Media

Accuracy of Report on Video News Releases Affirmed: CMD Issues Full Rebuttal of RTNDA Claims

The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) released a full rebuttal of claims made against its April 2006 report, "Fake TV News: Widespread and Undisclosed." The report tracked television stations' use of video news releases (VNRs). The report documented 77 television stations airing VNRs or related materials; not once did stations disclose the client behind the segment. Recently, the Radio-Television News Directors Association (RTNDA), through the law and lobby firm Wiley Rein & Fielding, issued a critique of CMD’s report that misrepresented and distorted the substance of the report. CMD's full, point-by-point rebuttal of RTNDA's critique is available online at: www.prwatch.org/node/5282.

Nuclear Public Radio

Submitted by Diane Farsetta on

On its "Weekend Edition Saturday" show, NPR aired a segment titled, "Environmentalists Rethink Stance on Nuclear Power." Who was their one example of an environmentalist turned nuclear power proponent? None other than Greenpeace co-founder turned industry flack Patrick Moore.

No
Main Source: 
National Public Radio (U.S.), September 30, 2006
Topics: 
Journalism
Nuclear Power
Third Party Technique

Iraqi Journalists: Not So Liberated

Submitted by Diane Farsetta on

"Under a broad new set of laws criminalizing speech that ridicules the government or its officials, some resurrected verbatim from Saddam Hussein's penal code, roughly a dozen Iraqi journalists have been charged with offending public officials in the past year," reports Paul von Zielbauer. "Three journalists for a small newspaper in southeastern Iraq are being tried ... for articles last year that accused a provincial governor, local judges and police officials of corruption. ... On Sept.

No
Main Source: 
New York Times, September 29, 2006
Topics: 
Iraq
Journalism
Human Rights

Judge Queries News Corporation Subsidiary's Email Deletion Policy

Submitted by Bob Burton on

A judge has challenged the fairness of the policy of a News Corporation subsidiary under which all e-mails are deleted after only three days, with only those considered important printed out and included in hard copy files. Justice Ronald Sackville told News Limited's barrister, Noel Hutley, that the company should "Keep them.

No
Main Source: 
Sydney Morning Herald, September 27, 2006
Topics: 
Ethics
International
Media
Secrecy

Iraq "98 Percent Off-Limits" for Press Corps

Submitted by Jonathan Rosenblum on

"Everyone is kind of groping around in the dark," says New York Times Baghdad correspondent Dexter Filkins on his return from reporting in Iraq. Despite employing 70 Iraqi staffers, the civil war there (Filkins doesn't hedge--"Yeah, sure" it's a civil war) has meant the Times cannot safely access stories. Its own five correspondents primarily spend their time pasting together reports by the Iraqi staff, protected by a small army of 45 security guards, armored cars, and belt-fed rooftop machine guns.

No
Main Source: 
Editor and Publisher, September 16, 2006 (sub req'd)
Topics: 
Iraq
Journalism
War / Peace

Pages

Subscribe to Media