The NOAA has been suspected of doctoring the record[1], of all varieties including the satellites once they got control of them[2]. there will be more insider stories of how some conspired to fake AGW data [3]
so I think it likely that the revisions and corrections will be challenged soon and we will see that the revisions had no factual basis. Many will resign, probably jumping before pushed. The cuts are unfortunately prejudging the outcome.
"Note how a huge swathe of South America has been labelled as “record warmest”. And what is this based on? In fact, there is virtually no temperature data available at all for that particular area, including nearly all of Brazil. The so-called record temperatures in Brazil and neighbouring countries are pure fabrication."
That seems like a pretty bold charge, how does someone who knows nothing about this tell who's telling the truth? Anyone care to weigh in?
EDIT: Seems you're downvoted to grey already, hopefully someone can still add some commentary.
I recently read a very convincing (to me at least) debunking of that first link, but unfortunately I'm not able to find it right now. But from memory:
The claim is that the temperature data in the first map is made up because some of its data isn't present in the second map (just look at Africa, South America, and the oceans). HOWEVER:
The first map shows a combination of two data sets. The second map only shows one of the data sets used in the first map. Not surprisingly, this means that the second map has less data.
The two graphs are also covering different time periods. The second graph covers a smaller time period, so presumably that lets them be more specific about where the temperatures are recorded. The ERSST data in the first graph goes back more than 100 years, so they don't have quite the same precision and consistency in terms of where the measurements came from. The bigger grid squares in the first map reflect that some of the data is interpolated as weather stations moved from city to city, new weather stations start coming into play halfway through the dataset, etc.
Here is an analysis from a data-driven organization dedicated to listing, understanding and reducing biases in science records. They have covered the National Climate Data Center data (which apparently GISS uses).
Edit: this discussion does focus on the U.S. network, where some of the articles you listed referred to data from Africa and South America, but assumedly the corrective techniques are similar.
"Note how a huge swathe of South America has been labelled as “record warmest”. And what is this based on? In fact, there is virtually no temperature data available at all for that particular area, including nearly all of Brazil. The so-called record temperatures in Brazil and neighbouring countries are pure fabrication."
That seems like a pretty bold charge, how does someone who knows nothing about this tell who's telling the truth? Anyone care to weigh in?
EDIT: Seems you're downvoted to grey already, hopefully someone can still add some commentary.