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Corporate Propaganda Still On the News
mofomojo writes, "Democracy Now! reports that a new study by the Center for Media and Democracy says Americans are still being shown corporate public relations videos disguised as news reports on newscasts across the country. In April, the Center identified 77 stations using Video News Releases in their newscasts; the findings led to an investigation by the Federal Communications Commission. A followup study has found that 10 of those stations are still airing VNRs today, for a new total of 46 stations in 22 states." From the article: "Most of the VNRs have aired on stations owned by large media conglomerates such as News Corp., Tribune, and Disney. They've also been sponsored by some of the country's biggest corporations including General Motors, GlaxoSmithKline, and Allstate Insurance."
Microsoft survey say's they are best, film at 11.
Adverts disguised as stories?
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
.. the first one to say DUH
or they will get caught airing their corporate advertisments of the Republican Party.
I've seen a few of these fake corporate news stories, and usually it's pretty obvious that the story came from a company (particularly for regular viewers, since the local news reporters are typically not involved). As sneaky as this is though, I'd much rather watch corporate ads disguised as news than government propaganda disguised as news, something the current administration has been found to do.
Either way, it's pretty sneaky and low.
Crack - Free with every butt and set of boobs
Well put.
There is another kind of evil which we must fear most, and that is the indifference of good men. -- Boondock Saints
Has anyone else noticed that at every turn corporations again and again attempt to subvert the powers of the state and twist both public opinion and the law to their own benefit. In many cases, large corporations behave like small, independant countries or baronies, accountable to no one but themselves and largely immune from reprecussion. Only the state can realistically challenge their authority, and even then only with considerable effort and expense.
The situation in many ways resembles the old medieval baronies, who quarralled and feuded amoung themselves, and methaphoricall and literally stamped on the faces of the general population. The state/king had only limited ability to exercise control and essentially each barony was a virtual state within a state. In many cases, different parts of a country could be at war with one another, or with the monarchy.
In case anyone thinks this is a bit far fetched, consider this. What if MegaCorp(TM), drove up to your house one day and towed away your car on some flimsy legal pretense? Barons and Lords did this kind of thing all the time. What can you do? It's getting to the point that the police will not even dare to investigate large corporations with their armies of lawyers. Your ability to conclude a successful suit before you grow old and die is also ever decreasing.
You get a lot of SciFi where in the furture, corporations rule everything. Is this really so far fetched? If they have more de facto power and influence than the nation states in which they reside, then what is to stop them, like the old barons before them, from simply all but forming states of their own? Maybe Richelieu's reforms will be rolled back, just in a different form.
May the Maths Be with you!
Shit, they are still showing political stories disguised as news too. kdawson likes those.
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to think "profiling is worse than the slaughter of innocent people..."
Why not link to the the real article instead of, or in addition to, the story about the article?
There isn't any real news. Don't you realize it yet. Stories are generated and fed to the media by the PR departments of the various interests. How it works is a bunch of 'journalists' sit in a room and generate feel good stories about the establishment and negative ones about whoever we happened to be currently at war with. You see it doesn't really matter if what is reported happened, all is required is the 'facts' be spun in favour of the winners. Like when Bush recently legalised the torture of prisoners, NBC reported this as Bush banning torture.
davecb5620@gmail.com
I think it would make more sence these days to point out news that really is news.
How about a this-is-really-news and this-is-really-news-for-nerds departments? Slashdot?
But also for other special interest groups we're supposed to like.
It's nice to see that somebody else finally noticed. Glenn Reynolds was writing about this problem back in 2002:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,42050,00.html
Recycling is supposed to be a good thing, so you'd think that media organizations would be proud when they do it. But in fact, they tend to keep it quiet.
I'm not talking about aluminum cans here, but about the tendency of media organizations to turn press releases and written-to-order opinion pieces into apparently objective accounts. This happens all the time, partly because of media laziness, and partly because of ingenuity on the part of the various advocacy groups that depend on media coverage to advance their agendas and promote their fundraising campaigns.
