Screaming Penguin

New Scientist has coverage of the Symantec report that came out. Now, having discussed this a couple of times already, I don't want to beat a dead horse. All in all, the NS article is much more informed and well discussed than the Microsoft(r) Bitch-Boy(tm) press artciles. The problem is the lead in. The first six paragraphs are all bash bash bash with little perspective:

Doubts were cast this week over the security of three major software systems formerly regarded as safe havens from hacker attacks and viruses. But experts argue that despite the new findings, these systems are still more secure than their Microsoft counterparts because hackers overwhelmingly target the Windows software. "The Windows problem still dwarfs these other problems because internet criminals know that there are an awful lot of clueless Windows users," says Graham Cluley, security consultant at UK anti-virus firm Sophos. Until now, the open-source Firefox web browser, Linux-based web servers and the Apple Mac operating system OSX were heralded as more robust to hacker intrusions and viruses than Microsoft's Internet Explorer and the Windows operating systems. So it came as a surprise to the security community when all three came under attack in two security reports, funded by Symantec - the California-based anti-virus software vendor - and Microsoft. The debate was sparked Monday when Symantec, released its biannual Internet Security Threat report. The company found that between July and December 2004, 21 new vulnerabilities were discovered in Firefox while only 13 were found in Internet Explorer. "This runs contrary to a trend seen in previous periods where nearly all browser vulnerabilities affected Microsoft Internet Explorer exclusively," says Symantec in its report

Now, I know New Scientist isn't a newspaper as such, but really isn't like one of the proforma things in journalism that the lead paragraph should span the content of the article at a high level? While the title, "War of words over operating systems' safety" is perhaps a better indicator than the first few paragraphs, it's still pretty loaded. Frankly I am really fed up with reporting anywhere that goes "So and so says the sky is green, others disagree." (At least above NS had the courtesy to call them "experts" when they pulled this trick.) The media wonders why their credibility is for shit, maybe it is because they won't even delineate a fact from complete bullshit.