The stepping stones to truth...kinda.

It seems as though Lisa Parks argues in her essay Digging into Google Earth that the integration of photojournalistic images from the ground in Darfur are detrimental to Google Earth's Crisis in Darfur application layer as a tool for allowing a more "objective" and "true" coverage of the genocide in Sudan. Parks states that these images "eclipse the satellite images" and "fill [them] with closer views that are consistent with dominant Western tropes of representations of tragedy in Africa." Not only do these images perpetuate the subjectivity inherent in Western news coverage instead of creating a "revolutionary truth" in a more "objective" format for transmitting information, but they also overshadow the more informative and seemingly objective satellite images (as uninformative and deceptively outdated as they may be) through their establishment of a "personal code". But is this integration of more personal and subjective images necessary in order to make such explorations of disaster more accessible and interesting to the modern viewer? Just as TV news sources utilize subtle plot arcs (and thus cliffhangers to maintain viewer attention across commercial breaks and the span of multiple days for longer trails/stories) and integrate more humanitarian individual stories (that connect closer to home in specific neighborhoods, etc) in their coverage of the daily news, must Google Earth anchor the "more distanced" coverage of Darfur in the subjective/human to maintain user interest? I believe that the modern viewer requires the integration of these images (that in a way function as specific character studies in a larger problem) in order to feel more connected to the events that are occurring in the barren landscape presented in the sprawling satellite images. The journalistic photographs are a required stepping stone for modern audiences to make the transition from passive attention to the very controlled medium of news broadcasts to the more interactive (and thus more action-driven interface of), but still highly controlled, Google Earth. The interactiveness of Google Earth, however, allows the user to create their own truth of the event, by allowing them to pick and choose the elements that they explore in the software, creating a potentially fragmented (and consequently misinformed) view of the crisis being presented. The question remains, how do we make the necessary transition from passivity in news broadcasts to more interactive applications that still control the information given to the user in order to make sure that they have the "necessary" information? Then, how can we turn this interaction with the software into tangible, productive action with the crisis at hand, in order to avoid passivity in interaction?

Erik Maser