The first part of this formula, media laziness, was demonstrated by journalism students here at the University of Tennessee a few years ago. They produced a fake press release for a non-existent student group opposed to political correctness and sent it to various news organizations. Some ran the item; some even embellished the report of an event that never happened with additional details that weren't in the phony press release. None called the contact number (which was genuine) or did anything else to check its validity. Yet when they were exposed, their response was to call the experiment "unethical."
http://instapundit.com/archives/021755.php
News stories, to a degree seldom appreciated by the general public, are often the product of press releases generated by trade associations and interest groups. Often those releases are converted into news stories by the simple expedient of placing a reporter's byline on top. Television news stories (especially those appearing on local stations) are often supplied fully produced, with blank spots left for the local news reporter to insert commentary that makes the story appear his or her own. Opinion columns are often "placed" by businesses or interest groups to support a particular point of view -- often, they are even written by those groups and then run with the byline of distinguished individuals, or even regular commentators, who have barely read the piece, much less written it. Indeed, the Sasso "attack video" was something of this sort, for the journalists who broke the Biden/Kinnock story did not at first disclose their source.
Most readers and viewers have small appreciation of how little of what they see on television or read in newspapers and magazines is original with the reporters, editors, and producers involved. Yet in fact news organizations are highly dependent on predigested information from public relations firms, government officials, and advocacy groups, information that is often passed on to their readers and viewers with no indication that it is not original. That problem is not new, but it has gotten worse in recent years. . . .
Although a "video news release" is still more expensive to produce than a standard paper press release, they have become much more common. According to a recent poll, seventy-five percent of TV news directors reported using video news releases at least once per day.
Corporations that pay media companies money sometimes affect their programming content. More at a 11.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
The trite reply to this article is -DON'T watch it-. I threw out my TV in 2000; I have a Mac, w/ great DVD capability, I rent stuff that's really great --Ken Burns stuff (jazz..), The Sopranos (isn't organized crime SO MUCH MORE interesting than the disorganized variety?), HBO and Showtime specials..... Other than that, TV is a wasteland. Go re-rent Clooney's 'Goodnight and Good Luck', pay attention to this gracious man's words about television. Show your kids.... But mostly, TV's PURE drek. DREK!! Makes kids stupid, and adults, even stupider. DON'T DO IT!! Resist your corporate overlords!! cheers, skeezix-the-cat.
--I do what I can, I work in the dark.
One factor that seems to be overlooked is viewer ability to smell a rat and subsequently not be taken in. I feel more people realize the segment is a crafted fake, versus a genuine news spot, than the agencys doing the monitoring assume. I know I've seen these and have been able to tell, and if I can detect the fraud, so can others.
Want something to really worry about in terms of broadcast hyjinks? MTV is using the tried and true subliminal 'power of suggestion' in various spots in their broadcasts in Asia. I happened to be capturing TV via a DVR one evening, and when I played back my sample via the jog wheel, I was able to clearly see a text message inside a faint white rectangular box, overlaid into a short commercial for an upcoming show. It came and went quickly...'progress is now - Fridays on MTV'...not long enough to spot unless you were paying close attention at that moment, but long enough to be captured by the brain for subliminal decoding...ouch. MTVs' idea or broadcast on the behest of some agency, perhaps?
Propaganda is as old as the printing press. Back in the days if you had political aspirations, you got editorials into the newspaper. This gave you exposure and the opportunity to push an agenda. These days it's much more sophisticated -- you've got people with absolutely no desire to be a public servant getting paid pretty decent money to cater a political agenda (Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, etc.). Since the people they most like to criticize have no power, they've moved beyond being mere editorialists to being Republican idea-brokers.
Brief aside: While that's going to sound partisan, think about it. You've got one party that wants to tax the rich and one party that wants to cut taxes to the rich. (a) If you're rich, who're you going to side with? (b) List the number of CEOs for companies out there that aren't rich. Of course there are exceptions, George Soros I guess being a big one. Still, on the whole, propagandizing for the conservative movement is much older and more universal than the Republican/Democrat duality.
