How ironic that lately it's been the comedians: Stewart, Letterman and Fey who have delivered the most hard-hitting truths about American media and leadership. - missbelladog
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Showing posts with label media as mindless recycler. Show all posts
Showing posts with label media as mindless recycler. Show all posts
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Jim Cramer Defends Himself On Today Show (VIDEO)
How ironic that lately it's been the comedians: Stewart, Letterman and Fey who have delivered the most hard-hitting truths about American media and leadership. - missbelladog
Friday, July 11, 2008
This is how easily the Media becomes a bullshit peddler (PICTURES)
Now look carefully.
These pics that appeared on the front page of numerous newspapers are actually photoshopped. It looks like there are more missiles than there actually are. Ironically, if it was the Iranian Press Agency who did this, they did Dick Cheney a favor. Cheney and the Bush camp want to go to war with Iran. They pretend they don't but actually they are only to happy about this mistake. Below is the actual photo:
What's more serious though is when papers pontificate as they did about Mugabe, when Mugabe was nowhere near out of the picture. I also fail to understand why we need to see the same pictures and stories in 4 or 5 different newspapers. I don't know about you, but I only read a story once, and I only need one picture to get an idea what is going on. So this thing of newspapers pouncing on the same story, repeating and recycling the same 2nd,3rd and 4th hand accounts...well, it seems not to make my sense.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Media: How to hurt the poor even more
I guess the pictures say the thousand words. Make that 500.
The other 500 then: There has been some debate, even a poll, where 70% of readers approved publishing a picture of a burning man. Every newspaper I saw in South Africa had the same set of images. There was a lot of ethical and moral grandstanding around this, but virtually no consideration of just the economic fallout that this brings about. Here are a few relevant quotes:
Traders said stark images of violence on the front pages of the Financial Times, Guardian and New York Times, prompted a kneejerk retreat in the rand yesterday.
“The photographs had a marked effect,” said Paul Kamp, a senior dealer with Standard Chartered in London. “The violence has been going on for a while, but when investors see these pictures on the front pages they wonder what’s going on — it’s not nice to see.” - Mariam Isa
Attard Montalto said a raft of key economic data due next week, combined with risk aversion and continued xenophobia, could conspire to drive the rand back above the R8/$ level in the near term. That level was last breached in late March, when the rand weakened to a five-year low of R8,25/$.
I don't know if I am stating the obvious saying this, but with oil at $130 and our currency at R8/$, petrol prices in the months ahead will go up by 10-30% and you can basically start writing off lower- middle class South Africa who will have to start getting rid of their houses and begin the nasty process of defaulting on cars, TV's and their furniture, because they simply can't afford to operate under these conditions. I'm guessing 25% of our economically relevant population, or 1/4th of our economy, at least. And it's not just us who are going to burn off a whole new set of economic losers; the scary thing is it is happening everywhere at the same time, creating a cascading effect.
I've raised the concern here that South Africa's currency took a battering as a result of the images appearing in overseas newspapers, and important economic players then changing their positions. In the months ahead we will learn that we need to find ways to really slow down local economic degradation (and it might mean keeping your job for a while longer too, so pay attention). We need to look at making investments into farming, managing the impact of higher costs as much as possible, and remain cognisant of ways to prop up and support our currency. Having said that, I predict stock markets around the world to start wobbling from this point forwards, so there isn't a terrible amount we can do.
The simple act of publishing photographs, while one might have one's own reasons, also has wider consequences, and when the Rand weakens, it makes the price of petrol in Dollars even worse, which means South Africans pay doubly for their troubles. Worth thinking about isn't it.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
TJDR Prize Winning Campaign for ABSA is a Joke
The Jupiter Drawing Room are a creative lot, I'm not going to argue that point. Since the days when the creative director visited AAA and drew a schlong on a white board, said, "You need to put that into advertising," I started treating TJDR product with circumcision...err...I mean ...circumspection.
