Same Talking, Different Heads: How Not To Localize News

from the handed-the-same-envelope dept

Fri, Nov 4th 2011 12:23pm — Mike Masnick

If you haven't seen this short clip of a bunch of local TV newscasters all saying the exact same line about Conan O'Brien's officiating a same-sex marriage on stage in New York City during a show this week, it's really worth watching just for the mind-numbingly bizarre reaction you have to seeing so many newscasters all repeat the exact line: "Conan O'Brien may be about to push the envelope on late night television." Or, as O'Brien notes, watch as they each put "their own spin" on the news: Honestly, it's hard not to watch that and think that all of the newscasters didn't receive the identical script. While the phrase is a common one, it's not that common that it would lead so many newscasters to all use the identical phrasing. It's possible these are all news affiliates from a single company, who were sent a basic script -- but, once again, this seems to highlight the growing irrelevance/ridiculousness of TV news these days. If you're just going to have 50 different newscasters all read the identical script, why not just have a single newscaster do it, and air it directly on all those other stations.

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Filed Under: conan o'brien, local news, pushing the envelope, same sex marriage

44 Comments

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heyidiot (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 12:32pm

There was a difference...
Some of them said "EN-velope", and some of them said "ON-velope"...

Seemed fair and balanced to me.
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- el_segfaulto (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:01pm
  
  Re: There was a difference...
  Seemed fair & balanced to me.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:53pm
    
    Re: Re: There was a difference...
    Seemed fare and balanced to me.
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    - Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:11pm
      
      Re: Re: Re: There was a difference...
      Seamed faire and balanced to me
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:14pm
      
      Re: Re: Re: There was a difference...
      Seemed fair and balanced to me.
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      - Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:20pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: There was a difference...
        The vast majority of the stations involved are affiliated with CBS not FOX. Fox flame FAIL
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        el_segfaulto (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:30pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: There was a difference...
        Joke comprehension fail!
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        abc gum, 4 Nov 2011 @ 5:32pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: There was a difference...
        "The vast majority of the stations involved are affiliated with CBS not FOX. Fox flame FAIL"
        
        Oh - I see - So Fox is fair and Balanced then ... carry on. Nothing to see here.
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        Marcel de Jong (profile), 5 Nov 2011 @ 10:02am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: There was a difference...
        Apparently the vast majority of the stations involved were NOT affiliated with FOX but with CBS. Online Fox flame fails. More news after the break.
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      - Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 6:12pm
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: There was a difference...
        Seemed fairly imbalanced to me.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 12:36pm

Hey, that last one at least was a variation.

And there was the one lady who (mistakenly) swapped the word "able" for "about" - this is progress people, this is the culture of remix!
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- Chris Rhodes (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 12:38pm
  
  Re:
  And there was the one lady who (mistakenly) swapped the word "able" for "about"
  Fired.
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ComputerAddict (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 12:38pm

One lady even said 'TV' instead of Television...

Maybe television was too big of a word for her so her studio had to shorten it. /sarc
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Mr. LemurBoy (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 12:39pm

All these newscasters receive my stamp of approval for pushing the envelope.
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W Klink (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 12:41pm

How it happened
How Did 27 Stations End Up With Identical Scripts For a Story About Conan O�Brien?
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- Chris Brand (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 12:57pm
  
  Re: How it happened
  Interesting to see that the URL for that story is .../how-did-28-stations-end-up-with-identical-scripts-for-a-story-about-conan-obrien_b28039
  Did one of the stations change their script ?
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Ima Fish (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 12:52pm

The bigger question than why local reporters were reading the same story, is why this Conan story was being aired on local news in the first place?

Local news outlets should be reporting on local news. That should be their sole focus. If they're reporting on stuff the entire world has already read about online, they're failing miserably.
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- Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:23pm
  
  Re:
  I guess you're right local stations should report on local stories, national news should report on national stories, internet news should stick to stories about the internet. See how that logic fails.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- nasch (profile), 5 Nov 2011 @ 8:04pm
  
  Re:
  Local news outlets should be reporting on local news. That should be their sole focus. If they're reporting on stuff the entire world has already read about online, they're failing miserably.
  
  Eventually maybe, but I'm sure there are still people who get most or all of their news from local sources. I honestly feel sorry for anyone still watching local TV news though.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 12:56pm

Mostly I find lamescream so short of what the news media are supposed to function as, that I now get my news from other sources.

Sources that don't have a vested interest in selling one slant as opposed to another. By the time it makes it to newspapers and tv news, it's old news given today's internet speeds. If you know where to look, you can often find about the days happenings and be on to other stuff, long before it hits lamescream.

When you start seeing things like Eric Holder making statements that several of the major media's are withholding info on an agreement (mainly to keep an open line to White House sourced news) and cussing a reporter for breaking it as news, (Fast and Furious) you begin to get the hint that the major news networks are acting as government stooges so you won't be able to depend on them for unbiased news.

Lots of that going on in today's world of corporate control.
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- el_segfaulto (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:04pm
  
  Re:
  Something I've noticed... My favorite (and only) sources for non-interwebs news is The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. I've seen coverage from other places on the E-PARASITE act but not a peep out of either of them. Makes me wonder if Viacom is flexing its muscle.
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  - Willton, 4 Nov 2011 @ 3:11pm
    
    Re: Re:
    Something I've noticed... My favorite (and only) sources for non-interwebs news is The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. I've seen coverage from other places on the E-PARASITE act but not a peep out of either of them. Makes me wonder if Viacom is flexing its muscle.
    
