Smoking and Advertising

Newsweek columnist Anna Quindlen used her column this week to criticize a cigarette brand and its advertising. She says the Camel 9 brand, packaged in black with hot-pink foil, is designed to rope in younger girls as cigarette consumers.
Earlier this year, New York Times ad industry reporter Stuart Elliott covered the launch of Camel 9, the positive reaction of investors and the company's move to market the "male" Camel brand to female consumers.
NPR also has a package on Camel 9 that's worth listening to.
Quindlen does a good job reminding us all that this is a legal product. Do the congressmen who knocked on magazine editors' doors to get them to eschew Camel 9 ads have a decent strategy? Is that one way to keep this brand from marketing to girls? Is it marketing to girls? If it's not, should ads be pulled or should women be allowed to decide whether they smoke and whether their brand is Camel 9? If you worked in an agency, what kinds of ethical decisions would you have to make in marketing products that are legal but reviled by some (cigarettes, liquor, guns, fast food, sugary drinks ... the list is getting longer)? Who are the stakeholders when we make ethical decisions in advertising?

Update on tape story

In a previous post, a 202er raised the issue of still images being posted of a girl abused in an explicit video. The victim has been found and is safe. Here's a link to the developing story. I remain interested in your thoughts on the decision by AP, CNN and other news organizations to show the girl's picture to aid in locating her.

An OJ story that interests me

I've pretty well established that I cannot stand the OJ Simpson story and the attention it's getting (I try to keep my opinions out of this blog but this one ... ugh).
In any case, the New York Times has an interesting piece on the hotel where OJ is said to have committed his infraction and their refusal to rent out the room in question. It strikes me as a nice moment of pride over profit.
How do you feel about "tragedy haunting"? Should the place Nicole Brown was killed be on a Hollywood tour map? Should Anna Nicole's suite be open to the public? Do the media promote this kind of voyeurism?

In the News

Let's take a different tack this week. I know what I'm reading about. You post a comment to tell me what YOU are reading, hearing and watching.

Ad controversy

The battle over body image in fashion opened another front in Europe. A controversial ad featuring an emaciated woman (caution: disturbing image in that link) is supposed to provoke conversation, but others have accused the company of trying to profit off the controversy.
What do you think? Do fashion advertising affect body image? Are most models too thin? Are advertisers responsible for the social impact of their messages? If so, does that apply to single messages or advertising as a whole? Go back to the first week of this blog and check out the post on a church's view of advertising and its "10 commandments." How does this square with that?

Covering College Athletes

You may have heard about a controversy this week in Oklahoma when a college football coach went on a tirade against a local reporter who had written a column critical of a student player. The reporter stands by her column.
One of Gundy's assertions is that the news media should stop treating college athletes like they're professionals when they're just kids. Do you agree? Should sports reporters aggressively cover college athletes? Give them a break based on youth? And why do you say that?

Listening in on the Phone for Ads

Wow, this may be the most significant privacy question with telephony since the NSA started listening in:
Company Will Monitor Phone Calls to Tailor Ads
What do you think of this? Would you use a service that listened in on your calls? Did you know that gmail does that with your e-mails? How would you feel if the government were doing it instead? (I, for one, am immediately suspicious of their claim that they won't save data about the calls. My response would be, "That's what you say ... for now.")

Facebook and Reporting

I have column out in the new edition of The American Editor from the American Society of Newspaper Editors, discussing the ethics of using Facebook to find information about crime and accident victims who have been killed.
I've discussed this with a bunch of you, many of whom have told me wrenching stories about losing young friends and seeing it play out on FB.
What do you think of this? Is it fair game for reporters? Does it weird you out? Feel voyeuristic? I'd love to read your comments.