Back on topic: What's news isn't that we're being targetted with propaganda. What's news is that we're THINKING it's news, when really it's been happening all along. Sort of scary that alot of people believe that propaganda is all silly WW2 posters and such and a thing of the past. It's sophisticated. Like the Devil, it's greatest victory is convincing the world that it doesn't exist -- and there are a LOT of people who don't believe propaganda exists. I guess, because, to realize it means to admit we've been suckered by it, and nobody wants to think of themselves as a sucker.
When the news is over, you then get Democrat party talking points andpolicy thinly disguised as sitcoms and Dramas (west wing, etc)
Most usians may not be familiar with it, but fascism at it's core is the joining of political and corporate powers. Both Italy and Germany in the 30s had huge corporate blocks that had a lot of political power. That may give you some pause next time you see all the 'campaign donations' that flow one way. What do you think flows the other way?
(oh and mods: please show your immaturiy to mod something down when you don't agree with it)
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This isn't any different then what happens every day in newspapers when reporters lift quotes from company press releases. If the reporter is worth a shit, they will add their own sources to it, but not their own spin. In some cases, this might be the only way to access a national level source who is difficult to reach, let alone film, especially with limit travel budget. But many, with the power in hand, will add their own spin. The lie occurs when the reporter does this, but doesn't disclose their own (or stations/newspapers) agenda.
You can piss on Rush, Sean H., and the air america talkers all you want, but they fully disclose their agenda. The old main stream media hasn't realized this yet.
Not only can the corporations bully the little guy, they can bully the Government. After all, some of these corporations are global in scale, and have economic resources that dwarf those of many countries. I think that's why Microsoft only got a slap on the wrist in their anti-monopoly case aa while back.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
No way! News are good. Like that important piece of nerd news that you can now see corporate logos from space. (though it was still a bit unclear if they have a drive in lane in the orbit)
Those Workers World Party mouthpieces over there in their little firehouse do nothing but pass wingnut conspiracy theories as news. Their biggest story? Dick Cheney flew two cargo planes (armed with military pods) into the twin towers while surrounded by Jewish bankers in the sub-basement of the NYSE, after which the CIA detonated explosives which were planted two days prior during a mysterious fire drill. The freemasons then stole all of the gold from the WTC vaults so as to further fund their worldwide domination. Other great feats of DN/WBAI? Accusing Rudy Guliani of trying to keep WBAI shut down after 9/11 due to the dust. Afterwards they bitched 24/7 about letting them in too soon and not doing an environmental impact study and endangering their lives. Sneaking on to the NYSE floor during an invitation-only party and harassing guests. Actively supporting dictators like Kim Jong Il. Bantering as nausium about Islam is so wonderful and peaceful and misunderstood...I have yet to see Jews and Christians fly planes into large buildings, though. Let the flames begin!
When I was in college, I had a part time job as a classroom tech. You see, we had fancy, computerized classrooms that the profs really weren't trained to use. When they ran into issues, I had to help them.
One of the classes I did this for was a sophmore or junior level public relations class. The technique of handing the news something that looks like a news video, but is really just a corporate press release, was explicitly covered in this class. Not only was it covered, but it was encouraged as a legitimate and smart method of getting the word out.
In other words, the underlying problem might not just be corporate greed, or the laziness of news organizations - it could be that this kind of public relations is still being taught as appropriate in schools. Time to beef up the ethics training in the college of communications?
Plausible conjecture should not be misrepresented as proof positive.
... and when you're done with that, maybe you'll remember that all TV News is Television first. That's why we don't call it News TV.
Thank God! Now, we know the truth.
This is something that happens in print too with advertorials. Recently in PC Gamer there was a huge section in there about cellphone games. I'm in advertising, and thus have pretty finely honed ad senses so I could tell pretty quickly it was sponsored by Cingular, but the section was HUGE, and the ONLY indication I had of this was the TINY TINY black text on dark background on the very front page that said "ADVERTISEMENT". Absolutely disgusting.
If you find this sort of crap on TV or in print, feel free to call the station/publisher and let them know your feelings about being misled by their content and explain how you are going to be perusing their competitors media instead.
