I’m off today and all of next week, but I’ll leave you this week with something fun to ponder, discuss, or disagree with.
I can’t stand:
The use of “Google” or “texting” as verbs. People who use “Google” as a verb, as in “I Googled him” sound like they’re choking on walnuts, for one thing. For another thing, companies can’t be verbs. Also, “Googling” someone sounds like something your mother would rush you to confession for thinking about let alone doing. Just. Don’t. And you can’t “text” someone. You can send someone a text message. Text is a noun. Use it accordingly.
Entertainment programs posing as news shows. If you tell me one more time about Tiger Woods’s indiscretions or Paris Hilton’s new boyfriend, you’re not a news show – you’re a gossip show. Now if either of these celebrities shoot up a Wendy’s and you report that, it’s news (and no, I don’t consider either of these people to be capable of anything so awful). If you’re telling me the news amid your gossip, that’s nice, but it doesn’t equate you with a news show. It equates you with The View. Stop pretending.
That journalism programs rarely teach ethics anymore. If you sell an article to a magazine and collect a check, that’s ethical. If you sell an article to a magazine that someone else paid you to write to promote their company AND you accept a check from the magazine, that’s unethical. If you don’t know why that is so, my point is made. It’s called conflict of interest. If you have to, teach yourself journalistic ethics. And please, pass them on to your friends.
Reality shows. They’re not reality. They’re not even shows. They’re attempts by networks to convince the public that these are entertaining snippets of the lives of “ordinary” people who are anything but ordinary – or entertaining, for the most part. They’re ways of alowing media outlets to produce cheap television and cut out actors, writers, and all sorts of creative contributions. And worse – our kids are watching.
What’s got the bee in your bonnet this week?
"Googling" and "texting" don't bother me as they entered the language recently enough for usage to be fairly fluid. But as for "actioning", "tasking" and the like . . .
Agree with you on the point about entertainment shows posing as news shows. It's true of newspapers, too – in the UK, many readers of the broadsheets look down on the tabloids, believing that a long, soberly written article about Paris Hilton is somehow more worthwhile than a short, pun-filled piece in The Sun. I would add sport posing as news – as I've written on my blog before, "sports news" is one of my favourite oxymorons.
One reason I only work for corporate clients is that I don't feel comfortable with the whole ethics thing. With PR so prevalent you don't even have to have been paid directly by a company to have a conflict of interest. Think of all those lunches, parties, free gifts, press trips etc (I suspect the UK is worse for this than the US). Also, working for corporates means I get paid enough not to have to survive on treats sent to me by PR firms and I can choose to holiday with my husband rather than a bunch of other journos and PR types I don't know!
You're so right about reality shows. Look at the credits – you'll usually find a "story editor" in there somewhere.
I quite like the new verbs Google and text. I often say to people, "Google me," or "I'll text you". I don't like when text gets shortened to tex though. Aren't we a funny old breed?
Have a great week and a bit off.
Many of what you say. I just cut a rant from my blog re: USA TODAY outsourcing to Demand -crap content for a crap publication, who's surprised? And Fox-pretends-to-be-news-but-wouldn't-know-a-fact-if-it-bit-them-in-the-butt.
I decided to rant about the lack of portrayal of healthy relationships instead.
Great minds, and all that.
This reminds me that in whatever generation we are, it does not mean that everybody's doing them then we have to conform and like what they are doing as well.
I also do not like reality shows…and to think they profit millions from these shows.
I'm a fairly recent graduate from the University of Missouri's School of Journalism. We most certainly discussed ethics in multiple classes and I don't know of a single professor who would condone being paid by a product to write a positive review. We also discussed how you shouldn't accept gifts, perks from those that you interview.
So, I wouldn't say that journalism programs rarely teach ethics anymore. I would say that there are more opportunities for journalists to have their standards broken and are subsequently weak enough to give in.
I'm okay with Googling, texting and even Tivo'd as words, but what's really annoying me lately is adults saying "frigerator" instead of "refrigerator" or the long-acceptable abbreviation, "fridge." Saying "frigerator" makes people look like illiterate fools.
Money-spending publicists? Lunches? Parties? Gifts? Trips? I deal with publicists every day and have never received any such perks. Heck, the few times I've been sent out of town for a story I've had to pay for everything and submit an invoice for reimbursement, which often has a too-low-to-cover-airfare price cap. (Well, Food Network let me eat some of the lunch their crew had made – mushroom stroganoff and a crisp green salad. Yum.)
As a fairly consistent grouch, I'm upset that you picked one of the five days a year that I'm not grumpy about something to ask what I'm grumpy about 🙂
At the risk of ruining the spirit of this post & comment thread, I just wanted to stick my head in the proverbial door to wish you a relaxing & refreshing vacation week. May the sun shine brightly, the Guinness flow freely, & the penny-a-page solicitations get lost en route to your in-box!
HaHa on using Google as a verb. I have to admit, I do that at times. I agree on the reality shows. There are cameras everywhere so it's not reality. As far as Tiger Woods and all of these others that cheat etc… I don't care. It's not our business. It's between the person and their family – period.
What got me this week was a proposal by our local supervisors – and I use that word loosely, which basically proposes "Meatless Mondays" meaning they would ban anyone from serving meat on Mondays in restaurants etc… WTF? While I only eat meat on occasion anyway, I have a huge problem with those idiots in city hall telling me what I can and cannot eat. I proposed if this goes through that we all stage a sit in at City Hall and eat cheeseburgers every Monday.
Hey, I like some of those "reality" shows. I get a kick out of watching people willing to make complete fools of themselves on television. Even though it is scripted, it's mindless tv for me when my brain is too tired to think.
The bee in my bonnet lately- arguing with a supposed philosopher who doesn't know who aristotle is. Don't claim to be knowledgeable of ancient philosphers when you can't even name one of the most famous of them all.
agreed on the last two. THey'r not reality shows … and no, etchics isnt as emphasised as it used to/should be.
"USA TODAY outsourcing to Demand -crap content for a crap publication, who's surprised? And Fox-pretends-to-be-news-but-wouldn't-know-a-fact-if-it-bit-them-in-the-butt."
That might be the truest thing I've read in a week. 🙂