Updates on Previous Posts

Some new stuff on things posted earlier:
1. The Washington Post's Eugene Robinson has a interesting twist on the Dan Rather lawsuit while the LA Times' Tim Rutten calls it "pathetic"
2. The New York Times screwed up ... and badly. Their ad rate for the controversial moveon.org ad was indeed grossly low (definitely fired a bullet into the foot of their credibility there and handed new ammo to the "liberal media" faction)
3. I referred you earlier to a book by Rajiv Chandrasekaran called Imperial Life in the Emerald City. He's coming to campus to deliver the J-School's Nafziger Lecture, 5 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 17, in the Pyle Center on Langdon. It's titled, "Iraq's Elusive Peace" (and yes, attendance does count for extra credit in 202)

Truthiness

Stephen Colbert coined my favorite word of the last 10 years: truthiness.
A few media orgs have started actually trying to decide whether a public statement is true (imagine that).
- the St. Petersburg Times and Congressional Quarterly have launched Politifact to verify the claims of presidential candidates
- the Annenberg Public Policy Center at Penn has FactCheck.org
- the Washington Post has started a blog called The Fact Checker, with a reporter and researcher applying a "Pinocchio test" to public statements of interest (check out the post earlier this week on the "General Betray Us" ad)
Jack Shafer does a good job rounding them up in a new piece in Slate. Here's a bit of it:
Why can't the press drop the pretenses and call people who lie liars?
On the Media co-host Bob Garfield, exasperation filling his voice, asked that late last month on his show. Garfield's prime example of a public figure deserving the label was Alberto Gonzales.
"In the major institutions of the media, hardly a soul has invoked the term that best describes [Gonzales'] failure to tell the truth," Garfield said. "The word is lying."
So should the news media call a liar a liar? Who decides whether something is "true"? Check out some current controversies. Can we objectively say what is true and what is untrue? If it's a news organization's job to inform the public when someone is lying, what's taken them so long?

In the News

Here's some of what I've been reading about lately:
- moveon.org, "Betray Us" and New York Times ad rates
- Politics in Pakistan
- OJ Simpson (though I really wish I weren't reading about this ...)
- Fed rate cut
- Blackwater in Iraq
- protests in (and about) Jena
- Taser use in Florida
- notable polygamy trial
Quiz questions could come from these, comments you post or developments over the weekend.

Dan Rather Offended

Dan Rather is suing CBS. I must admit, I didn't see this one coming. I thought if he'd lash out in defense of his reputation, it would have been sooner. This one bubbled up unexpectedly.
At issue is a story CBS did on President Bush's service (or lack thereof) in the National Guard during Vietnam. Documents upon which the story was partially based were later deemed unverifiable, at best. An external investigation ensued, and Rather later retired ("in disgrace" would be too strong a term but certainly not with the acclaim one would have expected before the Bush story).
Is the suit worth it? Was his reputation damaged and if so, can he rebuild it by a suit like this? Does he damage his cause more by bringing the issues up again? What obligations do the news media have to verify information provided by a source?

Washington Post On Being

Yesterday a 202er asked me what I think is the "best of the Web." Hands down, the thing that captures that for me is a Washington Post online series called "On Being." It's just a person or pair answering questions directly to the camera that's deftly edited into a brief package. A new one goes up every Wednesday, and I have yet to not be blown away. Check it out today and every Wednesday.
In general, the Post blows me away online. Their "Being a Black Man" is definitely worth a look.
Locally, the State Journal has been behind but just got an award nomination for their Hip Hop 101 package.

Times Ad Acceptability

Interesting discussion in the New York Times today, with their director of advertising acceptability taking reader questions. The organization does these "Talk to the Times" sessions weekly. The timing of this appearance is perfect, with the controversy over the "General Betray Us" ad by moveon.org.
What is a newspaper's responsibility in accepting advertising? How likely are audience members to confuse the content of an ad with the opinion of the paper?

Hot for Teacher

Hardee's and Carl's Jr are in some hot water over a new ad showing a teacher dancing provocatively while students rap about "flat buns" for a burger. Check out a local news story here and view the ad on YouTube. The parent corporation has already pulled it, after a number of teacher organizations said it was offensive.
What do you think? Is it offensive? Are we taking things too seriously here? Does complaining about it generate a controversy that gives the ad much more attention via outlets like YouTube (and this handy blog)?

Discussion Arena

A 202-er sent this link in after reading about the offensive rape story in the Central Connecticut State University student paper that's posted to our discussion arena. The paper ran a comic strip that has again raised concerns:
NEW BRITAIN - The campus newspaper at Central Connecticut State University, which came under fire earlier this year for printing a satirical article extolling the virtues of rape, is the target of angry protests again after it printed a comic strip this week that made reference to locking a teenage Hispanic girl in a closet and urinating on her.
Check out the whole story.
What responsibilities do student editors have? Should university administration have the power to oust editors or writers? How do the papers here work (by the way, we're the only campus in the country with two daily student newspapers)? What recourse would you have if they published something that offended you? Should you have any recourse at all?