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
Up until election day last week the company that employs me sent emails every day to advise me on how I should vote to best impact the company's wishes. Every fall I endure coercion to give to United Way, including a meeting for those of us who opt out getting a special "sit down" to help us understand why it is important. Every spring I am "encouraged" to participate in the company sponsored "walk for this" or "pledge for that". Note that company policy strictly prohibits me from visiting political web sites, handing out political infromation, engaging in excessive political/social/religious debate or soliciting for any charity on company time or property.
I can no longer refuse company provided health insurance without providing written proof that I get some coverage from my spouses employer? Alcohol is now banned from the company "holiday" party because the company wants to shield itself from any risk, and of course protect our health as well.
Some of you will ask why I stay; simple answer, the pay check is fat and the work somewhat engaging. If either of those change, I am out of here, but for the time being... After 20 years of working I have come to the conclusion that all large companies act like this, and while some idealist will pop in and tell me to go work for a small company; mega-corp is where the money is for the most part.
I wish T.V. was the only problem....
# Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose...
Only three things are certain; death, taxes, and apocryphal quotations - Ben Franklin.
This organization calls itself "Democracy Now!" yet fawns over Fidel Castro as if he really were leading a democratic government.
Do you have ESP?
The part we should be truly offended about is that this sort of thing works. People watch their local news, and say "gee, if Asian Reporter Trisha Takinowa says global warming is horseshit, it must be!" I don't see anything wrong with bias in the news, so long as all the facts are presented.
Hear! Hear! Doesn't anyone remember " Mad City " from '97?
Let me introduce you to my very own DMCA-protected encryption key: BC 1B 64 4A 8D DE 49 E8 C3 7D CC EE 1A AD EE
Even more insidious is the media's tenancy to state as fact corporate assertions. Its worse because I believe it is much easier for JQP to swallow these whole. For example, in how many newscasts have you heard something like "the music industry lost 8 bajillion dollars to piracy last year.", with no mention of how everyone and his brother outside of the music industry disputed that claim.
A passion for apathy.
Work that anti-business /. meme for fun and karma!
Hot on the heels of telling us these things are shown by "News Corp., Tribune, and Disney," Captain Obvious wants us to know that they're paid for by "the country's biggest corporations." Whoa. No kidding, Sherlock. What next? Water Wet, film at 11:00?
The only people with money to produce this crap are big corporations. It's pretty unlikely that Joe's Pizza is going to be able to pay for an advertisement disguised as a hard-hitting news story on the benefits of eating pepperoni. It's equally unlikely that big business is going to spend tens of thousands of dollars on these things and then air them on Public Access Channel 9.
I swear that the stories here are getting more and more like tabloid articles written by four-year-olds after one too many servings of Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs. I suppose that with my high UID, I shouldn't be complaining about the decline and fall of slashdot, but it's hard to resist when stories like this are "news for nerds"
Interested in a Flash-based MAME front end? Visit mame.danzbb.com
Not to start a huge flame war but I think this raises the issue of how modern capitalism which is reflected in the institution of the Corporation has an impact on modern democracies.
The Corporation as an institution focuses on one thing; to benefit itself (profit). The classical theorists would argue that making a profit in the free market would coincide with the common good. However the idealized free market is not a real world example and in real world examples we find a "clustering" effect where economic power becomes consolidated with a very few. Therefore they act only to benefit a select minority.
Democracy in its modern form via representative governments has basically three basic premises; transparency of government, accountability of the government and the equal protection of the rights of all citizens. The role of the government is to provide for its citizens solutions through policy over matters of importance to its citizenry. But also to protect the rights of minorities over the majority.
In these two structures we have two very distributions of power. In the Corporation power is held by the top percentile. In Democracy power is distributed more cleanly, representatives and government officials wield more power by the nature of their office however they are bound by the rule of law. Also in a functioning democracy these officials are never in power for too long and are accountable to the public (elections). The basic incongruence of these power structures, the Corporation and the Democratic State, leads to a conflict.
They also love the fascist dictator of Venezuela, and their coverage of the Middle East is downright antisemitic.
Where were you when the voynix came?
I would like to thank ITAR-TASS for bringing this to our attention. This will help me separate the news from the capitolist propoganda. Long live comrade Stalin!!!
