November 13, 2003
Interesting Trends in Advertising Activism
Due to the overwhelming amount of crap they’ve decided to call newsworthy, I’ve given up on watching the network morning shows as I get ready for work each day. For a fair and balanced look at the news I’ve decided to turn to CNN for their (relatively) unbiased look at world events. Personally, I’d like to find a news source with a little bit better Weltanschauung but whatcha gonna do, right? Stuck in their own happy provincialism most of the media outlets don’t offer the type of perspective I’m craving so I turn to the lesser of all the evils until I am able to get online at the office and peruse multiple news sources in order to form my own opinions.
Recently though, I’ve noticed a trend that’s alarming me a little bit: when CNN cuts to a commercial, there are ads for FOXNews — ads which are not being run by FOXNews themselves but ads that are being run by Comcast, my cable provider! I’m not sure if this is a new “industry standard” but this seems a little unnerving to me. I haven’t seen this happen once or twice since I started watching CNN, either — each morning I will see at least one or two (usually more) FOXNews ads over the course of the hour that I take to get ready. OK, I’m not seeing black helicopters or men with dark suits and sunglasses, but why would Comcast be doing this — and why is CNN allowing this to happen? Does CNN know that this is happening? Has anyone else seen this?
Along with this, the other day, I also caught an ad for these bozos. Take a gander at the quality, tone, and language of their content — and pay special attention to who is behind this "non-profit coalition". Know where the ad for this site was run? Right after a CNN piece about KFC's new ad campaign. If the things that the Center for Consumer Freedom says are true, then why is there a "growing fraternity of 'food cops,' health care enforcers, militant activists, meddling bureaucrats, and violent radicals"? The truth is out there — are they afraid we'll find out?
Posted by huxley75 at November 13, 2003 03:24 PMIt is no suprise that this is actually happening. As far as the media is concerned, only a few corporations are involved; and to top it off, many hold stock in each other.
There used to be several dozen businesses that owned only a few respective media channels. Due to the events of the past fifty years that total has dropped to around eight or five. So because of this, they share quite a lot and the media is only becoming more and more biased.
Posted by: Adam at November 13, 2003 04:20 PMYou can’t possibly be implying that ClearChannel, News Corporation, Time-Warner, Disney, etc. have a choke-hold on the public opinion?
Posted by: Huxley75 at November 13, 2003 05:04 PM