In the News

This morning, I'm reading about:
- the president's troop withdrawal plan
- New England Patriot woes
- apparent assassination in Anbar province
Anyone have more to add to the list?

Just Fake It

Well, you have media ethics issues and then you have MEDIA ETHICS ISSUES!!! Check out this coverage in the Washington Post, New York Times and ABC News of a French "reporter" who faked interviews with some of the most recognizable names in the world. We don't need another black eye.
The key question here is how journalism maintains its legitimacy when it's undermined from within.

Heartbreaking ...

Earlier this year, seven soldiers wrote a moving op-ed piece in the New York Times, arguing the U.S. was naive in its view that the war in Iraq is winnable. Editor and Publisher reports today that two of the seven were killed in Baghdad. The original piece moved me, and this news saddens me. I'd encourage you to go back and check it out. It's behind the Times' paid archive wall now, but you can easily get it free using Nexis via the . Just search for "The War as We Saw It" in the Times in August 2007.

Predator Update

The New York Observer has a new piece with more on the controversy over Dateline NBC's "To Catch a Predator" that I highlighted in a post last week. Find it here http://www.observer.com/2007/catch-catch-predator?page=0%2C0

Journalism internships

The Institute for Human Studies has internships in journalism. Application deadline is Nov. 1. Find more info here.

In the News

So what have you been reading about this week? I've been digesting a good deal on:
- Petraeus and Crocker visit the hill
- political turmoil in Japan
- 9/11 anniversary
- Dem and GOP campaigns, especially the entry of Fred Thompson into the fray
- wave of foreclosures and trouble in the mortgage industry
- this morning, I'm monitoring quake activity in Indonesia and some Putin rumblings in Moscow ... remains to be seen if these will develop into important stories

Oh, and of course there was Britney on the VMAs.
Use the post comments function to weigh in with what you've been reading about this week. I'll read all of those before I write the quiz.

Current events

I'm getting a number of questions about current events on the quiz and how to "study." It's a tough one to answer because I don't know that you can study for them. I try to come up with questions that you would be able to answer if you have been reading a newspaper, checking out a news Web site and watching or listening to a broadcast news show every day. My daily mix usually includes a full run through the New York Times and Wisconsin State Journal in print and the Washington Post online. I browse the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Chicago Tribune online, as well as checking out headlines on Google news, Yahoo news and CNN Interactive. I watch about a half hour of CNN during the day. I receive breaking news updates via e-mail from the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN and Fox News. I also read at least one magazine story a day from Newsweek, TIME, the New Yorker, Madison Magazine, Harper's, Atlantic, Sports Illustrated, Slate or Salon. Finally, I subscribe to e-mail newsletters in areas of interest to me (media ethics, marketing, tech news, etc.) and Google news alerts for specific topics and people I should be updated on, such as prominent alumni of the J-School.
How, you ask, does she have time to write those scintillating J202 lectures??? ;)
My media diet benefits from a big buffet, but I'm never eating everything on it. I suffer from abiding "New Yorker guilt" because I have not made it fully through that magazine in four years though it arrives right on my doorstep. I once insulted a prominent editor by telling him if he wanted me to read his paper in full every day, he was going to have to put better stuff in it. And I've been known to say, "I don't read the news. I raid it."
What I'm trying to do with daily consumption is give myself a minimum base of information on what's going on in my city, state, nation and world. I'm never "fully informed," and I doubt you can be either. I know a heck of a lot about Iraq (I think it's the story of this age), but I'm undercovered when it comes to developments in science. I love law, so I know a ton about crime and courts each week, but I don't pay all that much attention to celebrity news (just enough to make cheeky comments in class about Britney Spears on the VMAs).
Your diet will differ from mine. To keep us standing before the same buffet, each week I'll post some "what I'm seeing in the news" items on this blog. You should reply with comments about what you're reading. And then if we all update ourselves on what's being noted, quiz scores will go up (oh, and you'll be better informed ... which is why I have the silly quizzes in the first place!)

