The Power of Instant Images Unfiltered !!!

[venice]

watching the pictures from Japan and the unrest in the Middle East that comes in our home in real time...as a baby boomer, it just amazes me how seeing the images as they happen without being filtered/censored can impact public policy..during the 50's and 60's our government tried (often without success) to manage how images were fed to the public..the Civil Rights movement and Vietnam dissent were largely influence by photographs and newsreels on the Big 3 networks that our government had tried to control ... the beating of Rodney King by the LAPD,911, Hurricane Katrina, the torture of prisoners in Iraq by US troops, the Wikileeks (sp?) revelations, the Wisconsin debate over collective bargining and even the infamous Carnival Splendor "spam cruise" in the age of the internet and cell phone cameras cannot be control by any entity

my question, do you think that sometimes instant imaging is not a good thing ? and how do you think it has influence public policy ?

[Donna]

I know exactly what you mean....we saw the images of the devistation almost as it happened, pretty soon the daily news papers will just not be needed, not fast enough.