That's what video is so important on the Web. The Elite and their puppets (Rove, Bush et al) love....love to spin that the media is control by the Democrats - or controlled by the so-called Left (which of course doesn't exist (more spin)) but all the while, the Elite dominate all the media, everywhere. And brain wash millions ...... 50 million or so in the last election in the USA
And it's now so obvious that the Elite are spreading their bullshit onto the Web - with it's "Pay For Say" web sites - 1000s and 1000s of web sites.
What's even worse is Web users who believe everything they see on the Web - when folks here start quoting Wikipeeedia - then I know "we" are all in deep shit.
I don't know whethet to laugh and cry when I hear all over the Web - for example - from web site producers who think that movies or video on the Web - means animating magazine pages (to make them load as slow as possible!?). These same schlock site makers more often than not, then start yacking that "we" don't need more television on the Web because "we" have 1000s of channels to watch on regular TV...blah blah blah. Of course these web site killers all crapped in their pants when YouTube sold for 1.5 billion.Too bad YouTube uses Flash - which sucks...sucks badly. More schlock.
Band width needs to be preserved for true streaming of video on the Web. All web pages that simply use Flash to make magazine pages wiggle - needs to be banned! If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video must be worth millions of words. Even the dumb assed Fascist Republicans understand that.
Corporate propaganda isnt' really still in the news. The giant anti-corporate propaganda industry produced and planted this story, and duped news outlets are reporting it. It's entirely untrue that any news outlet would run a story that was pla... nt... oh, wait... Darn.
Can anyone tell me how to set my sig on Slashdot?
Honestly, is this any different than a press release? I mean seriously, when i submit a press release on a slow news day, i can expect to find some to most of it copied verbatim into a news story the same day. Is this really any diffrent?
Also, what about places like CNN who *pay* al-queida for propaganda tapes and then air them? Why is this kind of thing OK to groups like Democracy Now? May that be against their political interests? hmm.
...which is why I listen to PRI/NPR. I would be overwhelmed with shock to see hour blocks devoted to true discussion of important topics by leaders in their field on both sides of a story on FOX, or CNN (don't get me started on the utter slop that is nightly local news). In between these discussions they report news via BBC WorldWide, which is one of the most respected, public driven news outlets on the planet.
I watch FOX on occasion for pure enjoyment in exercise. I can talk about all the things flashing on the screen for hours. It's quite fun. I love John Stewart's take on it...
"The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge." - Daniel Boorstin
...and DNC talking points being presented as news?
We must be alert to the danger that public policy could become captive to a scientific-technological elite. - Eisenhower
The media, at least mass media, are by their very definition and size required to be corporations by themselves. The difference to "normal" corporations is that the goods they sell are information.
Or opinion.
In a democracy, you cannot rule against the people. Or so you're told in school. Actually, you cannot rule against the public opinion. If that opinion is based on information and facts, and people finding their own opinions, this is actually a good thing.
That's not the reality today, though.
Public opinion is made and shaped by the media. You're told what you're supposed to hear, you're shown what you're supposed to see and more often than not, you're also told what you're supposed to think and believe because "that's the public opinion". To support it you often get to see some statistics that make the statistician in me cringe, because you can see easily how crooked they are sometimes.
And hey, if "the people" believe that, how can it be wrong? 10000 say yes, you say no, now who's more likely wrong? You? Or 10000 others?
There's a carefully crafted and delicate balance of power (and money) between government, corporations and media (corporations). You, the voter, don't matter anymore. You're being shifted around and moved, statistically dissected and examined to see what spin would make you vote this or the other way.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The fact is that all news is slanted to the view point of the presenter. Liberals may not notice as much because 80% of the news is slanted their way. Until Fox news came along it was closer to 100%. Everyone should be free to hear the news from their political perspective, with 80% of the new remaining Liberal and about 50% of the people being on the liberal side of things look for Fox News' ratings to continue to climb.
I swear I didn't know it was loaded...
-FL
You had to rescue those nations? How did you do that, go back in time? And now those nations have to pay tribute to you with support for all those other wars your country is diving in?
