FrancisPage: Ink On Your Face

Wednesday, December 6, 2006

Ink On Your Face

You're going to make mistakes as a TV news producer -- spelling errors, fact errors, technical errors. Most of the time, they're minute and forgivable. But for crying out loud, don't do what a producer in Baltimore did. WJZ ran a "news" item saying Michael Richards appeared in blackface at a celebrity roast for Whoopi Goldberg.

From the Baltimore Sun:

WJZ's story, broadcast at least twice yesterday afternoon in breaking-news style by anchor Sally Thorner, was attributed to DatelineHollywood.com. But WJZ's news department was apparently unaware that every story on the Web site satirizes Hollywood.

It didn't take me five seconds to figure that out.

Moral of the story: don't believe everything you read on the Web. And don't use it to fill news time.

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