I reject your false accusation.  The biases of the accusations made
against Elmer-Dewitt are perfectly suited for comment here.  You want to
inspect and judge ad hominem arguments?  Then read the "gonzo-stylist"
piece, Meeks' diatribe, sent to this list in toto by a Mr. Weiss of
Seattle. 

Please exercise your concern for ad hominem attacks where it correctly 
pertains.  Thanks so much.......

My concern is that journalistic jealousies may be contributing to a 
"mau-mau" style attemped attack (building a drumbeat) originating with a 
particular flavor of Internet partisans.  They are angry with Dewitt, 
because they feel that their journals (their writing, their names, their 
opinions) should be the ones informing US opinion about the Internet in 
general, and cyberporn in particular.  

Methodology seems the "cover-story" for a different motive entirely. Why
do I make this claim?  Because poor methodology is all over the stories
about the Internet.  It is very common.  But it only causes a clamor in
certain circles, at certain times.  WHY?  Well why do you think? Other
agendas (than ethics or quantitative methods) are the motive, but this
factor does not appear in the story as reported by either side.  Think
about it.  

On Wed, 12 Jul  1995, Brian Clapper wrote:

> "S. Finer"  writes:
> > Well, what should one expect from a highly partisan account?  This teapot
> > tempest they obsess on is primarily an ideology uber alles type "scene".
> >
> > Journalists use the results of questionable methodology all the time, and
> > one hardly ever hears a peep about it. Why is it a story now?  The yelling
> > going on here is due to gored oxes, not because of faulty methodology.
> 
> You're making an ad hominem argument.  Whether or not journalists use
> questionable methodology "all the time" (a rather hyperbolic generalization,
> though not without some truth) does not disqualify a particular journalist
> from taking issue with bad methodology in a particular study.  If the
> methodology in Rimm's study is faulty, that fact doesn't change simply
> because a potentially biased journalist happens to be the one pointing it
> out.  Questioning the journalist's motives, rather than discussing the facts
> of the case, merely fans the flames of controversy without adding anything
> useful to the discussion.
> ----
> Brian Clapper, bmc@telebase.com
> 

------------------------------

End of online-news-digest V1 #237
*********************************


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