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The recent debate over the AR rating in the Top 10 list vs the LA Times,
seems to equate, a least in Joe's mind, popularity with quality or at
least with being a better online service.

Since when? The latest circulation figures for Reader's Digest lists them
at 15,150,822  versus the Scientific American's 633,693. (Ad Age, Aug.
26).  More people can identify Heather Locklear than the prime minister of
Israel. How many Barbara Cartland novels are sold each year?

Polls are polls. Statistics are open to all sorts of interpretation.
Quality is quality.  Never should they be confused.

The question is what *is* quality in this new media? Print media turn to
the Pulitzers, broadcast to Emmy, and other awards, but do we have a way
to judge quality beyond the number of hits or the amount of hype a site
has done?

Yeah, I'm biased, in case you wonder. I do some writing for the Times, but
I also teach research methods at the University of Southern California,
where we still gaze in awe at the tobacco companies' reseach that shows
that #1, nicotine is not addictive and #2, there's no "proof" that
advertising leads to smoking.

Give it up, Joe.  The AR made it in a poll.  Great.

Carolyn Cline
ccline@bcf.usc.edu

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To: Joe Shea , Jeff Perlman