Really? You've got to put a penis into your marketing message? Drive your point home eh? Thrust your creativity into the marketing mix? In theory yes, and it's always great to have an excuse, a license to be creative. But we have some some of the most awful architecture and other blunders in the marketing mainstream because the average person who considers him or herself creative, is actually far from it. An artistic streak - the real thing that courses through a rare few individuals blood, is not always a blessing, and while genius is a whisker away from madness (creatively speaking), there are few that know the difference.
Which brings us to the ABSA campaign. I remember reading Brendan Seery in The Star praising this campaign. I was in ABSA this morning and saw a beautiful and artistic depiction of feet, a child's ballet feet with the sort of whorly leafy folds in a pixie book, or in Lord of the Rings illustration. I don't know about you, but I'm not a hobbit, and I am in the bank to make a serious transaction.
Meanwhile, the message ABSA conveys (against a climate of growing financial austerity both here and abroad), is:
These feet have been
to a place
where the world cannot hold them down.
To the edge of dreams
where pain is nothing and glory
but a step away.
No matter where your dreams lead you
we'd like to help you get there.
So here you have a major financial institution basically reinforcing this disconnect with reality (I alluded to it below in the media and the financial markets). Daydream away, experience no pain - what fantasy world of finance is this?
Because right now a lot of ordinary people are feeling plenty of pain. They are starting to think of giving up their homes; they're certainly finding their lifestyles are no longer within reach.
Yet: ...these feet have been to places where the world cannot hold them down.
Ummm...right now, the world has taken hold, and in the real world food prices are affecting a global population. So while ABSA is saying you can get a house TODAY, in fact house prices are high, about to devalue, whoever is foolhardy enough to purchase in this market, will see their mortgage payments escalate while the value depreciates.
But hey it's a creative ad and it's all dreamy and that's all that matters? In reality what our friend from the advertising agency was saying, is when you put a penis into your advertising message, you're just sodomising a market, getting what you want out of it and leaving it in ruins. The media and advertising are culpable for this massive manipulation, to get consumers to sleep, perchance to dream, and to awaken in a nightmare. This was clear when I studied advertising, and it was clear when I did my internship at TJDR. Maybe ad executives can live with themselves (despite a job that requires the spreading of lies and unsustainable deceits), but we don't have to. But that requires a collective wake up, the start of critical thinking, and the end of our sleepwalk into the future.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Brent Crude Oil Right Now: $108.76 (Up 0.27%)
I had a discussion with an American intern (based in California) whose story is on the front page of The Times this morning. I'll load up an exclusive on that with a picture probably tomorrow. One of the things that came up in our conversation was the stuff that is actually making front page news. Today, on The Times it's Soap star's 'brutal assault on woman'. On the Sowetan, on the front page but not quite headline news, is Nwabisa for movie fame. On CNN the Olympic Torch is top story right now, and on MSNBC - Affidavit: Girls had sex in polygamist temple. It's not the feature story but it's prominent.
What's happening is that news is becoming a mixture of info-tainment and 'what people want to know'. This effectively sidelines and dilutes vital news.
WHAT SHOULD THE HEADLINE NEWS BE AROUND THE WORLD TODAY?
In my humble opinion, simply this: $110. Filling the entire page. I've looked on CNN's website and I can't find a single story about oil. Since this is the driver of an imminent worldwide recession, it's odd that it's being - apparently - purposely ignored.
It's also odd that CNN is imitating SKY News' unique breaking news branding (using yellow and black), and the visual format is very similar to Sky News. CNN just has one small problem - although it looks like SKY News, it is still nowhere near as good, or on the ball.
So here's the story no one wants to read:
Oil Prices Set New Highs Above $110
That was the price of oil yesterday. Oil is shattering records, and shattering lifestyles. It is responsible for fundamental (major fundamental) shifts in lifestyle (whether we choose to or not), work, and business. It's still passing under the radar though, in favour of what soap stars are doing, and the latest movie. It's crazy. But then it's a crazy world, and the human critters are long overdue for a massive wake-up call. We won't need any headlines though to tell us it's happening, we'll be feeling it, like a pinch that gets worse. I wonder if we'll do a collective wake up though?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)