Pardon me, but have you been drinking the nationalistic-flavoured Kool-aid? All people that fought in WW2 are retired or dead. The politicians that got you in that war are all dead. Do you think you somehow inherited some right over 'your' former allies?
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So when a local station did a "report" on Wal-Mart dropping the price of something or other to a quarter, that wasn't a real story? I feel so used.
In any given 30-minute "news" timeslot I get maybe 5 seconds' worth of actual news between the weather, sports, and paid advertising that should be run during the scheduled commercial breaks. That 5 seconds consists of information I hadn't already found on the internet 2 days previously, and is more often than not celebrity gossip. "Oh, Brittney Spears got divorced. Nifty."
Since so many willingly pledge allegiance to them, I thought I'd just throw that out there.
When you have several 24 hour news stations and about 6 hours of news on local stations you're going to needs some filler. Basically my local evening news is a three hour loop of the same 15 minutes of stories. I'm sure there is stuff that should be reported that simply isn't but for the most part the local news covers little more than the front page headlines of the local paper. Maybe this waste of airtime would be better spent airing more Judge Judy but Joe Sixpack simply isn't going to watch coverage of a high school marching band competition for very long. They NEED to sensationalize a few key stories and keep repeating them. That's their only hope to fill airtime and still keep a viewers interest. It's a sad truth but it's still a truth. I think reports like these would be a bit more insightful (and appear less bias) if they fully covered the aspects the return of investment that "news" crews get for sending people all over the place looking for news versus companies and organizations that are willing to give their broadcast materials away for free for some airtime. It's cheaper than a commercial and people take more notice.
Besides, press releases aren't news? You better tell that to the slashdot editors. Never mind the slashvertisement aspect of it all.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
I RTFA, and the point of the article... is.... what? The media lies? Wow, now there's a news flash.
Local stations can play all the propoganda they way and call it "news." That's their right. The evil creeps in when governments begin to _force_ stations to play propoganda as news.
6th Street Radio @ddombrowsky
One common myth is that corporations pour millions and millions into a candidate's campaign coffers. But they don't and can't. FEC regulations limit donations from one individual or organization to a given candidate or elected official to $2500 in a calendar year. Neither can they give $2500 each to 100 employees on the understanding that they'll give the money to that candidate individually. If they get caught with a scheme like that, or even encouraging their employees to donate to the candidate, they will be in hot water and so will the candidate.
That also goes for what the FEC calls "in-kind" donations, what is popularly called "soft" money. That is considered to be the same as giving them hard cash.
What corporations can and do do is say to candidate X, "We sure love what you stand for, and are sorry we can't give you more. But do you have colleagues who believe as you do whom we could also support?" Then candidate X gets to cherry pick his/her supporters who are also in or seeking office, and the corporation gets to spread its money broadly.
Nevertheless, the level of maximum contribution to a given candidate is low enough that we private citizens might conceivably match it. If you can go beyond that and do what the corporations do, you will get decent access to the candidate on par with what they have. I've seen it, especially on the local level. Doctors, Dentists, and lawyers, usually.
The truth is that corporations really have more influence than John Q. Public because they maintain a relationship with officials and John doesn't bother. But he could.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
So a left wing propaganda group trying to pass itself off as non-partisan, which has a show on NPR which is mostly leftist propaganda passing itself off as news, is complaining about corporate propaganda being passed off as news?
Please keep the references to pots referring to kettles as black to a reasonable volume.
It's not just large corporations that do it. I've seen VNRs and the like from law firms trolling for plaintiffs to join class action suits or to gin up sympathy for one of their cases in advance of jury selection.
"Dr. William Gray, the famed Colorado State University hurricane predictor"
I'm sure that colorado state is a fine institution and all, but shouldn't this be a tip that its fake? What the hell would an expert on hurricanes be doing in the middle of the country? Wouldn't he be at some institution on the east coast or in the gulf region?
Next up, lets talk to the famed Southern Illinois marine biologist Dr. Ima B McFishy.
Water is wet. Especially Dasani water, which has been shown to be 15% wetter than the leading brand. Dasani, from Coca Cola. Ain't nothing like the real thing.