Breast Cancer and Advertising

A Wall Street Journal story today looked at controversy surrounding the marketing of a new test for a rare genetic factor in breast and ovarian cancer. (The New York Times had a similar piece.) Some people are concerned ads promoting the test will prompt too many women to spend money and worry needlessly because the problem is rare and the test imperfect.
What is the company's responsibility here? They're trying to turn a profit. Should they heavily market the product, regardless of the concerns? Who are all the stakeholders (people with a specific interest)? Who is responsible for relaying information about the rareness of the gene or potential problems with the test? People who are selling it? Patients who use it? The government? The media?

CK and the Middle Finger

Check out this piece from AdAge: http://adage.com/article?article_id=120337
It covers a huge influx of business to marketing agency Cramer-Krasselt (founded in Milwaukee and built in part by, you guessed it, another alum of the J-School). Many in the industry were astounded earlier this year when one of its leaders very publicly showed a client the door. I couldn't recall a time when I had seen anything like that. I found it oddly electrifying. Strat comm is fun when it's edgy. CK certainly took us to the edge.
The AdAge piece seems to indicate it worked for them, rather than costing them business, as many had suspected. What does this mean? What obligation do agencies have to listen to clients? Is it like the restaurant business, is the "customer always right"? And what about CareerBuilder's reliance on the USA Today ad meter for evidence that the spots weren't successful? Is that any more scientific than the random polls I stick on this blog?

"Blogging" vs. "Reporting"

A Washington Post columnist wades into the debate over "what/who is a journalist" with a take on the blogger who tried to "out" Larry Craig. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/05/AR2007090502519.html?hpid=news-col-blog
From high atop his Adams Morgan apartment building, Michael Rogers decides who is living a lie and who may be turning toward righteousness.
Then, with a few words sprayed onto the uneven ground between gossip and journalism, he turns a life upside down. Or he offers absolution, remaining silent if he believes the person in question has a good heart.
This isn't a new debate. Newspaper companies fear losing revenue to the Web and newspaper reporters fear losing readers to it. Bloggers can be a threat.
But beyond that is the more central question Fisher is trying to get at: what is "journalism" and does it deserve higher esteem than blogging?
What do you think? What is it? What kind of regard does it deserve? As I said in lecture, I think challenges to legitimacy are a greater threat to journalism than declining revenues. Are news organizations earning their legitimacy?

Interactive on the Surge

Today's New York Times online provides a cool multimedia feature on Iraq. If you're not up to speed on what's at issue as Petraeus and Crocker head to the hill to give their perspectives this week, this is a great place to start. Watch the video overview and then click through each of the neighborhoods to see a list of vital statistics and photo galleries. It's a good companion to the lead feature:
BAGHDAD, Sept. 8 — Seven months after the American-led troop “surge” began, Baghdad has experienced modest security gains that have neither reversed the city’s underlying sectarian dynamic nor created a unified and trusted national government.
If you're seeking a relatively short backgrounder on why these sects battle, TIME magazine had a great one. If you have more time to learn deep background, read Night Draws Near by Anthony Shadid (a Pulitzer Prize winner and graduate of our fine j-school).
One of the principle critiques of American news media (and the audiences that consume their content) centers on an inability to focus on the long ball, to cover complex and lasting stories well. Iraq is certainly in that arena. News organizations are accused of covering any particular battle with aplomb but losing sight of the war overall. Do you agree? As someone in whose name (and with whose money) this war was initiated and is fought, have the news media done enough to help you understand it? (Incidentally, Newsweek had an intriguing piece this week arguing that perhaps you also ought to be forced to fight it.)

George Will and Miss Teen

Newsweek columnist George Will has a pretty good piece this week on declining standards of decency. He manages to tie together Larry Craig and Alberto Gonzales, drawing in a Ken Burns documentary for kicks.
But he closes by bringing in Miss Teen South Carolina's rambling (posted to YouTube if you missed it last week).
Will writes:

• Last week, there was nationwide merriment at the expense of an 18-year-old participant in a South Carolina beauty pageant. Asked a question about why many Americans might lack elementary knowledge about the world, she got lost in syntactical tangles and spoke nonsense. Although there was not a shred of news value in it, Fox News and CNN played the tape of her mortification, and by last Friday YouTube's presentation of it had generated more than 10 million hits. The casual cruelty of publicizing her discomfort, and the widespread entertainment pleasure derived from it, is evidence that standards of decency are evolving in the wrong direction.

