China space mission article hits Web before launch

China space mission article hits Web before launch

news.yahoo.com

BEIJING - A news story describing a successful launch of China's long-awaited space mission and including detailed dialogue between astronauts launched on the Internet Thursday, hours before the rocket had even left the ground.

The country's official news agency Xinhua posted the article on its Web site Thursday, and remained there for much of the day before it was taken down.

(visit the link for the full news article)

From the files of "Believe nothing that you read, and only half of what you witness" comes this little gem. I especially was amused at this quote from the *ahem* "real time" dailogue between the astronauts & mission control:

"The firm voice of the controller broke the silence of the whole ship. Now, the target is captured 12 seconds ahead of the predicted time ...

It would appear that the target made even better time than the pre-written story claims, hitting it's intended target a full 2 days ahead of predicted time (possibly even 2 days and 12 seconds ahead?)

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Yes, it's funny.

But this is newspaper business. Do get one printed takes almost a 12 hour cycle from the event to the final print to the distributor to the people. I think they were just eager to get the story to the people as soon the event happened. After all it was 9 pm at night. Just wanting to be the first before all the other newspapers start selling the next morning.

But just imagine if....the start didn't end well.

I understand that, but the fact that they included a narrative between the astronauts & control as well as the sensationalism of reaching some checkpoint 12 seconds early... well, it just proves that you cannot believe anything you read in the news (especially in China).

lol, you've never been to a newspaper publisher have you?

It's not just China, EVERY country's newspapers do it.

Heck they even have templates pre-made for car crashes... just put in the number of children dead, how many cars involved, and a quote from a grieving mother, and the rest of the template is done for you.

Product launch coming up?
You make a few versions. One claiming it was a total failure, with things like "Severe overheating issues"... another saying it was a resounding success "It performed remarkably better than any of us had hoped."... and another about delays "The company was unable to meet the deadline citing budget cuts."


As for the comments made between control and the astronauts... they're the same comments that have been made pretty much every launch.

Making me believe they likely took a news brief from an older event, and planned on altering the details as the events transpired. It's the quickest way to beat your competition to the press.


It doesn't matter where you go, the news has already been written before it happens... all they had to do is fill in the missing bits.

I wonder how many people at the newspaper went on "vacation" permanently after that.

Kinda like in the South Park movie "They will be transported to death camps..........did I say death camps? I meant happy camps!!!"

Except they will be on vacation.





Does anyone think this was intentional by one really really brave person to try and show the Chinese people how much they are lied to?

I Thought this looked odd, I was watching the live launch, and it didnt look right, it just did not seem real. It was more like watching the thunderbirds taking off

"Are you sure it's big enough?"


[edit on 25-9-2008 by monkeybus]

So China's launch may be a fake then? Or is it the newspaper just wanting to be the first to have the story?