CNN- just Hype-Ad for the iPad?

CNN is a real mixed bag of a media institution. Occasionally there's still good reporting and that roving first-on-the-scene feel that reminds you of its early days.

Yesterday wasn't one of those occasions. The launch of the iPad would have been a great time to look behind the scenes at how Silicon Valley's business model failed manufacturing, exported high technology assets and eventually paved the way for trillion dollar deficits which your grandkids will still be paying for decades down the line.

It would have been a great time to examine the curious make-believe world of the confused consumer, especially those who camped out overnight to receive the latest shiney goods that magically came from Fairyland.

It would have been a time to ask how dependency on the manipulation of the Yuan's exchange rate is intimately linked to the iPad's pricing, and exactly where components and resources like the lithium in the battery were sourced, and at what environmental and political cost.

But that would have meant opening up Apple's dependence on Hon Hai and Steve Job's alter-ego Terry Gou, and the links between Mr Gou and the Chinese government. And that would have needed some serious investigative reporting, and might have put at risk some lucrative advertising from the whole host of other manufacturers Hon Hai also supplies.

So basically CNN's Saturday reporting amounted to uncritical hype for a new product from a company still merrily cheerleading the way for outsourcing to China. I watched a number of CNN TV reports, and watched video reports and read reviews on their website.

A media environment like that means the chances to make the case for backshoring stay few and far between. I'd be interested if any of our readers come across any reporting that asks any of the other questions above. If you come across some, please post a link so we can take a look at them.

In the meantime, if you'd like an alternative view of what doing business in China actually entails, there's this blog from Bill Waddell over at Evolving Excellence. It's personally informed and you may find some of it controversial. But it's probably a lot closer to reality than the sugar coated, teeth-whitened smiley-happy first-name chat between 'reporters' that passes for serious journalism elsewhere.