tagged w/ yellow journalism
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The BBC will today apologise to an estimated 74 million people around the world for a news fixing scandal, exposed by The Independent, in which it broadcast documentaries made by a London TV company that was earning millions of pounds from PR clients which it featured in its programming.
BBC World News viewers from Kuala Lumpur to Khartoum and Bangkok to Buenos Aires will watch the remarkable broadcast, available in 295 million homes, 1.7 million hotel rooms, 81 cruise ships, 46 airlines and on 35 mobile phone platforms, at four different times, staged in order to reach audiences in different time zones. The BBC will apologise for breaking "rules aimed at protecting our editorial integrity".
The Independent exposed last year in an investigation into the global television news industry how the BBC paid nominal fees of as little as £1 for programmes made by FBC Media (UK), whose PR client list included foreign governments and multinational companies. The company made eight pieces for the BBC about Malaysia while failing to declare it was paid £17m by the Malaysian government for "global strategic communications". The programmes included positive coverage of Malaysia's controversial palm oil industry.
The BBC also used FBC to make a documentary about the spring uprising in Egypt without knowing the firm was paid to do PR work for the regime of former dictator Hosni Mubarak.
The BBC Trust's Editorial Standards Committee carried out an investigation into BBC World News which reported in November it had uncovered 15 breaches of editorial guidelines. Eight of the breaches were in respect of FBC programmes made about Malaysia. The trust also identified other breaches of rules on sponsorship in programmes shown by BBC World News, which is a commercial entity and carries advertising. In its apology, the BBC will say: "A small number of programmes broadcast on BBC World News between February 2009 and July 2011 broke BBC rules aimed at protecting our editorial integrity. These rules ensure that programmes are free, and are seen to be free, from commercial or other outside pressures."
Making a direct reference to the FBC documentaries, it will say: "In the case of eight other programmes, all of which featured Malaysia, we found that the production company which made the programmes appeared to have a financial relationship with the Malaysian government. This meant there was a potential conflict of interest, though the BBC was not aware of it when the programmes were broadcast."
It concludes: "Editorial integrity is the highest priority for BBC World News, which is why we apologise for these breaches of our normal standards."
The Independent has revealed FBC, which was run by the former Financial Times journalist Alan Friedman and the CNN presenter John Defterios, was also making editorial programmes that featured FBC clients for the global business broadcaster CNBC, which suspended its FBC-made show World Business. Other FBC clients included the governments of Greece and Kazakhstan and companies like Microsoft. FBC also tried to suggest in its promotional literature it had "cultivated" key opinion formers, such as economist Jeffrey Sachs, as "ambassadors". Sachs totally rejected the claim.
When The Independent published its investigations into FBC the firm said it had kept strict divisions between its editorial and PR operations. FBC closed its London offices and went into administration in October. Broadcasting regulator Ofcom is investigating FBC.
Bad practice: The stories
Hosni Mubarak
As Egypt was in the throes of a revolution, the BBC commissioned FBC to make a documentary on the country. But the firm had a commercial relationship to promote Egypt as "liberal and open". The programme, Third Eye: Egypt, warned of the threat of takeover by Islamic fundamentalists.
Mark Thompson
The BBC director general has ordered an end to the practice of acquiring news programmes for "low or nominal cost" after the BBC admitted 15 breaches of its editorial guidelines and buying documentaries for "nominal" fees as little as £1 from a company that was working to promote foreign governments.
Malaysia
Since 2009 FBC has made at least four BBC documentaries dealing with Malaysia and controversial issues such as the country's palm-oil industry and its treatment of rainforests and indigenous people. The company has received millions of pounds in payments from the government of Malaysia for a "global strategic communications campaign".
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/tv-radio/bbc-to-issue-global-apology-for-documentaries-that-broke-rules-6719997.htmlThe BBC will today apologise to an estimated 74 million people around the world for a... more
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Dear Nancy,
You are truly grinding on my very last nerve. You’ve always gotten on my nerves, but as of lately, I can no longer bear to hear your voice. When I think about you my brain conjures up words like, “yellow journalism” and “sensationalist” and of course, “scandal monger.”Dear Nancy,
You are truly grinding on my very last nerve. You’ve always... more
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The War of the Worlds was an episode of the American radio drama anthology series "Mercury Theatre on the Air". It was performed as a Halloween episode of the series on October 30, 1938 and aired over the Columbia Broadcasting System radio network. Directed and narrated by Orson Welles, the episode was an adaptation of H. G. Wells' novel, 'The War of the Worlds'.
The first two thirds of the 60-minute broadcast were presented as a series of simulated "news bulletins", which suggested to many listeners that an actual alien invasion by Martians was currently in progress. Compounding the issue was the fact that the Mercury Theatre on the Air was a 'sustaining show' (it ran without commercial breaks), thus adding to the program's quality of realism.
Although there were sensationalist accounts in the press about a supposed panic in response to the broadcast, the precise extent of listener response has been debated. In the days following the adaptation, however, there was widespread outrage.
