Super Bowl LI is this afternoon and the hype is living up to expectations. I read earlier today that “experts” are predicting that Americans will eat 1.3 BILLION chicken wings today. (In case you were wondering, “1.3 billion chicken wings is enough for every man, woman and child in the United States to have four wings each”). It just so happens that the “experts” quoted are the National Chicken Council. Here’s their press release…the one that generated the news stories. As you can probably tell, this is all about promoting chicken wings. It’s not news, it’s advertising. And journalists and news outlets that carry the story are part of the problem facing real journalism.
And speaking of journalists, there will be approximately 5,000 of them covering the big game. Is that really necessary? I know what you’re thinking…I’m just jealous and wish my organization (fat chance) had sent me to Houston to report on the game and the many associated parties.
Of course I’ll be watching the advertisements. Every year there are a few good ads…ones that might even be worth the $$$ that keeps increasing every year. This year a 30-second spot will set the advertiser back a cool $5.5 million. Over the past half-century, total ad spending in the big game is approaching $5 billion. And while I don’t have hard data to support my claim, I think it’s fair to say that not all of those dollars were well spent. But there have been some great ads that have been worth every penny. Coke “Mean Joe Green”, Apple “1984” and Budweiser “Frogs” come to mind. (See them here.)
Okay, enough ranting. But before I close, I thought I’d revisit that whole chicken wing thing. PETA has, characteristically, found a way to make you feel guilty for indulging. Don’t click this link if you plan to enjoy some hot wings at your party…I warned you!
I agree with the fact that there are too many journalism pieces on such a trivial thing. However, for it to be covered by thousands of different sections is a great deal of help to the companies. But is it needed? Advertisement at a game or press release is through the roof as everyone is scrambling for air time during a popular segment. With that being said its easy to see how we can be over doing things a tad.
Definitely agree with Tim and Randy. The “mind manipulation” plays a huge role within the news and media. Advertising is found in all sorts of media, and whether it may be intended or not, it is still there. Journalists carry these stories and news that are really good for nothing but the advertising. It may not be a problem for them, but rather the viewers because we are the ones to notice the “mind manipulation” throughout. We notice the advertising which makes it a problem for us.
After listening to the podcast “Faker-Harder’ and then reading this article, it wasn’t too hard to notice the numerous amount of efforts to make one do more research on certain products or brands. As easy as it was to identify certain advertisements, it was pretty difficult not to click on the hyperlinks suggested. Although this an online article it does make one want to check his or her source’s claims. I believe that this approach on media will lead to more correct information given by the media.
These “articles” if you can even call them that are nothing more than advertising. I don’t think many people realize just how much time and money companies put into catching the consumer’s eye. If we were able to rid the news of articles like this, then I think we could really make some progress in identifying “Fake News.”
Articles like this are mainly just making statements and giving advertisement. “1.3 million people will be eating chicken wings during the super bowl.” I believe an article like this is a journalist trying to selling wings and get your attention that people across the country will be eating wings while watching the game. Their is no news behind the article just a rant. When I think of new about the super bowl I want to see stats of the teams that are playing each other and the players, I don’t want to know how many people are eating wings.
Articles like these make sense and are appealing to the audience, but lack as news. Advertising is everywhere and will continue to be everywhere to show their product off to the media. They are promoting things that the watchers will want to see. Especially in the Superbowl, this is a large fan base and their example of chicken wings is just one of the things that have taken off. There are certain items associated with the Superbowl that help get their product out to the world. Media is what brings people and profit in, but inst really classified as news. Its more of entertainment to persuade people to buy there stuff, especially in the Superbowl commercials.
I have to agree completely with what’s been said. When it comes to different stories like this, I can see myself where the problem comes from which happens to be the news outlets. I feel like if they want to give out news they may need to be a little bit more specific and actually specify the different news they are sharing. Of course people are going to take in what the media feeds them and run with what’s said.
I like articles like this the most when it comes to journalism because it is the most interesting to me. The book tells us about the different types of journalism and the times each of them kind of came up. The book states yellow journalism, objective journalism, inverted pyramid style, and interpretive journalism. I do not think this article really fits in any of them. I do think that articles like this lighten up the mood thought and makes things more fun. I usually read articles like this over other ones and I think these type are necessities but I do also think they grab peoples attention and they are actually read by people. Articles really don’t need a fake attention laugh and I do not think a robot could make these either.
You see advertising everywhere. News outlets are now becoming more of a “promotional” outlet. Chicken wings and other items have become associated with the Super Bowl because its what the media is showing. And of course people are going to go get them, as Tim said above its “mind manipulation”. Media outlets show stuff they know will draw people to their programs. Come Super Bowl week, how many Budweiser or as mentioned chicken wing ads do you see during any given program? It’s all apart of the media trying to draw people in.
Yes, news outlets that carry these types of stories are most definitely part of the problem. A lot of people don’t really realize how powerful the news really is. They say Americans will consume 1.3 billion chicken wings for the game. Even if those numbers are inflated, people see something like this on the news and start to associate The Superbowl with chicken wings. It’s like mind manipulation. It certainly doesn’t meet the newsworthiness criteria that’s for sure. These news outlets need to be more particular with what they consider news.