consensus is Washington's top priority. And for the first time in American history, it's the media's top priority, too." S More...
Nov 14, 2011
Krista
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A graphic novel that gives you a history of the media in visual bits that bite deep.
The main point; "We hunger for objectivity, but increasingly swallow "news" like Jell-O shots in ad hoc cyber-saloons. We marinate in punditry season with only those facts and opinions we can digest without cognitive distress. I see our most hallowed journalistic institutions crumbling, I see our business model that relied on mass audiences being displaced, with stunning speed, by More...
The main point; "We hunger for objectivity, but increasingly swallow "news" like Jell-O shots in ad hoc cyber-saloons. We marinate in punditry season with only those facts and opinions we can digest without cognitive distress. I see our most hallowed journalistic institutions crumbling, I see our business model that relied on mass audiences being displaced, with stunning speed, by More...
Jul 11, 2011
Kalen
rated it:
Not entirely sure what to think of this one just yet. I love the premise but I'm not convinced it was entirely well-written. Having said that, I don't typically read graphic novels or non-fiction so the format took some getting used to and it's possible that was my real challenge.
I laughed when Gladstone cited Douglas Adams' comment that "Anything that is in the world when you're born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that's More...
I laughed when Gladstone cited Douglas Adams' comment that "Anything that is in the world when you're born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that's More...
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Jun 06, 2011
Guy
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"We get the media we deserve," declares NPR's Brooke Gladstone in her excellent The Influencing Machine, an insightful graphic manifesto that sits comfortably alongside Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business and Jaron Lanier's You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto, both of whom make cameo appearances.
Gladstone, aided by Josh Neufeld's seamless visuals, makes a compelling case that the ills that plague media today -- mass and soci More...
Gladstone, aided by Josh Neufeld's seamless visuals, makes a compelling case that the ills that plague media today -- mass and soci More...
Jan 15, 2012
Dan
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I had high hopes for this "media manifesto in comic book form," as it seemed to be very similar in style (both graphically and narratively) to Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics. McCloud's book maximized the potential of "sequential art" to explain complex issues in an immediate, simple way. And there are some very clever visual choices in The Influencing Machine that manage the same trick.
But ultimately, I ended up feeling the same way about this book as I do abo More...
But ultimately, I ended up feeling the same way about this book as I do abo More...
Jul 10, 2011
Mza
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As a cool lady and an expert on a topic -- media influence -- that comes up constantly on my feed and inspires waves of heated commentary, Brooke Gladstone seems like a natural candidate for Internet intellectual celebrity, but I never heard of her until this, her first foray into my field of special interest, comix. Following the Scott McCloud model -- in which a shape-shifting narrator speaks directly to the camera, bridging dramatic representations of important concepts -- Gladstone takes us
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Dec 07, 2011
James
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I learned about this book from the same ALA "Best Graphic Nonfiction" list that yielded Harvey Pekar's forgettable Beat history. In this case, fortunately, the praise was warranted. The Influencing Machine (Gladstone's central metaphor for the media is to equate it with the mechanical mind-control engines that feature in the delusional fantasies of some famous 19th-century paranoids) is a smart and funny graphic history of journalism and a meditation on the roles and responsibilities
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Dec 13, 2011
Barbara
rated it:
The Influencing Machine: Brooke Gladstone on the Media is not your typical graphic text. It’s a sweeping look at the history of the media, as well as a forecast on how technology will influence human evolution.
Equal parts philosophy, cultural criticism, and polemic, Gladstone’s Machine shows her reader how news has been reported and how public policy has been shaped from an American perspective.
Compared to a text-based book, Machine sometimes seems to dispense its infor More...
Equal parts philosophy, cultural criticism, and polemic, Gladstone’s Machine shows her reader how news has been reported and how public policy has been shaped from an American perspective.
Compared to a text-based book, Machine sometimes seems to dispense its infor More...
Nov 14, 2011
Karen
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Gladstone used graphic non-fiction to deftly communicate the historical, psychological and sociological truths of the media's influence in society. From Caesar's Acta Diurna, the first daily news which pressured the Roman Senators to be accountable (and reminiscent of the Daily Stand-Up Meeting) to the digitally borne diseases stemming from the homophily echo chamber (where people only consume media "facts" that substantiate their entrenched belief systems resulting in polarization), o
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Nov 04, 2011
James
rated it:
Disappointing. This book is not "visionary," nor is it particularly "opinionated"as it has been billed; it is certainly not a "manifesto" as that implies the book is articulating some idea outside of normal liberal-establishment orthodoxy. And man, you need some outsized blinders on to consider that orthodoxy coherent.
Gladstone starts the book by saying there is nothing "conspiratorial" about mainstream media - a remark I can only imagine is a More...
Gladstone starts the book by saying there is nothing "conspiratorial" about mainstream media - a remark I can only imagine is a More...
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Feb 13, 2012
Becky
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Graphic novel about media bias and information seeking behavior written by NPR correspondent - pretty much my ideal nonfiction book, but somehow I didn't enjoy this very much.
Perhaps because Gladstone is new to the medium, I found the book suffered greatly from a lack of narrative and structural cohesion. Her apparent thesis in the introduction - that consumers and advertisers cause media bias - did not seem to be the guiding thesis of her discussion, which spanned history, psychology, More...