There are 0x40000000 types of people: those who understand 32-bit IEEE 754 floating point, and those who don't.
This seems like a good opportunity to mention "They Rule" located here:
They Rule
Its a neat (flash based sadly) tool allowing you to identify which heads of various corporations are also heads of other corporations and see the web of power and influence they exert. I am sure these individuals don't think of themselves as the defacto government, but I think they are rapidly becoming it.
The core evil to my mind, the main mistake, was in allowing a corporation to have legal status as a type of individual - a "corporate entity" as such. In this role it ends up having more rights than a citizen, and that makes it superior to a citizen in some sense.
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
The anti-TV attitude represents the same sort of close-mindedness found in book burners. TV can't make anyone more stupid than books can.
"Resist your corporate overlords!! "
Oh. A tinfoil helmet nutjob? That must explain it. You'd better burn the books too: most of them are published by corporations. shudder.
Where were you when the voynix came?
So, how many candidates get in that hot water with each election? If the motive is certainly there, but nobody is getting caught, then either your assumption (companies are motivated to buy political influence) is wrong, or the corruption happens but goes undetected.
IMHO all political advertising in all media should be forbidden, there should be no ties between political parties/factions and the media. If a candidate can not spend his election money on ads, he might be less inclined to start smearing.
Alas, one can dream... (or live in the Netherlands
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Surprised? Media agencies are controlled by major politicos... why is it any surprise that their attitude is mimmicked by their creations?
Is this any different from a Hamas member providing footage for Al Jazeera broadcasts, or an IDF provided video airing on Fox News?
They'll air mass murderer's demands for retribution, hell even their savage decapitations. Knowing that, why is it a surprise they are also shills for corporate interests, as well as those who perpetrate acts of violence, all in a quest to increase ratings and to maintain corporate sponsorships?
Corporations are formed to protect and increase wealth for their shared owners, they are in existence to make money. Positive press releases from "friendly" interests, IE those who have a say in their Advertising revenues, are obviously going to be spun in a positive light. While negative press releases will be buried unless they are impossible to avoid, or generate immense viewer interest.
Negative, ala attack reports, will be spun negatively etc. It's quite simple. To maintain income they must appease sponsors and grab viewer attention, not report the news. So news is no longer important, and one could argue it hasn't been for quite a while.
Of course corporate controlled media serves its feduciary interests...
Living in the DC area, these types of "TV Reports" are often pulled right off the fed. gov't Public Affairs Offices Announcements. These "announcement" are often "announcement softeners", it seems, as quite often new official policies are announced soon after such a "news report". Just as often, it seems, does some Congressional vote surface on the exact same subject right after such a gov't PAO report.
These days, quite a few Dept.-level (Fed.) Public Affairs Offices have their own TV studios to create the filler used in these reports. I know FEMA/HSA does. Once the "news" is created, they then "broadcast" the availability to all TV stations, especially when a disaster has struck. Occasionally, they actually broadscast helpful info, but this is not their prime goal, that being information management.
Cragen
I work at a newspaper, and we have a number of advertisers who send in out-of-house designed ads that look exactly like a news story (with a very tiny, faint "advertisement" notice). Usually they are for weight loss pills or crap like that.. We run them anyway, though. *sigh*
"Better to be vulgar than non-existent" -Bev Henson
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6147984.stm seems to be an innocent story, but guess who got it placed? My own company's UK subsidiary. An interesting story nonetheless for us geeks :)
Wait, is this comment a slashvertisement?
Oops
Just because you can, does not mean you should.
Tried and not true, you mean.
http://www.snopes.com/business/hidden/popcorn.asp
Subliminal advertising does not work. It may have a marginal effect that fades very rapidly, but it is much less effective than superliminal advertising, where people are actually aware of the message and will remember it. The only experiment in which it was reported to have Master of Puppets-like mind control effects was not only not reproduced by others who tried to replicate the results, the guy who did the study admitted later he made the whole thing up. (Technically he only admitted to making up the data, but that's more or less the same thing.)
