onfocus

mediachannel.org: When Is A Journalist A Journalist? : "Most mainstream journalists don't acknowledge how their own ideologies (or the pressures of their employers) guide their work. Yet they are considered 'real journalists' because of their insider status and where they stand in the pecking order of some media combine." [via sotd]

The cable channel CNN Headline News has officially gone down the crapper. Last month they changed their format to feature "younger faces" and "hipper content" in an attempt to compete with MSNBC. In the process, the channel has become worthless. Please allow me to break it down rant style:

The New Look

Yep, it looks like a web page now. A graphic "slide" related to the current story hovers in the upper lefthand corner. This might be a picture of a shark with the words Shark Attack, bullet points of facts about the story they're showing, or short quotes from the people involved in the story. Below this, the Headline section, comes hypertext complete with different colored, underlined subjects and a brief excerpt from the article. The problem is, we can't click on it to get the whole article. The blurbs often aren't enough to make sense of what we're reading even if we wanted to. Then, the weather takes up the lower right portion of the screen and scrolls through different large graphics with current temperatures. I'm glad I can see a sun icon while I find out the temperature in Texas. And finally they have a tiny, tiny window where the video is shown. On the web, video has to be tiny thanks to bandwidth restrictions. On TV, there is no excuse. If only the commercials were in that tiny box as well.

The Content

The concept behind "Headline News" is that you get the latest news headlines right away. Pre-AOL makeover, the channel used to show the top news stories at the top of the hour. These days if you tune in at the top of the hour, you're likely to see a 5 to 10 minute live-on-location report about stem cell research. Great for CNN, bad as a headline. Which brings me to the Headlines section: This text area is not usually news, but promotions for various CNN shows. "Oprah will be on Larry King" was one I saw recently. That's a headline? Their "news stories" lately aren't much better. They had a "Breaking News" segment a moment ago detailing the dinner menu for a state event at the Whitehouse. To which the anchor replied, "Mmm, good eats at the Whitehouse tonight."

The Sell

We all know news has become entertainment. I enjoy the short attention span media as much as the next person. But AOL Time Warner seems to have taken it past entertainment to a new level of marketing. We aren't getting news on CNN Headline News. We're getting commercials - of course - but now the content passing as news between the commercials is merely more commercials for more AOL Time Warner media products (which may, in fact, be commercials themselves). To come up with this new format, they probably paid some consultant a huge sum to spin yarns about the new visual language of their target demographic (younger viewers like me). Instead of speaking to me, however, the channel has become the confused MTV of news. That's not a good thing.

the coast in fog at Bodega Head

As matt mentioned on his site, I took my new GPS out for some geocaching yesterday. It was fun, and we saw some great scenery as we hiked around Bodega Head. After we found the cache, we logged our visit on a notebook inside. We also took a picture and left some New Zealand money for another visitor.

skp and matt at the cache

Woohoo, Labor Day Weekend! While we don't have political parades and carry signs that say "Labor Creates All Wealth" anymore, this vacation isn't just signaling the end of summer. Check out the origins of the holiday. It's a good reminder of some courageous Americans who had to fight to change their (and our) lives. Here are some great labor related quotes.

If I ever form a punk band (and I intend to), I think we should be called Outrageous Executive Salaries.

another birthday, yay! I'm 28. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley was also born on this day. Not to mention Cameron Diaz, R. Crumb, Ted Williams, and Huey P. Long. That's a good crew.

I put up a new series of old pictures and called it a story.

Apparently, this economic slowdown (don't use the R word yet) isn't affecting everyone. I was stunned by this article (free registration required) from the Chicago Tribune: "Some of the CEOs getting the biggest raises were also the ones laying off the most workers, the report said. These included Disney CEO Michael Eisner, who earned $72.8 million in 2000 while laying off 4,000 workers..." The headline states that CEOs make 531 times that of factory workers. It shows what kind of companies they are when they cut jobs to keep their outrageous executive salaries.