NEWS MEDIA SHOULDN'T ALLOW IDIOTS TO COMMENT ON STORIES

You frequently hear people lament that the news media of today is not as good as the news media of the past. Then again, you hear that about everything. When I entered college as a media major, being in the news media was considered one of the ultimate jobs a person could have. After all, the news media was America's window to the world. If I wanted to I could choose the path to belong to that elite group with such people as Walter Cronkite, Chet Hutley and David Brinkley, and Peter Jennings (All pictured above). I've got a surprising eye opener for you. Watch the evening world news on CBS, NBC and ABC, then watch an old evening world news cast on You Tube from the 60s, 70s or 80s. They haven't changed except for the technology and personalities.

On the other hand watch a clip of CNN from the 80s and then watch a little of it now, you WILL see a big change. Personally, cable news has went down in quality. Also, you would be shocked if you saw Internet news pages of the 90s versus today's.

Let me give you my opinion about what made the men above trusted voices. They were larger than life figures in Washington, DC or New York. When they told you what happened, you accepted it as the truth and didn't argue with them. Now thanks to Facebook, Bubba in Bois D'Arc or NellieBelle in Piedmont, Arkansas can make a snide remark about a story KYTV or KOLR ran on the 6 pm news or bad mouth Brian Williams or Scott Pauly.

I feel the comments on local news stories on Facebook has reached some very dangerous and tacky levels. After a recent tragic accident here in the Ozarks, people began leaving comments accident if the man and woman, who died in the accident were having an extra marital affair. WHAT DOES THAT MATTER? WHY WOULD PEOPLE BRING UP THAT AT SUCH A DELICATE TIME?

Another problem is how Internet news like Yahoo and MSN is driven not by importance, but what people have shared, searched or read. Never mind important world news or national news, Yahoo and MSN is going to give you headlines on Anne Hathway's ugly dress or a video of cute kittens on You Tube.

Let me also add that it is either time to do away with Letters to the Editor in newspapers or make stricter rules on what letters get printed. Some local newspapers run letters from the same idiots week after week and day after day. I was recently looking at some back issues of the Springfield News Leader and discovered that many of the crazy right-wing letters in the 80s and 90s were from the same people EVERYDAY. Many of these were stupid too. Case in point: Ron Davis in his Chatter column (which was hated by these idiot NL letter writers) had said that he wished Guns N Roses would perform in Branson. Several brain damaged individuals didn't want Guns N Roses in Branson, because they considered them "vulgar" and "untalented." You know who else they didn't want to come to Branson? ANDY WILLIAMS. Yes, the Letters to the Editor section in the Springfield News Leader was once filled with hateful letters from Ozarkers who didn't want Andy Willaims to bring his "Hollywood values" and "Las Vegas values" to "ruin" the Ozarks. This was after he had told some an interviewer that some of the Branson shows were crappy.

The one thing I have learned from working in the media is that the majority of people think you do a great job but never tell you. The people who constantly criticize the media are insanely jealous of media people because they chose a bad career, like real estate or auctioneering.

Of course, opinions like these are why I'm considered the Super Villain of the Ozarks!!! Mwu-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! 

OLD PEOPLE ENJOY NEGATIVE STORIES ABOUT YOUNG PEOPLE

I had a news director at one local radio station that ordered me to write traffic accident reports so that it sounded as if the younger person caused the accident. Even if the Missouri State Highway Patrol said in their report that the older driver was at fault, the younger driver was to be fingered as the cause of the accident because, "Older listeners and the advertisers like it that way. That way if an advertiser caused the accident, they won't be upset with us." That news director also wrote several negative stories about youth because "the older listeners like to hear bad things about teenagers."

Reuters/MSNBC had a story to about research conducted in German on this subject. Yes, old people do like negative stories about young people. I believe that many news organizations in the Ozarks (News Leader???) feel as my former news director did and these German researchers have shown. However, THAT DOES NOT MEAN THAT THE NEGATIVE YOUTH STORIES NEED TO TAKE PRECEDENT OVER POSITIVE STORIES ABOUT YOUNG PEOPLE!!!

After all, you are reporting the news, not writing for 21 Jump Street.

Of course, opinions, like this one, is why I'm considered the Super Villain of the Ozarks!!! Mwu-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

I MISS THE CRAIG HALL CROWD & I STILL HATE THE PREPPIES

Permit me to wax nostalgic for a bit, but this post has been coming for awhile and it is something I have to get out of my system. I've been thinking about my college years, when I was obtaining my Bachelor of Science in Media. I was just out of high school, away from home and I didn't have a job, so I was able to enjoy myself and have fun.