"Now, Chavez has about an 80% approval rating (unlike Bush who is in the 30's). "
Of course Chavez is Loved by Millions. It is the law there. Also, the Dictator of the Month site is not "right wing". It is merely anti-dictator, and shows a marked lack of "wing" bias. Roughly half (or at least half?) of the dictators named are "right wing". If they had any sort of right-wing bias, they would have quietly left OFF the list Pinochet and Marcos and many others.
As for Israel, I know that hatred of Israel is typically rooted in hatred of Jews. I'm honest enough to admit that. Honesty is not shilling. "Disapproval of the policies of the Israeli government" is a straw-man, typically a cover for rabid hatred of Israelis. A typical ludicrous belief that someone hides under mere "disapproval" is the idea that Israel has no right to fight back when attacked or invaded. It ranges from there on down to the belief that Israelis don't have a right to exist: a wish for genocide shared by countries ranging from Iran all the way to "moderate" Dubai.
Where were you when the voynix came?
"Can you even see city hall in most modern city skylines?"
Not much in the free world. In places like the former USSR, you can find such places where government buildings towered over all. Legacies of the time when the supremacy of the leaders was most important (as opposed to supremacy of the people, which tends to encourage private skyscrapers).
Where were you when the voynix came?
It's just free speech in action. If you don't like the articles and ads, just ignore them. It's nothing to get worked up about. I learned long ago not to easily get "sickened" that someone expresses views I might not agree with.
Where were you when the voynix came?
Dear Kettle,
You're black.
Sincerely,
Pot
VNRs are the very definition of "bullshit". That, and Direct-To-Consumer marketing by pharmaceutical companies ("Big Pharma") - which only the US and New Zealand allows BTW.
Please read the hilarious, fascinating and yet disturbing book "Your Call Is Important To Us: the truth about Bullshit" by Laura Penny - it is most excellent and elucidating.
How many escape pods are there? "NONE,SIR!" You counted them? "TWICE, SIR!"
... political propaganda!
Let me be ... the first one to say DUH
You got that right.
What part of "News Release" don't they understand?
When did the rules change so it was only "news" if a reporter pried it out of people as they kicked and screamed, tricked it out of them, or dug it out of their trash cans?
When did the people operating corporations lose the same free-speech rights, and the expectation that news media would carry their voices when they had something interesting to say, that demonstrators and political candidates enjoy? (Or did THEY lose access to media attention, too?)
If it's news there's no reason not to run it. If the PR operation did the work of making a video it's a cost savings for the broadcaster. And quoting verbatim rather than rephrasing increases the chance of getting it right.
(NONE of which reduces the ethical obligation of the news operation to credit the source (rather than pass it off as their own work), to fact-check (especially if the claims are unreasonable), to present opposing views (if the subject is in dispute) and/or estimates of the credibility of the source, and to make editorial decisions on whether the material is right for their format and target audience.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Everything on the news is propaganda.
Stories are selected by editors, who have their own agenda.
Stories are reported by the correspondents, who also have their own agenda.
Meaningless crap is hyped all evening urging you to tune in at 11 while truly important stories are never broadcast.
It's all propaganda of someone with some viewpoint.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Sorry, but all those people that vote for socialist parties (I probably will next week) do not do so to help your 'elite' to get a gouvernment the way you describe. It could be that they all are being decieved, or it could be that you are just plain wrong?
Socialism in my book is about the gouvernment behaving socially. Maybe your ideal is more like each man for himself?
This space is intentionally staring blankly at you
"It could be that they all are being decieved"
Probably, or they are ignorant of history. Tens of millions died as socialism was implimented in Central and Eastern Europe during much of the 20th century. There's also the element that the socialist parties in Western democracies. Even though they want to increase government oppression, are not really that socialist.
"Socialism in my book is about the gouvernment behaving socially. Maybe your ideal is more like each man for himself?".
It's always every man for himself. That's not an ideal, that's just how it is. Socialism is the proven best method for one man to get the most for himself at the expense of all of society. It appeals to the worst in people. As for a "book" definition of socialism, why not look at wikipedia first? It mentions greedy government control first: "As an economic system, socialism is often associated with state or community ownership of the means of production."
Where were you when the voynix came?