« Of Spaceships and Rocketships | Main | Penny Pinching »
June 24, 2004
All the News that fit to print
One of the biggest promises of the internet has been the ability to mass disseminate information to an audience diverse in locations, cultures, and opinions. Overall, the experiment has been rather successful, and the recent proliferation of blogs has been a positive sign of this features continued existence. There are now numerous alternative news sites, the mainstream news sites, and most importantly an easy means with which to discover many of these tidbits (think google or yahoo searches) providing the internet with a content rich environment not found elsewhere.
Which is why, this article on CNN.com about what actually constitutes news surprises me. CNN has tried to fashion itself as the source for all that is news, by providing an objective view towards it's coverage of various topics. Obviously, this doesn't apply to the opinion or talk show segments which are by nature designed to not be objective but inflammatory. As I see, they've done a pretty good job at keeping the individual segments relatively non-opinionated, but that is where objective nature of the programming ends. CNN has historically been found to invite guest panelists and include and exclude segments that support the channels' unspoken agenda. The point of this posting isn't to debate the agenda of CNN, but if you're interested you can find out more at www.fair.org, or your favorite search engine.
Then what it is the point? Reading the original article, CNN seems to mock the broadcast news networks for running news segments about "the final episode of Friends" (among others). As this has been one of the more recent events, I can remember watching small segments on CNN Headline News about this very topic. Why this mockery of other news sites? More than likely to create an air of elitism, when applied with some revisionist history. Doing some searches on CNN's website, you can't find any mention of the Friends finale now, or maybe they just want me to pay for said content, something I refuse to do.
But they do raise an interesting question; When did pop-culture become headline news? When I was younger, I remember television news being one of the most boring and drab segments on TV. This was partially because the news was less interesting to me at the time, but also due to the manner of presentation (mono-tone voice, etc). This might be the rose tint in my vision, but I also remember shows like Extra or Entertainment Tonight filling the void for pop-culture news (there are now numerous speciality news shows doing this). When did it become acceptable to merge these two show formats? Is this a side-effect of the massive mergers of mass-media? Remember, most of the mass media outlets are now owned by for-profit companies, many of which are in the entertainment industry. By law, these institutions are required to put investor interest above all other considerations. This includes presentation of news, selection of segments, and ordering of segments.
To borrow a quote from George Seldes:
"The most stupid boast in the history of present-day journalism is that of the writer who says, 'I have never been given orders; I am free to do as I like.'"
[EDIT: As proof of this whole do as I say not as I do message, this morning CNN.com has the byline "Rapper DMX arrested in New York" listed as a headline under both Entertainment and Law sections.] 
Posted by Dan at June 24, 2004 10:25 PM