Media Business

Imagine a world where the media felt their primary obligation was to inform society of important events and issues “with an openness to consider the different views out there before arriving at any conclusion.” Sounds like heaven, right? Well, NB member ‘lostincyberspace” has shared a fabulous editorial from a Malaysian newspaper called the Sun Daily that should be must reading for American…

On the flipside of Stephen Spielberg’s call for less violence on television, CBS is appealing one of the FCC’s rules concerning profanity. According to an article in Tuesday’s Hollywood Reporter (h/t to Drudge, emphasis mine throughout):CBS told a federal court Monday that the government's new "zero tolerance" policy for indecent broadcasts is threatening to choke off free speech.In its opening…

Here’s something you don’t see every day: a high-ranking member of the entertainment media publicly admonishing folks in his own industry. Yet, according to a Reuters article Monday (h/t to Drudge), one of the most successful movie producers and directors of all time is speaking out against excessive violence on television:Steven Spielberg urged TV networks to be mindful of what they show on the…

Appearing on Monday's edition of the "The Colbert Report," Dan Rather promoted his new HDNet investigative series by touting an ability to report "quality news with integrity." The small cable channel will premiere "Dan Rather Reports" on November 14. The show will feature the ex-CBS anchor who famously left his network after overseeing a segment that included forged documents used to attack…

Early on in the recent Israel/Lebanon war, there was a photograph published by both U.S. News and World Report and Time Magazine, which according to captions published with the picture was of a burning Israeli jet, shot down by Hezbullah missiles. The blogosphere was quick to dispute the picture in question, and the widely-circulated story was that the photograph was actually that of a tire dump…

Unsatisfied with American domination of the international news market, a French company is getting ready to launch a cable/satellite news channel.The staff of France 24 insists they'll be different than CNNi, BBC, and others, but in one respect they're perfectly similar. Just like their American counterparts, they pretend they're objective. They also appear to have trouble perceiving reality.…

Just as television is hypocritical when it comes to diversity (both political and otherwise), many newspapers which are run by liberals are equally hypocritical when it comes to how they structure shares of their stock. The New York Times is the best example of this--editorially, the paper puts forth an image of empowering the powerless and standing up for the little guy. But when it comes to…