| How does the news shape the way we see the world ? Here 's the world based on the way it looks -- based on land mass . And here 's how news shapes what Americans see . This map -- ( Applause ) -- this map shows the number of seconds that American network and cable news organizations dedicated to news stories , by country , in February of 2007 -- just one year ago . Now , this was a month when North Korea agreed to dismantle its nuclear facilities . There was massive flooding in Indonesia . And in Paris , the IPCC released its study confirming man 's impact on global warming . The U. S. accounted for 79 percent of total news coverage . And when we take out the U. S. and look at the remaining 21 percent , we see a lot of Iraq -- that 's that big green thing there -- and little else . The combined coverage of Russia , China and India , for example , reached just one percent . When we analyzed all the news stories and removed just one story , here 's how the world looked . What was that story ? The death of Anna Nicole Smith . This story eclipsed every country except Iraq , and received 10 times the coverage of the IPCC report . And the cycle continues ; as we all know , Britney has loomed pretty large lately . So why do n't we hear more about the world ? One reason is that news networks have reduced the number of their foreign bureaus by half . Aside from one-person ABC mini-bureaus in Nairobi , New Delhi and Mumbai , there are no network news bureaus in all of Africa , India or South America -- places that are home to more than two billion people . The reality is that covering Britney is cheaper . And this lack of global coverage is all the more disturbing when we see where people go for news . Local TV news looms large , and unfortunately only dedicates 12 percent of its coverage to international news . And what about the web ? The most popular news sites do n't do much better . Last year , Pew and the Colombia J-School analyzed the 14,000 stories that appeared on Google News ' front page . And they , in fact , covered the same 24 news events . Similarly , a study in e-content showed that much of global news from U. S. news creators is recycled stories from the AP wire services and Reuters , and do n't put things into a context that people can understand their connection to it . So , if you put it all together , this could help explain why today 's college graduates as well as less educated Americans know less about the world than their counterparts did 20 years ago . And if you think it 's simply because we are not interested , you would be wrong . In recent years , Americans who say they closely follow global news most of the time grew to over 50 percent . The real question : is this distorted world view what we want for Americans in our increasingly interconnected world ? I know we can do better . And can we afford not to ? Thank you . |