Because the program's oration included a segment in which "radio has a responsibility to serve in the public interest at all times," the news-bulletin format was decried as cruelly deceptive by some newspapers and public figures, leading to an outcry against the perpetrators of the broadcast and some confirmed suicides.
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The Full, Unedited 1938 Welles Production is brought to you in 7 parts:
(Part One) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wf5TPVz56A
(Part Two) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUBisKB5l98
(Part Three) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejt_aWUrEp8
(Part Four) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aYZPkHEp_s
(Part Five) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wxLjcz1oE8
(Part Six) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fFLmXZ9Lmk
(Part Seven) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuDdAe17OL0
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For more on "Yellow Journalism," please indulge in the following:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalismThe War of the Worlds was an episode of the American radio drama anthology series... more
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* Data for vital 'hockey stick graph' has gone missing
* There has been no global warming since 1995
* Warming periods have happened before - but NOT due to man-made changes
The academic at the centre of the ‘Climategate’ affair, whose raw data is crucial to the theory of climate change, has admitted that he has trouble ‘keeping track’ of the information.
Colleagues say that the reason Professor Phil Jones has refused Freedom of Information requests is that he may have actually lost the relevant papers.
Professor Jones told the BBC yesterday there was truth in the observations of colleagues that he lacked organisational skills, that his office was swamped with piles of paper and that his record keeping is ‘not as good as it should be’.
The data is crucial to the famous ‘hockey stick graph’ used by climate change advocates to support the theory.
Professor Jones also conceded the possibility that the world was warmer in medieval times than now – suggesting global warming may not be a man-made phenomenon.
And he said that for the past 15 years there has been no ‘statistically significant’ warming.* Data for vital 'hockey stick graph' has gone missing
* There has been... more
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LAKELAND, Fla.---- Animal control officers hope to trap a pack of raccoons that mauled a 74-year-old Florida woman who tried to chase them from her yard.LAKELAND, Fla.---- Animal control officers hope to trap a pack of raccoons that mauled... more
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We cannot be both Drug Free and Free - Dr Lester Grinspoon
UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs 1961
The Single Convention was the first international treaty to prohibit cannabis. Bangladesh means cannabis - the people centered their lives on the plant. This law help created the famine a decade later
In recorded history there have been no known deaths or harm
attributed to marijuana use, except maybe coughs.
Yet our beautiful country, with 5% of the World's
population, houses 25% of the prison and jail inmates.
The Greatest Generations' Longest War, born of racism and fed
by ignorance and lies must end.
President Raygun warned of MJ health damages, saying,
"We don't know what they are yet, but we know that they are permanent."
First, thanks to Hearst's Yellow Journalism, we were told that smoking MJ
made you a murderer. Then it was squacked that it drove you mad.
Then the buzz wuz amotivational syndrome. Then it grew
tits on males and made one impotent. Brain damage, mental illness,
lung cancer, where will the lies end. We can all agree though,
that prohibition breeds deception, corruption, violence and death.
You can not tell me that you're a civilized country if you are
incarcerating individuals for smoking marijuana... that's barbaric.
-- Vancouver City Mayor Larry CampbellWe cannot be both Drug Free and Free - Dr Lester Grinspoon
UN Single Convention on... more
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norrisnuvo goes on mastermind answering questions on prohibition.
Developed from an idea by Winston Matthews - written by Winston and norrisnuvo. Animated by norrisnuvo
http://www.norrisnuvo.co.uk
http://www.cannazine.co.uknorrisnuvo goes on mastermind answering questions on prohibition.
Developed from an... more
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Return democracy to youtube and the new medias
www.liveactionfilms.org
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The headlines this week about a new "gay" infection were dramatic. FLESH-EATING BUG SPREADS AMONG GAYS, said one Australian newspaper, referring to a study about an antibiotic-resistant bacterial infection affecting homosexual men in San Francisco and other American cities. EPIDEMIC FEARED--GAYS MAY SPREAD DEADLY STAPH INFECTION TO GENERAL POPULATION, shouted a press release from the Concerned Women for America, a conservative public-policy group.
But is there a new HIV-like public health epidemic on the horizon? Not likely, says Dr. Henry (Chip) Chambers, coauthor of the study, which was published this week in the online edition of the Annals of Internal Medicine. "This is definitely not the new AIDS," says Chambers, a professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). "HIV is a life-threatening disease that is incurable and necessitates lifelong treatment," adds Bill Stackhouse, director of the Institute for Gay Men's Health at the Gay Men's Health Crisis in New York.
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Another example of media spin to increase the ratings. This is yellow journalism at its finest. I am talking about the coverage of the study's results release. The media loves to sensationalize the fear aspect of any story to the point of ridiculousness. The headlines this week about a new "gay" infection were dramatic.... more
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jubal
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added this
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4 years ago
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Lawrence O'Donnell calls John Edwards a "loser" and urges him to drop out and stop blocking the historic election of the nation's first black candidate. If this doesn't fire you up, I don't know what will. I myself once thought that Edwards should drop out but have since broken free from media mind control and returned to my senses. This article is an outrage. Just how far will the media go to stop Edwards?Lawrence O'Donnell calls John Edwards a "loser" and urges him to drop... more
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