(Confession: I cringed for her mother but I laughed out loud when I watched it. And then I forwarded it to friends.)
Do you agree with Will? Does it lack news value? Is it OK to watch it but not OK for FoxNews and CNN to cover everyone watching it? (Can you find the United States on a map?)
We'll talk about communication values Monday. What makes a story a story? Why do people connect with advertising? Research gives us some clues ...

Bremer and image

An interesting volley of info surrounding perceptions of Paul Bremer, who used to head up the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq. He's been battling two arguments that have stuck to him like glue:
1. He instituted de-Baathification, stripping Iraqi public positions from anyone who had been a member of Saddam's party
2. He disbanded the Iraqi army
Many people claim these two choices led directly to the insurgency and the chaos that continues even now. Bremer, for his part, has been quite vocal in asserting both that these decisions were not his alone and that they were not disastrous.

His opening salvo was an op-ed in the Washington Post in May http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/11/AR2007051102054.html

Tuesday, the NY Times published a story in which he reacted to a new book quoting President Bush as he appears to say that disbanding the army wasn't administration policy. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/04/washington/04bremer.html

And today, he has an op-ed in the NYT, laying out his case in full. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/06/opinion/06bremer.html?hp

Bremer is using news media to engage in strategic communication, namely managing perceptions of him, the CPA and their joint performance in Iraq. How successful has he been? Does the average American care? Did you know who Paul Bremer was before you read this post?

(Incidentally, the best book I've read on all of this is Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Iraq's Green Zone. Its author, Rajiv Chandrasekaran, will be on campus in October to give a lecture for the J-School. Watch for more info and go go go. He'll be fascinating.)

Religion and advertising

an interesting blog post here http://www.plasticbag.org/archives/2007/08/the_vatican_on_the_et/

It covers the Catholic Church's attempt to provide ethical guidelines for advertising, e.g.:

• Advertisers are morally responsible for what they seek to move people to do.
• It is morally wrong to use manipulative, exploitative, corrupt and corrupting methods of persuasion and motivation
• The content of communication should be communicated honestly and properly.
• Advertising may not deliberately seek to deceive by what it says, what it implies or what it fails to say.
• Abuse of advertising can violate the dignity of the human person, appealing to lust, vanity, envy and greed.
• Advertising to children by exploiting their credulity and suggestibility offends against the dignity and rights of both children and parents.
• Advertising that reduces human progress to acquiring material goods and cultivating a lavish lifestyle is harmful to individuals and society alike.
• Clients who commission work can create powerful inducements to unethical behaviour.
• Political advertising is an appropriate area for regulation: how much money may be spent, how and from whom money may be raised.
• Advertisers should undertake to repair the harm done by advertising.

The blogger asks, "I wonder if anyone has had the nerve to turn these into a simple ten commandments of advertising?"

What do you think some of the "thou shalt nots" would be if we had a 10 commandments of strategic communication? Can you think of any ads that violate something you'd consider to be a central principle? (post a link for everyone to check out) Personally, I was troubled by this campaign: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17490782/site/newsweek/

Esquire and "To Catch a Predator"

I dare you to start reading this and not get utterly sucked into the story.

http://www.esquire.com/features/predator0907

It's Esquire magazine's lead feature on NBC's Dateline series called "To Catch a Predator," in which they set up stings for pedophiles.

So many media ethics angles here. Where would you like to begin?

Jerry's Kids

Here's an interesting op-ed from The Washington Post (for those of you new to them, an op-ed is usually an opinion piece in a newspaper not written by its standing editorial writers ... it voices an opinion not necessarily shared by the paper's editorial board).

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/31/AR2007083101273.html?nav=hcmodule

What do you think of his point? Do fundraising efforts like this communicate a notion of helplessness? How else might we raise money for causes?

TIME's case for national service

check this out

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1657570,00.html
TIME magazine ME Rick Stengel is trying to give backbone to the idea of structured (and rewarded) national service ... formalizing the volunteering lots of people do already. He sees it as the way to save the republic.

Personally, I've come to doubt just about anything that has a price tag attached to it because we seem unable to get through funding bottlenecks. But I love his ideas, especially the Summer of Service. What a concept. If it worked, we'd be the better for it.

What do you think? Do we need to refocus our efforts and serve more? And is it even appropriate for a news magazine editor to cough up his opinions like this? It's a call to action. Is that OK?

While you're at it, check out this response in his own publication:
http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1657256_1657317_1658698,00.html

Kinsley drills down to you guys. Do you think he has a point?