Skepticism Grows Over Claims That MH370 Lies In the Bay of Bengal

Sockatume (732728) writes "The latest episode of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Mediawatch program addresses GeoResonance's claims to have found the lost Malasia Airlines MH370 in the Bay of Bengal. They attribute the company's sudden prominence to increasing desperation amongst the press. Meanwhile, the Metabunk web site has been digging into the people and technology behind GeoResonance and its international siblings, finding noted pseudoscientist Vitaly Gokh and a dubious variation on Kirlian photography."

Re:Where's Waldo?

[jerpyro]

Yeah I don't really understand what the big deal is. I realize that there are a lot of families that may be suffering but because they were on an airplane it is somehow more newsworthy than a cruise ship with 10 times as many people, or genocide in Malaysia or doctors being killed giving polio vaccines in Afghanistan? Oh it's an airplane, let's tap into the 9/11 terrorist fear mongering so that we can get ratings!

*sigh*

Put up a Deposit

[RichMan]

If the company is so sure they can put up a refundable deposit on the cost of exploring their location. If they are right then they get the deposit back. If they are not right no deposit refund.

The deposit should cover the cost of putting one unmanned vehicle down on that location.

Would any of the governments be willing to back that compromise?

Re:Where's Waldo?

[DrXym]

The big deal is it's a story which lends itself perfectly to endless speculation. CNN can waste hours of its news cycle wheeling out pundits to explain how aircraft work, how transponders work, how accidents happen, how terrorists hijack planes, how the planes crash, how planes are found, how blackboxes work, how debris fields spread etc. In the absence of hard information, they and their guests can prattle on for days or weeks like this.

Scam ! Definitely a HOAX like oil sniffer :

[advid.net]

I've already posted that [slashdot.org] before, but anyway, I'll tell it again:

A search on their patent refs leads nowhere except to their site.

This remind me the Great Oil Sniffer Hoax [wikipedia.org]

Besides, if they were able to do what they claim, they would better look for gold in sunken ships and tell no one.
Their imaginary references are as old as 2003 with a site born in 2014... really ?

Face it: this is a hoax, at best, and more likely a scam.

Re:Where's journalism?

[Anonymous Coward]

But the plane wasn't filler-- it dominated their 24-hour network for months. They sold it as a thriller mystery. It pushed out all kinds of real news-- the invasion in Ukraine, for example.

The plane episode to me really was the symbolic death rattle for mainstream American news media, a clear message that it is completely dead. We deserve much better-- as the last superpower (at least for another few years) it should be the citizen's duty to stay well-informed, but we're so ill-served by the mass media and have accepted/embraced this cartoonish excuse for news-- it's setting the stage for serious and dramatic systemic problems in our democracy.

I remember the shock right after 9/11 when we heard how those "backwards" middle eastern countries like Saudi Arabia believed the attack was perpetrated by the Israelis. And everyone in the US was laughing at how uninformed and ignorant those fools were, but of course they're ruled by dictatorships and have no free media, not like us.

Then like 3 years later a huge majority of Americans thought 9/11 was Iraq's doing. So who are the fools?

This plane thing is an insult and an attack on the very notion of an informed public. The fact that CNN's ratings exploded is as much an indictment of the public itself-- if we wanted something close to actual news enough to watch it, they'd give it to us... So for me, this plane is the symbolic end of a free press in America in any kind of corporate, institutional form. Maybe it died a long time ago, but for me, this travesty really sealed CNN's reputation as just not giving any kind of fuck in the most apparent and sad way.

Re:Where's journalism?

[interkin3tic]

That doesn't really explain CNN's obsession with mh370 though: CNN's nonstop coverage of "A plane is missing" has been going on for months. In that time, Ebola has broken out, some celebrity somewhere has undoubtedly died, and Russia invaded Ukraine. Yet CNN KEEPS coming back to "BREAKING FUCKING NEWS, HOLD ON TO YOUR SEAT: THE PLANE!!! IT'S STILL MISSING!!!" It's clearly not about filler. Ebola would have made a much sexier story. Since it's all pundits, they wouldn't need to change anything, just ask the people in front of the camera to speculate on whether we're all going to die of Ebola rather than where they think the plane crashed.

At this point, I think CNN is staying with the flight because they think anyone still watching CNN is actually hooked on the dizzying highs that come along with watching yet another computer generated line over the indian ocean while some self-proclaimed expert on airplanes guesses about what was going on when the plane hit the water. Meanwhile people who actually want to know the news have switched over to the internet. It's the same approach other specialized cable channels are taking: The Learning Channel has realized that anyone who wants to learn anything tuned out long ago, but they can cling to some viewers with stupid shows like Honey Boo Boo. Not just filling time: addictive to some moron with eyeballs.