I found it was easier to make friends with people at SMSU (now known as MSU) than it was in the Lebanon R-3. For one thing, the need to conform to what everyone else was doing disappears in college. Also, I seem to have more in common with the city kids. We tended to like the same music, movies and other activities. We were the "Craig Hall Crowd," because that was where the communications, media and drama classes were held.

The people I tend to hang with in college tended to wear tie dye shirts with peace signs on them or shirts that said "EAT THE RICH" on them. Some even had pink t-shirts with a photo of Howard McNear, the barber from the Andy Griffith Show on the front and the words "PINK FLOYD" on the back. Get it! Yeah, it was funnier in 1987. We tended to drive older model small cars with bumper stickers reading "He who dies with the most toys, STILL DIES" or "Wouldn't be nice if the schools had plenty of money and the Pentagon had to have a bake sale?"

Our dorm room walls were covered in posters of Jim Morrison, Ozzy Osbourne and James Dean, as well as numerous assorted scantly clad women. The only names I can think of for these women were Marilyn (The Seven Year Itch subway grate pose), Farah (These were usually kind of ragged because they had been around for several years), Brooke and Elvira (Yes, THAT Elvira - usually these were Budweiser promotional posters, so you wonder if these guys were more attracted to beer than the big breasted Goth chick). Oh, I cannot forget the Tennis Girl poster (above).

I should point out that there was a boom in psychedelic music and fashion. Part of this may have been because Rolling Stone was celebrating its 20th anniversary and running a lot of retrospective article on the Summer of Love and the 60s. However, as I look back, we may have been rebelling against the "Just Say No" crap that had been forced down our throats in junior high and high school.

There were some people that we didn't like. These people were what we called Preppies. These people were like the villains in a lot the comedy films of the time. While we were wanting to Bluto from Animal House, these people wanted to be Greg Marmalard and Douglas C. Neidemeyer from Animal House. These people took things way too seriously. They were like the people we didn't like in junior high and high school. They were all involved in Young Republicans and came to class wearing ties. They were always business majors of some sort, only interested in money and kissing butt. They were overachievers, who felt Bart Simpson was a bad role model for children. Bad part I see many young college kids now who are exactly like the Preppie kids. Kind of sad when you think about it.

Someone at the Standard gave one of these boneheads a column. I can remember his last name was Seitz, because I thought he was full of baloney. He spread hate toward anyone who didn't think like him and his tie wearing Preppie friends. He probably is either a talk radio host or a weenie blogger. They went to little meetings on Monday night where they listened to speeches by Mel Hancock and Jean Dixon. Needless to say these people were not out having fun like the rest of us.


I guess what has brought this on is the fact I keep running into or seeing the Preppies around Springfield, but the people I liked are nowhere to be seen. Maybe they went back to St. Louis, Kansas City and Chicago. At least one person, went to Hollywood. I see her on TV from time to time. I guess the Preppies were from here in Springfield. I hope my friends are still they way they were when we were in school. After all the Preppies are all still the obnoxious little twerps they were when we were in school.

Of course, opinions like this are why I'm the Super Villain of the Ozarks!!! Mwu-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

WHY IS HE ON THE COVER OF TIME? I'M COOLER!

Some idiot at Time magazine thought that putting scummy doofus Glen Beck on the cover was a great idea. WRONG!!!

I'd rather be on the cover of Rolling Stone or Fangoria.

DISNEY & MARVEL BELONG TOGETHER

I'm a little late on the Disney buyout of Marvel. Here is the Washington Post story. I know this has upset some Marvel fans and would have upset me too when I was younger. However, below is proof it was meant to be.

MICKEY MOUSE CLUB



MIGHTY MARVEL MARCHING SOCIETY




PUNCH UP YOUR RESUME WITH 70s PORN CHIC

An out-of-work copywriter named Lawson Clarke came up with a great way to attract attention to potential employers. Ad Age's Bob Garfield reports that Clarke created a 70's porn themed website showcasing some of his best work and his half naked body. The site, malecopywriter.com, looks like a Playgirl centerfold with Clarke posing on a bearskin rug with his "best work" displayed on a neo-Panasonic portable TV. When you first arrive on the site the TV is playing, what appears to be, an old "Sign-Off" tape. Maybe that is what this blog needs to attract readers - a picture of me naked.

Making Fun of Complainers On Air Is Fun

Remember on SNL, when someone would try to give a cranky rant during Weekend Update and Chevy Chase would make fun of that person behind their back? My belief is that is what we in the media need to do to those who have complaints about us. Especially, when they have no valid point other than "I don't like that." I think it is a shame that this area seems to believe that a person, like myself, with a FCC licence and a Bachelor of Science in Media, shouldn't have any say in what goes out over the air but when old man Fussmucker calls to complain it leads to firings, format changes and other bad ideas.

If we make it harder for these people to complain, then we won't have to deal with complaints.

