[BC] "broken'" news

[Scott Cason]

>>Not everything has to be an on-location talking head to communicate,
although TV seems unable to cope otherwise. In these cases it is the
message NOT the medium that is important.

However, I have noticed lately that with all the technology and gizmos
at a news department's disposal, the message gets lost in the flash.
Weather seems to be the easiest victim in all this.  For example, our
NBC affiliate in Louisville has the some super-duper radar to where they
can see inside a storm and tell how powerful it is.  Now, unless you are
a pilot about to fly through this storm, that information is totally
useless to the average viewer.  Showing the viewer a simple base
reflectivity map with green for light rain, blue for moderate rain and
red for the storm is enough.  Hell, I'm an engineer and pilot in
training, and that stupid new doppler radar that WAVE has is confusing
to me.  Newsrooms let graphics and crawls and bugs and split screen
boxes and microwave trucks and satellite trucks and video phones all
obscure the main message.  

But what do I know, I'm just an engineer.

Scott Cason
LaGrange Communications
www.lagrange-com.com
(877)265-9773
(502)213-0024