From Michael Crichton’s 1/28/2005 American Enterprise Institute speech, starting at 1:07:
Michael Crichton: I gave a talk to the Press Club in ’93 in which I told them that they were out of the quality revolution, that they were in desperate trouble. But they didn’t care then and they probably don’t care now. I operate on the assumption that the mass media will never be accurate. I don’t think they ever have been. When did yellow journalism start? Almost at the beginning of American newspapers. And I don’t see any reason for them to change. The great dictum of journalism is “simplify and exaggerate,” which is exactly what Walt Disney told his cartoonists.
I do believe there will come a time, and it may come quite soon, when because of the internet people will be willing to spend a lot of money for verified information.(Audience member): The New York Times this week in the Science section reported that ice shelves are melting, and I guess that I’m willing to believe that’s not true, but I find it hard to believe that the reporter, the editors, the scientists quoted are either independently or in collusion advancing an anti-, er, pro-, sorry about that, global-warming agenda.
Crichton: Work on that.
The whole thing runs about 85 minutes. Good speech.