OK, maybe it's not nice to criticize my fellow journalists for their news coverage, and especially when they are in some way competitors in the news gathering business. But, I can't help it.
I'm not a big television fan -- seems there was more worth watching on TV when I was a child and we received only one channel, and that in black and white, than there is today with hundreds of channels from which to choose -- but my wife likes to have the TV on and to watch the news when she goes to bed at night and in the predawn hours when she gets up to start her day.
What's my criticism? Well, I often see it on those news broadcasts late at night and early in the morning. And, it's not just on one channel, either. I guess it's this "live" thing that sometimes gives television news media an advantage over print media like newspapers which go to an event or incident, take photos and gather information, and then go back and write about it so that readers can see photos which were live at the time of the event and read a carefully researched and accurate account of what occurred.
I must admit I have to laugh every time I see it. Some poor news reporter is standing out there in the dark -- "live" -- in front of an empty building, with nothing going on, late at night or in the predawn hours. Whatever occurred there is long over or it won't happen until later in the day, but we get this "live" shot in front of something we can't even see back there behind the reporter in the dark.
Yes, I feel for the poor reporters who have to stand out there in the cold, wind, rain or even snow just to show us "live" what we can't see or to tell us weather conditions which are the same outside our own houses. Why not set up a black backdrop in the studio, put the reporter in a winter coat or rain gear and make the wind blow with a fan? Oh, I guess that wouldn't be honest reporting, but could the viewers really tell the difference?
These meaningless "live" shots could be viewed as evidence those who send out the reporters really don't believe the lines they broadcast about global warming and our need to cut back on emissions and reduce greenhouse gases. How else could they justify such a waste of fossil fuels to have live but in-the-dark shots that do nothing for the viewer? I don't believe the lies we are fed about global warming either, but I try to avoid wasting time and expensive gasoline going to places where nothing is going on and there is little of significance to photograph even if I do a long exposure so readers can see some of what's out there in the blackness of night.
Maybe I'm just a disgruntled newspaper man because I can't show live shots in the paper. Sure, I could go out and take pictures of empty roads where a bad accident occurred earlier in the day or week. I could take dark photos of empty buildings where an event is scheduled for the morrow or next week. Maybe I could convince the schools to let me take some photos inside the gyms at 4 a.m. with the lights out instead of taking photos at the games later in the day. Do you think our readers would appreciate that? But too much black ink bleeds over onto other stories and makes a mess of the paper. Snowstorms would work better. I wouldn't even have to go out into the cold. I could just draw a box on the page and leave the inside blank and say there was a total whiteout.
Do you see my point? Isn't some of this ridiculous, just so the media source can say they are "live"? It gives a bad name to the whole profession!
OK, I've written my piece. It's not live. You won't get to read it for a few days, when our next issue comes out. It will probably be edited a time or two before publication. It won't even be printed on a page with a photo of me standing out in the dark, pointing to something you can't see. But I do wish my fellow journalists would just stop and think about how foolish they look out there at night "live" at the scene of nothing. Then, again, perhaps they like being out there in the cold and in the dark! Laughing is healthy, I hear.
Randy Moll is the managing editor of the Westside Eagle Observer. He may be contacted by email at [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author.
Editorial on 01/29/2014