I love this post – why because it captures the truth about Indian media scene quite succinctly.
Some mischevious reporter queried the White House whether they would now consider celebrating Diwali (coming on October 24th). Presidential press secretary Scott McClellan said he would “look into it”. For Press Trust of India, however, it’s all in a day’s work to take that politically correct statement and twist it into this: “The White House will consider celebrating Diwali on the lines of holidays of other religions commemorated by it.” This report will be happily propagated by hundreds of editors. Readers will be greeted by half-truth headlines like White House may sparkle this Diwali (see here and here). [Filter Coffee]
First things first, don’t blame the reporters – it is the editors at both the so called ethnic media and those back home who suck; can’t clean-up copy properly and have no idea what is a good story. Who gives a flying F**K about white house and diwali. It is called making news when there is none. Also known as the Spin Cycle.
Indian media has gone to the dogs, and they cannot really come-up with great stories. I think they are lazy and want to cover really easy, lifestyle stories. Times of India has now become worse than The London Sun. I am surprised that I have not seen a big feature on this topic. In any other country, this should be page one material or at least would make a nice lead feature for the Sunday morning news papers.
Three months ago, I posted a small item on my other blog, on who the whole ethnic media scene is a wee bit compromised. Here is what I said
For some odd reason, I woke up early this weekend and ended up watching this show called AVS: Asian Variety Show. It has been around for years but I have never bothered to read it. There was a segment on this singer called Adnan Sami, which was preceded and followed by long ads for his upcoming show in New York. Makes me wonder if there is any oversight of these ethnic media shows. To me this sounds like a complete conflict of interest. It is nothing but a commercial for the show and that’s what it should be treated like. Do the networks who lease time to these shows know about this? I am frankly disgusted by this attitude!
Tell me what you think?
I was reading your comments and had to respond. My name is Joya and I’m the host of AVS. I have very little to do with the show other than the writing and presenting of my bits. IN reference to your comments about the Adnaan Sami ads: As I understand it, the time leased on these networks is very expensive. So anyone airing a show on WMBC is beholden to their advertisers money. Whoever is paying the highest buck, WINS! Thus the Adnaan Sami ads. As I understand it, it’s also hard to get money out of the Indians who will part with any money to advertise. So maybe add ‘Cheap’ to your list of adjectives of ways to describe Indians.