Do We Need the Humor at the End of the Broadcast?
So the local news is a half hour in length on Channels 3,5, 19 and an hour on 43 and 8. Add in sports (not real news), weather (again not real news but history and gambling), commercials, and mindless chatter and there is really only 8-10 minutes or 16-20 minutes of news on the hour long programs. The three local networks are cramming the day into 10 minutes. How is it possible dedicate 45 seconds to 1 minute on a lighter story at the end of the broadcast? On Friday night 11/4/05, Channel 3 had a "news" worthy story about a camel that continues to escape and wander down the road. Then the booming trusted voice in news, Tim White, made some smart ass comment that was vaguely sexual and that was the end of the news.
The blood, crime and sex are up front then there are commercials, scandal, weather, commercials, sports, and finally the funny story. Are the weather, commercials and sports so stressful that we need a funny story to relieve the tensions? Shouldn't the funny story be placed between the crime and the blood? How do we trust these broadcasters if the entire broadcast is just a prelude to the punchline at the end? Do they need to make us laugh as part of the local news like they are auditioning for the Tonight Show or Daily Show? Will somebody please answer all these questions? We need to know what the thinking is here. How about a full half hour of real news?
So the local news is a half hour in length on Channels 3,5, 19 and an hour on 43 and 8. Add in sports (not real news), weather (again not real news but history and gambling), commercials, and mindless chatter and there is really only 8-10 minutes or 16-20 minutes of news on the hour long programs. The three local networks are cramming the day into 10 minutes. How is it possible dedicate 45 seconds to 1 minute on a lighter story at the end of the broadcast? On Friday night 11/4/05, Channel 3 had a "news" worthy story about a camel that continues to escape and wander down the road. Then the booming trusted voice in news, Tim White, made some smart ass comment that was vaguely sexual and that was the end of the news.
The blood, crime and sex are up front then there are commercials, scandal, weather, commercials, sports, and finally the funny story. Are the weather, commercials and sports so stressful that we need a funny story to relieve the tensions? Shouldn't the funny story be placed between the crime and the blood? How do we trust these broadcasters if the entire broadcast is just a prelude to the punchline at the end? Do they need to make us laugh as part of the local news like they are auditioning for the Tonight Show or Daily Show? Will somebody please answer all these questions? We need to know what the thinking is here. How about a full half hour of real news?
posted by Homeless Grapevine at 3:23 PM
1 Comments:
Humor is necessary in the presentation of the news on television. Studies show that 97% of Americans get their news from the Daily Show and the other 3% are blind. If evening news programs are going to compete in today's world, there needs to be more entertainment and less news. If I want straight-up news, I'll look in a newspaper. I turn on the TV to be shown what news is important and why it's important. How can something be important if it's not entertaining? Evening news today needs more jokes, words that contain no more than two syllables, some sort of storyline going on between the news reporters, cleavage, and some wacky intern who's always screwing things up.
"Charlie!" they'll groan as he drops the boom mike again. Then, he'll come back with some trademark quip like, "Whoopsy-daisy!" or "It's my first day!"
If they could have a clown demonstrate what's going on with balloon animals, my understanding of what is going on in the world today would increase ten fold.
And, why doesn't the news have a laugh track? Why aren't there celebrity guests? Why aren't there different spin-offs of the news, like Five O'Clock Action News: Field Reporters, Five O'Clock Action News: Associated Press, and Five O'Clock Action News: Freedom of Press? These are all issues that need to be addressed. I urge you people out there to write to your local stations and offer these suggestions. If the news doesn't change soon, no one will have any idea what's going on.
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