News = Money!

February 7, 2010 – by Gregory Franklyn

Nothing has illustrated to me the crisis in the dissemination of factual news and information more than the Health Care Reform debate over the last year! The most significant problem the 4^th Estate faces in disseminating useful and/or factual information is Money, and I’m sure that’s no surprise. But, what may be a surprise is how deeply the financial pressures on the Mainstream Media has effected what is presented to you as News & Information, on a daily basis.

Rising costs for television broadcasting and more broadcasting facilities have caused ad revenue to be squeezed because it has to be distributed over more hours of local programming by more broadcasting outlets. It’s a jungle out there! The overall result has been fewer reporters, with less time for in depth research scrambling everyday to fill expanded hours of news. At the same time, they are competing for ratings with several other stations in their local market.

As corporations are want to do, they saw a need and they filled it. Roughly a third of the stories you see on your news every evening are what is called “VNR’s” (Video News Releases). They are the video equivalent of a Press Release. The US Government originates a lot of them too. The Government releases are usually designed to direct your attention to something they want you to think or feel. The corporate ones, usually focus on a product or service.

A good example of corporate VNRs are the stories you see about expensive new technologies that corporations are selling to The Homeland Security Department for use in airports. VNRs are easy to recognize. If you see a story and none of your local personalities appear on screen, it’s a VNR. These releases are available to your local news stations at no cost that are used every day to fill time that the stations need in order to sell more advertising. No one is required to tell you that what you are watching is a VNR. They simply mix it in with the rest of the stories. It’s up to you to determine what’s a Press Release and what’s a news story. The question you need to ask is, “Where does this VNR come from, who’s paying for it and what’s in it for them?” The likely-hood that there’s something in it for you is slim at best!

The integrity of news has long since been compromised. If you’re old enough to remember Dan Rather walking off the set of the CBS evening news one night, that should have been a red flag about what News and Information had become at the Network level. Dan Rather was an old school reporter that came up in the news at a time when it was actually News and Information. The man had some balls and some integrity.

He saw the writing on the wall way back then. He returned the next night, but personally I’d have a lot more respect for him if he had just kept on walking. I think he realized way back then that it was already too late to change the force of inertia that killed journalism as a public service.

It’s a fact that stories critical of companies that buy advertising on local stations are almost never covered by that station. In Dan Rather’s case it would have been criticism of the company that OWNED the frigging network and signed his paycheck.

I have always liked a bumper sticker I see a lot here in Portland. Our local paper is called “The Oregonian” and their slogan is “If It Matters to Oregonians, you’ll find it in the Oregonian”. Several times, we will learn of a story that is critical of a company like Kroger Foods from a national news outlet, but not from a local one. (Kroger owns “Fred Meyer” stores which are a big deal here and spend millions every year on print and broadcast advertising).

The bumper sticker I’m referring to came out of our local realization of the fact that big advertisers are generally immune to criticism in local media. The sticker reads, “If it matters to Oregonians, you’ll find it in the Washington Post!” The amount of money a company spends on media advertising is directly related to how immune they are to criticism and affects what you see and read in the media.

However, it’s the competition aspect of the news that affects what you see more than any other factor. News = Money. It’s a very simple equation. It’s the top AND bottom line in mainstream Media and there are no exceptions! If you don’t get the ratings, you don’t get the money! It’s as simple as that!

Every year in Phoenix Arizona you will see a story about how hot it is. How hot is it? Your friendly neighborhood TV reporter will fry an egg on the hood of a car for you right there on TV. That’s how hot it is. Here in Portland, every flu season, local stations will take a scientist into someone’s kitchen and bathroom and do a germ count. You think your kitchen and bathroom are CLEAN? “Think again”, our local bubble-headed bleach blonde sternly warns! “Coming up next; Is your water safe to drink?” The answer, after you’ve endured yet another warm and fuzzy love note from your local Toyota Dealer apologizing for selling cars that kill people and promising not to do it again, is always “YES”, but by that time the program has successfully gotten you to sit through the message that Toyota paid them for.

What you see on the News is no longer about anything you need to know. It’s about compelling you to remain in front of the TV set during the commercials. Compelling teasers and compelling stories are how they do that. Here’s a partial list of the things that compel you to sit through commercials, and this applies to all programming, not just the news:

Fear of Danger, Scandal, Disaster, Conflict, Outrage, Greed and Shock!

These are the primary tools used by the media to compel you to remain in front of your TV or radio or to buy that magazine or newspaper. What do they all have in common besides the fact that they are compelling? They are all negatives!

Which brings me to the Health Care Muggings! You watched your fellow Americans acting out, up to and including carrying loaded weapons, over wild imaginings planted in them by Conservatives who oppose reform to a system that is clearly broken,,, for most Americans, that is. It’s working our swimmingly for corporations involved in Health Care that have enough disposable income to spend millions on political campaigns and lobbyists!

The reason you saw those town halls and not the ones where everyone was civil to one another is because the media needs compelling drama to keep you in your seat. The more outrageous the lies about the Health Care Bill, the more you were told about them.

That’s how you know about “Death Panels”. The media feeding you that garbage knows it’s an out and out lie, but it’s compelling and that’s why you saw so much of it. You know all about Senators Larry Craig and John Ensign’s sex lives and Senator Chuck Grassley’s “Kill your Grandma” BS. The reason that you know who these people are is because the media needs them to compel you to stay tuned!

All forms of Media’s very existence depends on their ability to manipulate you to stay put so they can sell that attention to advertisers. That’s why Radio Stations do promotions. Right now here in Portland KUPL radio is doing a promotion where they send out an intern to accidentally drop a dollar bill on the floor at a local mall. If you pick up that dollar bill and call the station with the right serial number you win thousands of dollars to go along with it. The result is that more people tune in to KUPL to find out clues as to which mall the dollar bill got dropped in and, of course, while you’re already there, you’ll likely buy something from one of their advertisers.

The content of your news and information has become whatever the media can dream up to manipulate your behavior, rather than anything you might need to know about. Meanwhile the FCC, which is charged with stewardship of YOUR public airways that should be advocating for YOUR best interests stand idly by watching, and being manipulated, right along with you, while fewer and fewer corporate interests buy up more and more media outlets. Not only is it a jungle out there, but you’re out there on your own, too!

I learned all of this from my decade as a television producer and educator and my advise to you tonight is to consume media with trepidation and to educate yourself to consume media with a critical eye. Please be cautioned; just because someone says something on TV, Radio or in print does not make it true. There is no requirement in your constitutional guarantee of free speech that anyone has to tell the truth. It’s up to you to determine who IS and who ISN’T!

My point is, because it’s so obvious what will attract the media and the fact that they don’t have the time, money or desire to check out your story, they have become easy to manipulate into saying whatever you want them to say. Think of modern day reporters as stenographers, typists or copy machines. The more compelling or outrageous your story, the more coverage it will get regardless of whether it’s true or not!

Much Love,

Gregory

March 7, 2010 · GLFranklyn · No Comments
Tags: Corporate Greed, Current Events, Economics, Health Care, Media · Posted in: Current Events, Health Care, Media