During the disasters of the 1990's Channel 5 KTLA Los Angeles was golden with a legion of fine reporters like Stan Chambers and fine anchors like Hal Fischmann and the disaster uber-babe of all time, Jennifer York in Sky Cam 5 with that then brand new WesCam covering the 1993 firestorms for which coverage she earned an Emmy. She did an encore for the Northridge Quake in 1994. Stan Chambers was in the chopper for the first night of the LA Riots in 1992.
Now KTLA is as light and fluffy as all the other stations in the LA Media market and has sold out to the bimbo movement in order to garner more of the male 18-35 demographic.... is that a high pressure system over the Silicon Valley or side view of a silicon-enhanced breast?
And to think KTLA started it all... in the world, period.... it had the first live coverage on TV of any disaster anywhere from a helicopter... the Bel Air Fire.... and that old Stan Chambers as a young man was covering the story of the little girl who fell down that well whom was being rescued which was the first ever TV news story anywhere to captivate a local media market.
How have the mighty fallen?!
Kimmer
Even so, I find the L.A. market TV news (pathetic as it is) much better
than, say, the Albany, NY, market (think, small town).
And my worst ever experience was a radio station somewhere in rural Arkansas
or Alabama. While driving along I-20, I found this AM station which went to
breaking news coverage shortly after I entered their coverage area. A pickup
truck had gone off the road and the driver was [I forget--killed, I think,
or maybe seriously injured]. The station continued live pre-emptive coverage
until I lost their signal. At first, they said "a pickup truck", then they
said they couldn't give more until family was found and notified, then they
went on to fully describe the truck, even to the license tag number, all the
while reminding the audience that they couldn't give the victim's name until
family was notified. (I think they even gave the species of the tree he
hit.)
In broadcasting, the law of physics applies: "Nature abhors a vacuum."
Airtime must be filled!
----- Original Message -----
From: "Vic" <sactovic@yahoo.com>
To: <californiadisasters@yahoogroups.com>Sent: Wednesday, May 25, 2011 7:39 AM
Subject: [californiadisasters] Re: A why is it?
My earlier defense of the role of the press notwithstanding, sadly, I agree
with most of the criticism of TV news. Local newscasts. especially, seem to
be nothing but a dreary recitation of all the accidents, murders, traffic
and weather they can cram into a half hour. One small exception is the NBC
station in Sacramento, which has long had a succession of solid political
reporters covering state government and politics. Sadly again, their current
one is leaving to go to work for a PR firm. I don't feel good about the
chances they will replace him.
BBC is often great. But if you're interested in what's going on in Africa
and the Middle East, another surprisingly good service I've tuned into
lately is Al Jazeera English's web service. Their hard news coverage is
generally excellent, in my view, much of it written and edited by laid-off
U.S and British journalists. Just ignore the anti-American rants of their
comment and analysis pieces.
Vic
--- In californiadisasters@yahoogroups.com, newnethboy <kef413@...> wrote:
>
> I found better coverage of the Mississippi River situation on BBC than on
US
> sources for a while. (I'm now watching NO TV-Internet sources, including a
> Webcam of Algiers Point. and WWL-TV and CE charts on river stage.)
>
> I just don't watch TV news at all anymore. (And I don't consider PBS's new
> program stream of such sources as al Jaziera to be an improvement!)
>
> Even on the Web news, I found about 10 times as much coverage of the IMF
> president's and Arnold's "issues" than of the plight of thousands of
> Louisiana residents being forced to move from their homes.
--
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