June 29, 2009
-
State of the News
Oh dear, it’s time for me to get complainy. I really hate doing this, but I feel I have to say (and by “say” I mean “write”) something. Today, I am complaining about 24-hour TV news stations. Let me set up the scene: I’m in the lunch room at work enjoying a bowl of microwave minestrone while watching the TV. Sure, it was Fox News, but I didn’t let that bother me. They were covering the Bernie Madoff court case. When I sat down, about 11:30 am EST, they reported breaking news that he was sentenced to 150 years in prison. “Well, that’s dandy,” I thought as my soup was heating up. What followed was thirty more minutes of Madoff “coverage.” I put the word “coverage” in quotes for a reason. During that half-hour, there was no additional information. They were, literally, just wasting time. After the conviction announcement, they spent maybe five minutes recapping everything that Madoff had done for the approximately five people on the planet who didn’t already know. The remaining twenty-five involved an overhead video of the courthouse and people outside. I wish I was being hyperbolic, but that is actually what was being shown on the television screen. The only other things on the screen were, from largest to smallest: a big text graphic screaming that Madoff was sentenced to 150 years, the news ticker, and a tiny picture-in-picture box. This tiny box, where I would at least expect some news to come from, featured nothing more than eye roll-worthy sob stories and ditzy anchorwomen engaging in pointless speculation. Geez, at least try to multitask. I can understand you want to be the first news station to present a tiny overhead shot of Madoff being escorted away in handcuffs (I’m writing this before I saw him leave, so I’m only assuming), but at least try to multitask. You can even keep that leviathan helicopter feed dominating the screen; just give me some actual news. It wasn’t until I was getting up to leave, my lunch break over, that they finally tore themselves away to report on other important news: namely that the 911 call regarding Billy Mays’ death was released (groan, more non-news).
Don’t think that this is only Fox News’ problem. I have seen other TV news stations do this sort of thing for other stories: shamelessly faff about simply because they don’t know what to do with themselves. Not too long ago, I was reading a newspaper on campus and somebody actually stopped to ask me why I was reading one. This post is part of the reason why! (The post’s content, not the post itself). That way, I could get all the news I need in a reasonable amount of time without all of the sob stories, speculation, and general faffing about. Even if some of that is included in a news article, I can skip over it and not waste time.
Sorry, I didn’t mean for this to turn into a newspaper rant. Still, it feels good to let out some pent up aggression. I apologize if this post wasn’t funny. I was just writing what I was thinking after a somewhat disheartening lunch break.
Comments (4)
I know exactly what u mean. It has just been constant footage of Madoff walking in and out of court. Must be a slow news day.
Well those stations air the breaking news all day for people who don't sit and watch TV all day so they can flip it on and hear the story even though it broke hours ago. That's the whole point of 24-hour news stations, lol. The only one I can't stand is stupid Nancy Grace and her damn tot story. God it's been playing MONTHS!! If you just wanna hear the story, just check news.google.com every once in a while.
While I generally agree with the sentiment that 24 hour news stations are, in general, quite useless, I cannot necessarily agree with the entire idea that the release of Billy Mays' 911 call was non-news. In all technicality, it was news - just not the kind that you wanted to hear. What makes it non-news is the incessant beating to death of that tidbit of news into a paper thin sheet of 30 minute programming. TV sucks, and while I don't read newspapers, I can understand that they are outstanding sources of current information - I just prefer to skip both outlets and head straight to the internet.
How was the soup?
It's pretty hard to have 24 hours worth of news, let alone continual interesting stories forever until fox inevitably dies. You have to give them a little credit for trying, albiet as little credit as possible; even so there is only one solution for those guys. Don't do it.
Newspapers are almost infinitly better than the news stations. You know with all the citations, testamonies, and other ways of getting facts from generally honest places (sometimes....err...once in a while). Too bad all the newspaper companies will cease to exist soon thanks to those shoddy news shows and the internet.