Thursday, August 25, 2011

Why should Murdoch's news people get to do all the good stuff?

Channel 9 TV in Australia is a big deal. It was owned by Australia's richest man Kerry Packer but it seems to now be owned by someone that Wikipedia doesn't want to name. Part of their sucess has been their news gathering organisation. They have the reputation for good solid journalism hah, hah, wink, wink.
But now, a scandal 
On separate days, two reporters filed fake crosses from the station's helicopter, saying they were near Beerwah, over the site of the search for the remains of the murdered Queensland teenager.
In one incident, the chopper was actually hovering near the station's Mt Coot-tha studios and in the other, it was on the Channel Nine helipad - and was filmed there by a rival network as the live cross went to air.
Earlier this week Channel Nine admitted the crosses had been faked, citing time restraints and poor weather.
Yes, not as glamourous as phone tapping, but what a jolly good jape, eh?
And it would have worked too if it hadn't been for those meddling rival news people!

But if they had been completely straight-up would the information have been somehow better coming from 1000m above the site? I can never understand the live cross syndrome that shows the empty building in the background and someone breathlessly telling us "And it was here, earlier today, where..."

11 comments:

zombie rotten mcdonald said...

Beerwah?

Now you're just typing in random verification words and pretending they are actual places.

You shemnick.

Hamish Mack said...

It's Australia, dude. 90% of the country is named after beer

mikey said...

It's a surprisingly common dodge. The dood the Neptune Society paid to fly my dad's ashes out over the Pacific and scatter them - he had a contract and he'd do a weekly batch run - got busted for taking the money, tossing the ashes in the City of Bakersfield landfill and leaving the airplane firmly tied down.

More profit, and only dead guys as witnesses - hey, what could possibly go wrong?

W/V would differ, and considers it the outrageous behavior of a bugrat

Big Bad Bald Bastard said...

This just seems like gratuitous overdramatization- why would they need a flyover in such a case?

Smut Clyde said...

Some breathless airheads telling you that they have no information over the noise of the helicopter engine is seen as more worth your attention than the same breathless airheads telling you that they have no information, from the studio.
Evidently this is what the public want.

mikey said...

"I have...No...Further information...at this time...This is mikey...reporting live from...the kitchen where...we're seeing the emergence of a chicken pot pie...More as events unfold..."

zombie rotten mcdonald said...

It's Australia, dude. 90% of the country is named after beer

If you named your daughter Blatz, you are an evil, evil man.

ifthethunderdontgetya™³²®© said...

I got a gal in Beerwah Diddy
Ain't no town and it ain't no city
She loves a man 'til it's a pity
Crazy 'bout my gal in Beerwah Diddy
~

Dragon-King Wangchuck said...

Oh wow. Thanks for all the support. It has been a trying week. I’m stunned by what’s been allowed to happen, and all the misinformation.

SRSLY d00d? You're upset at all teh misinformation? Rilly? I just don't know what else to say.

Substance McGravitas said...

It's only a story about a murdered teenager. Who could get upset about that?

mikey said...

If the murdered teenager got the virus and became a zombie they woulda been able to see from the helicopter and maybe save humankind, but no, instead the cheap lazy bastards were sitting in the parking lot with the rotors going THUMPTHUMPTHUMPTHUMP while they pretended to fly over the dead teenager saying "and we're pleased to report that the former teenager is not a Zombie" even as he was eating that nice old couple in the trailer park.

See? Cheaters never pros - per!

Hmmm. W/V seems to be encouraging me to achieve success: winfati