For instance:

• If someone calls on a studio line during a talk show to complain, play music or a air-horn over their comments.


• If protesters show up at your station complaining about the music, turn a hose on them. Little old ladies in tennis shoes don't like to be wet.


• Run liners about a complaint hot line at the station with a voice mail. Never check the voice mail.

The Real Reason Ann Coulter Won't Be On NBC Again

She tried to take a little girl name Dorothy's ruby slippers. Dorothy threw water on Ann Coulter and she melted. Let us rejoyce and sing little ones!

"Ding Dong Ann Coulter is banned. Ann Oh Ann that Wicked Ann. Ding Dong Ann Coulter is banned from NBC for life. Hi Ho the dairy-oh, sing it high sing it low! Ding Dong Ann Coulter is banned from NBC for life."

R.I.P MTV's TRL

One of my goals when a entered MSU (then SMSU) as an electronic media and broadcasting major was to host a teen music TV show like Dick Clark. I wanted to be that friendly adult the teenagers could trust to introduce them to the cool new music. Sadly, that dream becoming reality is disappearing very quickly.

On Sunday, MTV's TRL will go the way of American Bandstand, the Midnight Special, Solid Gold, Shindig, Hullabaloo, Where the Action Is and others teen music shows. The New York Daily News reports that original host Carson Daly returns for the two hour final show. This also is the end of MTV as a music video outlet, instead turning, like other networks, to cheaply made reality shows. Daly says he hopes it returns soon. Maybe it will or will it be like two of the above mentioned shows and be come a set of DVDs sold on late night TV through Guthie-Renker.

My fear is MTV is may turn from the young pop music fans who made them great and start catering to paranoid, cranky old white men like AM radio did (see story above).

News Leader - Don't Increase The Price, Charge LTTE Writers

Ron Davis over at Chatter announced this earlier this week. The Springfield News Leader is raising it's price. My suggestion, if they need to make more money, is charge the letter to the editor writers. I feel that students who write for a class project and liberals SHOULD NOT be charged. Conservatives should be charged by their topic.

• Anti-abortion letters - $75
• Anti-gay letters $75
• Too much sex/violence/foul language in entertainment $100
• Media is bias against conservatives $500
• Anti-cruising $ 30
• Young people are evil $50
• Anti-MSU $50
• Anti-Obama $100
• Anti-Clinton $100

I feel that with in a year, Gannett will not have to make budget cuts and we will get the paper for free.

I'm Going Door To Door Trying Find Friendly People To Talk To

A few weeks ago, a young guy came to the door. He was covered with tattoos and not exactly clean. He claimed to be a college student majoring in communication and was "required to go door to door, trying to find 1000 friendly people to talk to." He told me he wanted to go into radio. I was ready to explain to him that he should really concentrate on a career in television or cable technology, when his story became more outrageous. He told me that it was a "law" that he would have to have a two year internship at a radio station or he could (Are you ready for this?) sell magazine subscriptions. Why this doofus picked selling magazines is beyond me? Then, the story got goofy.

The money he earned would pay for his participation in a "special student project." He and other students from other American colleges were going to the BBC to film a remake of the film Monty Python and the Holy Grail "in memory of the original film's star John Gleezz, who died last year." You probably are ahead of me, but the chaps name is John Cleese and he is still living ("I'm not dead yet!"). Also. if the BBC wanted to pay homage to a legendary comedian, why would they have a bunch of American kids do it as a reward for selling magazine subscriptions?

I tried to get rid of the kid by telling him that I worked in radio, thinking he would see his story was not washing with me (Of course, washing was a foreign concept to this guy). Instead he tried to talk shop using strange terms for audio technology that he was making up as he went. I know this because the terms changed from "digital ominogragh" to "digital opthometer." I told him that must be "something new" and this bonehead said, "It was invented by the rapper P. Daddy." I assume that P. Daddy is really P. Diddy or Sean "Puffy" Combs or the late Bo Diddley (I wonder if they knew the late John Gleezz).

I didn't buy any magazines from this idiot nor did I buy any from the frightened and fidgety girl who came to the door the next week. While, I'm laughing at this, the sad reality is these kids are involved in something very ugly. Here is an article from the Houston Press about door-to-door magazine sales. From this article, I realize the guy was using something called a "dirty canvas," which sounds correct seeing he was dirty himself. Basically, it is a false story (I don't know if mangled names of celebrities are part of this or not). Also threats are part of the life of these poor kids. Thinking back on the girl's mannerisms, I would say her bosses told her that she had to sell some magazine subscriptions before she could have a bathroom break (that was kind of how she acted).

This is a scary read folks, but I thought I should bring it to your attention. I've also been wanting to tell about that goofy guy for weeks.

Embarrassing Banner Ad

Some ads on news websites and blogs are to advertise things related to the content. Adland has this rather amusing screen capture from CNN.com. Ooooppps!

