DEATH BY TELEVISION

The TV Trade mag Broadcasting and Cable carries this editorial indicating that not all industry insiders are blind to the continued degradation of TV “journalism” as illustrated by the Terri Schiavo deathwatchathon.

“… Aren’t CNN and Fox and MSNBC and radio talk-show hosts making a freak show out of this sad, sick woman’s predicament? And if those listeners and viewers considered the contrived shouting matches unseemly, what then did they make of the news media who used Terri Schiavo as a ratings gimmick?

“Not much, we conclude. It is significant to us that the more news there is out there the 24/7 news cyclethe more Americans have grown to doubt it and mistrust it, and the more the news business itself has bent its own better journalistic instincts to stay competitive. Terri Shiavo’s predicament has existed for years but, for the media, the literal life-and-death struggle is impossible to resist. To jaded media-watchers, however, she is just more fodder easiest to cover by not straying too far from the emotional argument.

“The television and radio news media have by now nurtured the Us versus Them story so completely, it is not difficult to come up with medical experts with political agendas, or religious leaders who also have theirs. Roving bands of pundits travel the TV carny circuit at times like this, and even the stars at the center of the controversy show up everywhere…”

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/index.asp?layout=articlePrint&articleID=CA513102

IT CAN HAPPEN HERE

Paul Krugman of the NY Times has another angle:

“What we need - and we aren’t seeing - is a firm stand by moderates against religious extremism. Some people ask, with justification, Where are the Democrats? But an even better question is, Where are the doctors fiercely defending their professional integrity? I think the American Medical Association disapproves of politicians who second-guess medical diagnoses based on video images - but the association’s statement on the Schiavo case is so timid that it’s hard to be sure.

“The closest parallel I can think of to current American politics is Israel. There was a time, not that long ago, when moderate Israelis downplayed the rise of religious extremists. But no more: extremists have already killed one prime minister, and everyone realizes that Ariel Sharon is at risk.

“America isn’t yet a place where liberal politicians, and even conservatives who aren’t sufficiently hard-line, fear assassination. But unless moderates take a stand against the growing power of domestic extremists, it can happen here.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/29/opinion/29krugman.html?hp

Scuze me Paul, but do you now consider Sharon a moderate?

THE INTERNET AT RISK

IwantMedia.com reports: “Media Wars Move to High Court

The Supreme Court on Tuesday is to begin the case of MGM vs Grokster — or Hollywood vs Internet piracy. The foundation of the U.S. economy is at stake, says NBC Universal’s general counsel.

Broadcast.com billionaire Mark Cuban writes in his blog that he will help fund Grokster against MGM. “If Grokster loses, technological innovation will be the domain of the big corporations only.”

http://news.com.com/Mark+Cuban+to+finance+Grokster+defense/2100-1032_3-5641530.html

Benton Foundation’s Communications Headlines carried this report: “Media Ownership Top Challenge for New Commission, Copps Says

“The FCC should begin a “comprehensive, open and public” rulemaking on media ownership, complete intercarrier compensation (ICC) reform by year’s end, and improve homeland security initiatives under FCC purview, Comr. Copps told an FCBA luncheon Mon. He outlined those ambitions in an upbeat speech peppered with jokes and tributes to FCC Chmn. Martin, who attended the luncheon but declined to comment…. Copps then looked to the future. “The first thing we find staring at us is a huge unfinished agenda.” Among the challenges, he said, “none ranks so high” as media ownership. Copps said he and Comr. Adelstein are “hitting the road” to gather Americans’ opinions. “We have a second opportunity to step up to the plate and come up with a set of rules to encourage localism, diversity and competition — and also a set of rules that can pass the red-face test in court,” Copps said.”

TIME MAGAZINE SALUTES AIR AMERICA RADIO

“Launch a left-wing talk-radio network in a medium ruled by the bully pulpiteers of the right? They said it couldn’t be done. Air America Radio exec Jon Sinton recalls the loud whispers before last year’s start-up: “They said, ‘Liberals aren’t funny or engaging. A concept of a liberal network is stupid.’”

“And for a while, they were right. The name-brand hosts, comics Al Franken and Janeane Garofalo, were audio amateurs. In their on-the-job training, three hours a day, they learned that comedy is easy, radio is hard. The most persuasive hosts were radio veterans Randi Rhodes and Rachel Maddow. But Air America came close to folding for a reason the right couldn’t have guessed: it ran out of liberal fat cats and went broke in two weeks. When its checks bounced, it lost stations in Los Angeles and Chicago. As the documentary Left of the Dial (on HBO this week) shows, staff members went for months without pay or health insurance.

“The story has a happy ending for liberals–or at least a promising second act. As it hits its first anniversary this week, Air America has expanded from six to 51 stations. It reaches more than 2 million listeners a week, with greater appeal for the young and women than most talk radio. It just signed Jerry Springer (a piquant choice but a pity, since he replaces Maddow). “I give them every benefit of the doubt,” says Michael Harrison of the industry magazine Talkers. “They have ratings to show, they get publicity, they’re selling ads.”

“And they have imitators. Liberal talk is radio’s fastest-growing format. If Air America hasn’t yet drowned out Rush Limbaugh, it has at least found its own voice. ”

–By Richard Corliss. Reported by Carolina A. Miranda
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1042449,00.html

NY TIMES AGREES TO SHARE 24-YEAR AIDS NEWS ARCHIVE

Press Release: ” After twelve years of requests from AIDS activists, The New York Times on March 24 reached agreement to make available its entire 24-years of AIDS news coverage to AEGIS.org, the world’s largest free-access AIDS information website. (AEGIS is an acronym for the AIDS Education Global Information System).

“From the July 3, 1981, story about a rare cancer manifesting in homosexuals to articles in the past two months about a mutant drug-resistant HIV strain detected in New York City, dozens of Times stories are available now at http://www.aegis.org/news/nyt/ , and additional articles will be loaded to the AEGIS.org archive over the next couple of months.

“I’m grateful to the Times’s executives for their humanitarian gesture,” said Sister Mary Elizabeth, founder and publisher of the nonprofit site. “Visitors to AEGIS.org will be able to search twenty-four years of AIDS stories, analyses and editorials for free. The Times joins other mainstream newspapers and wire services that have contributed their archives to us, such as Agence France-Presse, the Associated Press, Reuters, the United Press International, the Los Angeles Times and the Wall Street Journal.”