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From: gast@CS.UCLA.EDU (David Gast)
Newsgroups: comp.society
Subject: Re: NBC Coverage Decisions
Message-ID: <1738@limbo.Intuitive.Com>
Date: 7 Feb 91 07:47:26 GMT
Sender: taylor@limbo.Intuitive.Com
Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department
Lines: 83
Approved: taylor@Limbo.Intuitive.Com

Dave McCrady writes:

> Mr. Taylor says he is a journalist.  Then he must know that coverage 
> decisions are based on an editor's (or producer's) perception of what 
> is of interest to the viewer.

The primary purpose of a news organization today seems to be to generate
the most money for itself.  (Profit rates, in fact, have increased
substantially over the last 10 or 20 years.  They are off over the
last year or so because of the recession).  The most money is generated
by getting advertisers to pay the most while not hurting itself.  Thus,
if a news organization were owned by a large toxic polluter, it might
have incentives not to publish articles about that pollution.  Even in
takeover fights, it is not uncommon for competitors to report the news
better.

Anyway, the primary responsibility of a news organization, seeking to
maximize profits, is to its advertisers.  The viewers only come in
to the extent that lack of viewers could mean lower advertising revenues.
An advertiser, however, can also put pressure on a news organization not
to cover a certain story.  In this case, if the advertiser is big enough,
the story can be killed.  Remember that TV gets its revenues from
advertisers, not directly from viewersm and that even in the case of the
print media, a substantial portion of revenue comes from advertisers and
not subscribers.

I have purposely avoided mentioning cases, but there are many examples.
One can get further information by reading the magazine FAIR.

> But the program also needs the things that make television
> work:  pacing, a mix and hard news and feature stuff, analysis.

Well, I could do without the pacing, mix, and feature stuff as well as
the inane conversations among the anchor people, the trivia questions,
the advertisements masquerading as news, etc.

> I don't care if somebody managed to get a quarter million people out 
> to a rally in S.F.  Does anyone who wasn't there really care?  That's 
> a drop in the NBC audience bucket.  I can well understand their decision 
> to pass on it, given the REAL news that's happening in this world of 
> ours right now.

Presumably one is not showing the news of a rally because only the people
who were there could be interested.  If that were the case, the Super Bowl
would not be reported because only the people in the stands would care
about it.  The war would not be reported because no one here is actively
fighting.  Now you may be saying that in the whole country only 250,000
people are interested in a rally, but I disagree with that statement as
well.

The REAL news is that the U.S. is fighting a war and that the public is
not being given the truth about this war.  The REAL news covers all topics
of the massacre, not just the propaganda approved by the military.  The
REAL news is not a Nintendo game night after night.  (The Nintendo game
is great propaganda in part because the TV camera self-destructs and
the viewer is not permitted to see the damage to the buildings and the
people inside and the censors can decide which Nintendo to show.  They
would never show the errant missile attacking humans, for example.)

The REAL news is how many people have been killed or maimed.  Gen.
Schwarzkopf says that body counts are unimportant, but they are
terribly important to the people killed and maimed and there families.
(But pictures of fatalities may lessen our resolve to fight to the finish
so they aren't shown).  The REAL news is the damage we have done to Iraqi
cities.

The REAL news is that S.H. bought most of technology from the West.
The REAL news is the U.S. supported S.H. when he was using chemical
weapons against Iran.  If chemical weapons are so bad (I don't doubt
that they are), then why did we support him when he was using them?

The REAL news is that we are fighting a war over oil, and Bush's budget
contains little to reduce our consumption of oil.  The REAL news is
that we have billions to spend on high-tech weapons, but we can't find
enough money to reduce infant mortality.

In spite of this REAL news, the Nova last week shows a repeat of a
program on camouflage but with a few updates to praise our stealth
fighter.  Who makes that?  Would you believe one of the major sponsors
of the program?  Isn't it great that ``Viewers like you'' can support
this advertisment?  What happened to the REAL news?

David Gast