    It's more likely that the average viewer of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report does not care about E-PARASITE and that there are many other areas of news more suitable for lampooning. If Viacom is flexing any muscle, it's the muscle that looks for ratings and ad revenue.
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  - nasch (profile), 5 Nov 2011 @ 8:06pm
    
    Re: Re:
    More likely they just don't see a good joke there. They are comedy shows, after all.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:05pm

So is this a form of copyright infringement?
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jupiterkansas (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:08pm

This is what the internet will look like once the government and multi-national corporations start controlling it. Mass media dictating public opinion.

Nothing that happens on television (or at the movie theatre) is worthy of local news coverage.
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PlagueSD (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:13pm

If you're just going to have 50 different newscasters all read the identical script, why not just have a single newscaster do it, and air it directly on all those other stations.

That would mean 49 other newscasters would be out of a job. We're supposed to be creating jobs, not destroying them!!!

Think of the children...(of the newscasters)
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- el_segfaulto (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:23pm
  
  Re:
  Really? I always figured newscasters reproduced by splitting in half. It was the only explanation that I could come up with for all of the blonde airheads on Fox News.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:15pm

Local news is some of the worst TV news. My local news very often decides that pep rallies cheering for the sport teams and the weather are the only things worth reporting.

I can tell just by looking out my window that it's snowing, I don't need to see reporters all around the area confirm to me that it's snowing.

And if I want to watch a sports pep rally I can go to a sports pep rally, or buy cable or whatever to actually watch the national sports games the local teams are playing in.

I rarely watch TV news anymore, since it's so heavily biased to shamelessly milk any conflict possible regardless of the facts. There was one time the news in my area were all heavily attacking the Catholic church for not taking allegations of priests molesting kids serious enough. Then the church finally reacted by temporarily suspending around 18 priests with pay while they investigated the allegations. Then the same news organizations made a big story about the Catholic church overreacting and wrongly accusing 18 priests of molesting kids (with the 'evidence' of wrong doing being catholic church goers saying "he couldn't possibly be a child molester", rather than actual investigative journalism proving they were innocent of all charges).
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:17pm

They don't appear to be all from the same day.
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btrussell (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:44pm

"push the envelope"

Is that what they call it these days?
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:54pm

Actually, if you poke around a bit, you will find that many are making reference to a press release sent out by Conan's own people, using that phrase. For many local stations, entertainment news is something they do off hand, as time filler. They likely read the story pretty much right off the press release.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 1:55pm

Seemed fare and balanced to me.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:06pm

I was really hoping that all the replies to this thread would be exactly the same.

I'm disappointed.
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- Anonymous Coward, 7 Nov 2011 @ 11:45am
  
  Re:
  that is something that would happen on fark
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Blaine (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:07pm

A couple of our local 'news' stations read the comments from their facebook page for a couple minutes each episode now.

They gotta have something to talk about.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:18pm

At least it isn't content from blog posters or The Huffington Post!
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:19pm

I wonder when people will just put virtual character on TV and do away with people entirely.
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weneedhelp (profile), 4 Nov 2011 @ 2:36pm

Does not suprise me
http://www.freepress.net/ownership/chart/main

MSM has long been a government lapdog.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 3:19pm

Guy Fawkes pirate masks for the masses.

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/11/04/world/europe/guy-fawkes-mask/index.html

They should all buy one.
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BUZ SMITH, 4 Nov 2011 @ 4:22pm

"same sex" wedding on TV
I think we should start open, live sex contests on late night TV to see who can go the longest before orgasm. After all, that may be legal in some states too.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 4:55pm

Reporters are L-A-Z-Y. If you give them words they can cut and paste they will use them verbatim whether they make sense or not.

I was involved with a community that was fighting an industrial development in their rural area. The media loved us because it was mostly simple farm-folk against a huge chemical company and the government. We would end each of our little meetings by deciding what we wanted tomorrow's headlines to say. Then we would contact the media and put those words into their mouths. It was a little scary.
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Anonymous Coward, 4 Nov 2011 @ 7:51pm

I was really hoping that all the replies to this thread would be exactly the same.

I'm disappointed.
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nasch (profile), 5 Nov 2011 @ 8:13pm

If you're just going to have 50 different newscasters all read the identical script, why not just have a single newscaster do it, and air it directly on all those other stations.

They do that, too:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_Ryan
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Anonymous Coward, 5 Nov 2011 @ 9:08pm

I've worked in local news and (whether it's good or bad) this kind of thing is common. As an Anonymous Coward indicated above, press releases are commonly picked up by news departments and, if they're even decently written, read on-air with few edits.

The other (more likely for this case) explanation is that the AP or another large newswire that these stations subscribe to put out this story. (That would also explain why these stations treat it as newsworthy.) AP wires are usually distributed as ready-to-read copy, so producers generally don make major edits and will use the same phrases ("may be about to push the envelope") that AP uses, however poorly-written they are.
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