Comments on: Local television news may be using pre-packaged health stories

By: They never seem to get it right « Adventures of a Funky Heart!

They never seem to get it right « Adventures of a Funky Heart! — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 13:34:36 +0000

[...] if the organization can provide additional audio or visuals for the story (often they can offer an entire prepared package) and just run with it. No muss, no fuss… and very little fact [...]

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 23:19:00 +0000

This has been happening for a long time. At least fifteen years. Usually they drop in a local talking head or voiceover. It’s like the associated press of video.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 19:18:00 +0000

TV is not the best place to get health news nor is the internet. The stories are often bias.

Would you believe that colostrum milk from a cow is now touted as the new health food? I worry that some naive mother will substitute formula or breast milk for this, thinking that it has more antibodies. Yes, it does, but babies absorb whole proteins, too.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 17:21:00 +0000

Feature stories, including most health-related stories, are not hard news. They’re filler and sometimes entertainment. As trends are seldom local, running a mass-market pre-produced feature that can be locally customized by inserting a comment or spot from a local doctor or hospital is a money-saving way to produce content.

Automated broadcasting of centrally pre-produced programming has been around a long time in the radio media; it seems to be a practice at the heart of the profitability of large radio networks which frequently need no live persons present at a radio station for many hours at a time, all the broadcast being handled remotely.