Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!rice!titan!phil From: phil@titan.rice.edu (William LeFebvre) Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle Subject: Re: Space muzak (Mission Status Report #12) Message-ID: <3041@kalliope.rice.edu> Date: 6 Apr 89 20:45:38 GMT References: <18927@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu> <2520@phred.UUCP> <11232@well.UUCP> Sender: usenet@rice.edu Reply-To: phil@Rice.edu (William LeFebvre) Organization: Rice University, Houston Lines: 44 In article <11232@well.UUCP> tneff@well.UUCP (Tom Neff) writes: >Before wasting too much time flogging the "media" as villain of choice >re: astronaut wakeup music and other such frivolous non-events during >mission coverage, I wish readers would remember that it's NASA who >chooses to spoon feed these things to us via press releases and >NASASELECT coverage. Obviously this is part of what NASA wants us to >hear about the mission. Total disagreement from this corner. NASA Select shows ALL activities for the ENTIRE flight. They even put together these nifty summaries at the end of the day. The MEDIA chooses what portions of that coverage to tape and reply. The MEDIA chooses what will be presented to the viewing public. The MEDIA chooses the wording of the reports. NASA provides them with a great deal of information (obviously too much to be presented in a 2 minute news item). It is the media that prunes down this information and decides what gets cut and what gets aired. As for spoon feeding, the media usually needs spoon feeding. Did you see any of the change-of-shift briefings during STS-26 (they were all carried on NASA select)? Some of those reporters seemed awfully dense. Just about every reporter in the room asked "is the temperature in the shuttle uncomfortable for the crew?" They wouldn't take "the crew is comfortable" for an answer! And trying to explain the technical aspects of the problem to the media was even worse. That just generated more questions and misinterpretations. I think I still have that on tape somewhere.......I should transcribe some of it for you. Unbelievable! >At least we don't hear QUITE so much about what they had for breakfast >the morning of the launch, these days. Maybe because it's some >kind of green disgusting ROBOCOP-type paste? But not by NASA's choice. The crew breakfast, complete with commentary, is aired on NASA select just like it has always been. Would you like me to find out what the STS-29 crew had for breakfast that morning? It's the MEDIA that has decided to not focus on that bit of triviality anymore. I don't mean to come out sounding like "NASA can do no wrong". I know they can. But let's at least concentrate on the things they really *are* doing wrong. William LeFebvre Department of Computer Science Rice University