Perhaps because Gladstone is new to the medium, I found the book suffered greatly from a lack of narrative and structural cohesion. Her apparent thesis in the introduction - that consumers and advertisers cause media bias - did not seem to be the guiding thesis of her discussion, which spanned history, psychology, More...
Aug 19, 2011
Lian
rated it:
brooke gladstone (host of NPR's On The Media) and illustrator Josh Neufeld take you on a enlightening and entertaining path through media in general and in particular this unwieldy -- and surprisingly modern -- thing called The News.
this book was actually heartening for me, and i think it would be too for anyone else troubled by the pervasive lamentations: the shrinking newsrooms, diminishing circulations and ad revenues, the infotainmentization of the 24-hour news cycle, the shady jou More...
this book was actually heartening for me, and i think it would be too for anyone else troubled by the pervasive lamentations: the shrinking newsrooms, diminishing circulations and ad revenues, the infotainmentization of the 24-hour news cycle, the shady jou More...
Sep 11, 2011
Beth
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On The Media is one of my favorite shows on NPR and I always enjoy Brooke Gladstone's insightful criticism of contemporary media. This book is the best OTM has to offer but rendered in images rather than audio. One of the things I love most about Gladstone is her ability to recognize the dangers of threats to free speech, uncritical acceptance of information, and the harm that bad media can do without giving in to hyperbole this is her great gift in this book. She calls attention to the things
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Nov 19, 2011
Maureen
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Brooke Gladstone hosts "On the Media" on NPR, a show I listen to, so I picked up this book. It's an odd presentation--a serious history of objectivity/bias and freedom of speech in "the news" in a graphic form, with a cartoonist who's done work for Harvey Pekar. Even given the limitations of a graphic work, with less text, Gladstone covers pretty much the entire timeline of news reporting, hitting the important pivotal highlights, the origin of written language, the Acta Diu
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Jul 03, 2011
Dan
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I generally can't stand the news, or at the very least I can't stand American news. For the most part, my view of American news can be boiled down to this:
If I want to hear the right wing, I listen to Fox. If I want to hear the left wing, I listen to CNN. If I want to hear the truth, I'll go to NPR. And if I want to hear what people really think of my country, I'll listen to the BBC.
It really irks me that I need to go outside my country's typical media sources to find out More...
If I want to hear the right wing, I listen to Fox. If I want to hear the left wing, I listen to CNN. If I want to hear the truth, I'll go to NPR. And if I want to hear what people really think of my country, I'll listen to the BBC.
It really irks me that I need to go outside my country's typical media sources to find out More...
Jun 22, 2011
Adam
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A good fast read about the subject of how media influences our lives. The graphic novel format made it much more digestible than a standard textbook and made the narrative flow much better. I learned a few things I didn't know but I still had to take it with a grain of salt considering that it is a book about the media written by someone currently making their living in the media. I think her concerns and comments about many of the issues seemed very valid but I imagine there are plenty of co
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Oct 26, 2011
Andrew
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"We get the media deserve". This is a great graphic novel. Gladstone is able to show the history of the "media', how it has change, and how it has stayed the same, plus give some great insight into the different forms of bias, consumer reaction to "news", and to a glimpse into the future of information dissemination. A nice antidote to the manufacture consent complaints about the media. The topic works well in the graphic format, quick, concise, informative without be
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Sep 05, 2011
Booksaremyboyfriends
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Brooke Gladstone, you wrote a comic book for me? Thank you! You know I love you on NPR and I love comic books. It’s about the history of media? That’s something I’m interested in! The historical tales are well-strung together, the observations are insightful and apt, the artwork is killer-great and you throw in some bangarang jokes to boot? Brooke, you shouldn’t have! And it’s like 150 pages, and most of those pages are drawings? Brooke, Brooke, Brooke. You better watch yourself. You let your g
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Aug 30, 2011
Raina
rated it:
Yay for NPR correspondants doing other fun stuff! Yay for nonfiction comics! Yay for media analysis out there in a semi-accessible format! Yay for Josh Neufeld getting work!
However...
Honestly, I was pretty surprised when Gladstone said in the acknowledgments at the end that she set out to write a comic book. I didn't feel like the text/writing completely suited the medium. There are whole pages of text, and a massive amount of the book is her talking at you. She says More...
However...
Honestly, I was pretty surprised when Gladstone said in the acknowledgments at the end that she set out to write a comic book. I didn't feel like the text/writing completely suited the medium. There are whole pages of text, and a massive amount of the book is her talking at you. She says More...
Jan 27, 2012
Jay
rated it:
"The Influencing Machine" describes the activities of the media in a historic and social context. Creating this book in graphic format makes it much easier to read and digest what would have been a long magazine article otherwise. Some of the ideas expressed are well known, but the author had some uncommon references and trivia that helped illustrate her points. I did find it funny that she mentions how polls can be untrustworthy and then references polls throughout the book. The last
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Jan 25, 2012
Victoria
rated it:
This graphic novel on our society's relationship with media is strongest when debunking the myth of an objective and unbiased media. Brooke Gladstone wanders through history showing the roots of our news systems and the connections that created our American media today.
The art was simple, restricted to a palate of black, white, and blue. Many cultural references were included in the illustrations, adding to the enjoyment of the reading experience.
The book ended with a More...
The art was simple, restricted to a palate of black, white, and blue. Many cultural references were included in the illustrations, adding to the enjoyment of the reading experience.
The book ended with a More...