FCC's Adelstein May Believe In the Existence of Talkola

I have mentioned here before that I believe that talk radio host accept payments by right-wing PACs to push certain issues to prominence. I have dubbed this practice "Talkola" after "payola," which I believe was not a real problem but the reaction of a bunch of cranky old men in the 50's to rock and roll. I've convinced one of my co-workers of this. He told me he has given up listening to talk radio because all of the host talked about the same topic for more than a month.

Now All Access reports that FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein, in a speech to the National Conference for Media Reform in Minneapolis over the weekend, suggested the same thing. Only he isn't talking about PACs, he is suggesting that the Bush administration was behind the positive spin given to the Iraq War by talk radio as well as the news media.

"According to news reports, analysts who disagreed with the information given to them lost access," ADELSTEIN asserted. "This comes in the wake of new revelations that network executives pressured news reporters to develop Administration-friendly angles when we were heading to war. Today, I commit to you that I plan to demand a real and thorough investigation. We need to determine, without delay, whether the DoD violated the laws we enforce against payola.

"These rules prohibit anyone involved with preparing broadcast or cable programs from accepting anything of value without disclosing it to the public," ADELSTEIN continued. "This is not just a question of journalist ethics and integrity. It is the law. The war in IRAQ is clearly a controversial issue of public importance. The American people have a legal right to know when the government is sponsoring the source that is purporting to provide objective analysis."

Adelstein also mentioned that it is illegal to use federal funds for propaganda purposes. "The federal anti-propaganda and payola laws are grounded on the principle that the public is entitled to know who seeks to persuade them so they can make up their own minds about the credibility of the information presented," he said. "The public has a legal right to know that people who present themselves to be independent, unbiased experts and reporters are not shills hired to promote a corporate -- or governmental -- agenda."

Adelstein continued, "It is time for us to curb the excesses of commercialism, as CONGRESS intended," he declared. " We need to ... develop new rules to clarify that sponsorship identification has to be clear and understandable. It should not be buried in a compressed crawl at the end of a show that would take a magnifying glass to read. "We need to fight thinly disguised payola fueling homogenized corporate music that leaves no room for local and independent artists. We need to fight video news releases masquerading as news, with public relations agents pushing agendas that squeeze out real news coverage and local community concerns. We need to fight product placements turning news and entertainment shows alike into undisclosed commercials. And we need to fight rapacious advertisers preying on the unsuspecting minds of our young children."

Here is a transcript of the speech. It is great reading.

Let's Give Paris Something to Cry About

If you read this blog often you know I haven’t taken the Paris Hilton thing very serious. I think that in the long run this is a non-issue. I think there are some Internet sights making this and the cable news networks making this into a big deal. Brad Belote on the KY3 blog has written a great piece on the media’s obsession with this.

Here is my take. Yes, Paris committed a crime. Yes, she should be punished. With that said let’s look at why this is getting so much play on the cable news and Internet.

• Paris Hilton is female. There is whole anti-female sentiment expressed on one of the two major cable networks. That network has been touting the idea (much like their "war on Christmas") that there is a "war on men." They obviously believe Paris Hilton needs to be punished for being a girl. She (and her pals, Lyndsay Lohan and Britney Spears) need to be punished for being, as they used to say, "fast girls." Then again these same people hated Princess Di and today hate Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Michelle Wi and Danica Patrick. The only women they like are Anne Coulter and Condelizza Rice. These individuals don’t want women in sports, politics or business. Just keep them at home in the kitchen.



• She is under 30. There is an anti-youth movement afoot with the same cable network and the talk radio boys. Anything young people like (YouTube, MySpace, Ipods etc.) is evil. This isn’t new even in the mainstream "old" media. The message in the "new" media is, "The only good young people are serving in Iraq. If you are not in Iraq, you should be in jail." Drudge and Rush have both made negative remarks about young people.



• She is connected to Hollywood and been on MTV. Notice how much of the coverage has mentioned that Hilton was on the MTV Movie Awards. There seems to be an attitude with the ‘new’ media that everyone in Hollywood and half of the state of California should be punished for something, usually being ‘liberal.’



• She is wasting the Hilton fortune. There are a group ‘new’ media fans who have a big business and money fetish. They admire Conrad Hilton for being a ‘self-made man’ and feel Paris is ruining the family name. These same people also took up for Ken Lay and the Enron boys.



• Midwestern-Good Americans are enjoying this. This is also the mentality that caused us to see way too much info about Anna Nicole Smith’s death. We want to see these famous people punished or hurt or dead. It makes us feel superior. Yeah, if you are a psycho.

Frankly, as Brad Belote said there are more important issues. If we looked at those issues we would probably see that they need to be fixed.