To the Cable News and Sports Networks:
To tell a story, you have to make choices. Every day, at every moment in the world, there’s an infinite number of stories are taking place.
The human brain can process, give or take, about 1 story at a time.
If you decide to simply fling at me all the pieces of “information” you’ve got at once, I’ll end up with a bunch of unrelated bits swimming randomly in my head. And I'll be no more aware or informed than I was before switching on your circus.
To tell a story well, you have to focus on that story.
Most of us have made the concession that, okay, you’ve resolved to run a crawl at the bottom of the screen. So that, while you’re doing a story about pandas, the bottom of the screen will tell us about a severe winter storm in the Ural Mountains.
But, at least, you could make the decision that some stories don’t belong on the crawl. And that some stories that you cover shouldn’t have a crawl beneath them.
Somehow, watching your coverage of the Mumbai (Bombay) terrorist attacks, and the suffering and the destruction, as it was happening, I felt that perhaps at a moment like this, I don’t need to know who is BFF with Lindsay Lohan.
To tell a story, you have to make choices. Every day, at every moment in the world, there’s an infinite number of stories are taking place.
The human brain can process, give or take, about 1 story at a time.
If you decide to simply fling at me all the pieces of “information” you’ve got at once, I’ll end up with a bunch of unrelated bits swimming randomly in my head. And I'll be no more aware or informed than I was before switching on your circus.
To tell a story well, you have to focus on that story.
Most of us have made the concession that, okay, you’ve resolved to run a crawl at the bottom of the screen. So that, while you’re doing a story about pandas, the bottom of the screen will tell us about a severe winter storm in the Ural Mountains.
But, at least, you could make the decision that some stories don’t belong on the crawl. And that some stories that you cover shouldn’t have a crawl beneath them.
Somehow, watching your coverage of the Mumbai (Bombay) terrorist attacks, and the suffering and the destruction, as it was happening, I felt that perhaps at a moment like this, I don’t need to know who is BFF with Lindsay Lohan.
Perhaps, I don’t need to know which pro athlete has been offered a three year extension on his contract, or which Las Vegas venue will host a special episode of a TV show. Yet, I saw such stories rolling over and over again at the bottom of your terrorism coverage.
How you cover stories, what you cover, and what you emphasize, are the three most important factors in establishing who you are as a news network, and whether you perform a valuable service to society. If you can’t make these choices, you’re no better than the randomness of the Internet world.
About 20 years ago, Andy Rooney wrote, about the dismantling of his company’s news operation, "CBS, which used to stand for the Columbia Broadcasting System, no longer stands for anything." How about you?
How you cover stories, what you cover, and what you emphasize, are the three most important factors in establishing who you are as a news network, and whether you perform a valuable service to society. If you can’t make these choices, you’re no better than the randomness of the Internet world.
About 20 years ago, Andy Rooney wrote, about the dismantling of his company’s news operation, "CBS, which used to stand for the Columbia Broadcasting System, no longer stands for anything." How about you?
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