Thoughts at the office
Reading ntcoolfool's journal, and especially some of the comments that media people left seeking interviews, got me thinking.
A lot of people complain that during tragedies, the media are vultures. And some of those entries are pretty bad...not the entries themselves, but after he posts how the VT massacre affects him, he gets anonymous comments like "Hi, I'm from the CBC, call me." There's only a couple problems: A) all media outfits are businesses these days, and are run with an eye towards profit and B) horrible tragedies on page one sell by far the most copy.
People complain that "the media only reports on bad news!" Well, hell yeah we do. If we write about firefighters pulling kittens out of trees no one reads it. These are things people want to know. Every media source thinks: "If we don't report on them, people will go to other sources that do." It's the same problem with 24-hour news channels. Even though usually there's nothing to say, you have to be saying something, or the viewers will go to the competition.
Also on the subject of the media...a glorious, stirring eulogy for Kurt Vonnegut. Classy, FauxFox News. Classy.
A lot of people complain that during tragedies, the media are vultures. And some of those entries are pretty bad...not the entries themselves, but after he posts how the VT massacre affects him, he gets anonymous comments like "Hi, I'm from the CBC, call me." There's only a couple problems: A) all media outfits are businesses these days, and are run with an eye towards profit and B) horrible tragedies on page one sell by far the most copy.
People complain that "the media only reports on bad news!" Well, hell yeah we do. If we write about firefighters pulling kittens out of trees no one reads it. These are things people want to know. Every media source thinks: "If we don't report on them, people will go to other sources that do." It's the same problem with 24-hour news channels. Even though usually there's nothing to say, you have to be saying something, or the viewers will go to the competition.
Also on the subject of the media...a glorious, stirring eulogy for Kurt Vonnegut. Classy, FauxFox News. Classy.