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Amazon buy the news

3point14

Pi
3point14
Joined
Nov 4, 2005
Messages
23,073
I mean literally. A bought and paid propoganda piece where news should be.

If this doesn't scare the **** out of you, I don't know what will


"Local news stations across the U.S. aired a segment produced and scripted by Amazon which touts the company's role in delivering essential groceries and cleaning products during the COVID-19 pandemic, and its ability to do so while "keeping its employees safe and healthy.""

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/...anda-segments-scripted-and-produced-by-amazon
 
The media has been doing this for ever, you’d be surprised how many “articles” are in fact nothing more than at best slightly edited press releases.
 
If it's obvious that it's advertisement or otherwise paid to be aired by someone (or shown on a website or newspaper) then i don't see the problem. If its not obvious, or even disclosed at all, then it's very problematic.

It's certainly not uncommon for newspapers, especially online, to have "paid content" but it's and should be disclosed that it is paid for and by whom very explicitly to avoid any impression that it's normal journalism.
 
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The Great Zaganza said:
Ever heard of the Sinclair Group?
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Was it John Oliver or Trevor Noah who did a great edit job of Sinclair Group pieces and mashed them all together in a grid to highlight their identical content? I can't remember. Someone with better google-fu could find it.


Amazon is scum. Jeff Bezos is an evil, horrid man.
 
Video news releases have been around for 15 years at least.

Source Watch: Video News Release
Video news releases or VNRs (also referred to as fake TV news) are segments designed to be indistinguishable from independently-produced news reports that are distributed and promoted to television newsrooms. TV stations incorporate VNRs into their newscasts, rarely alerting viewers to the source of the footage. While government-funded VNRs have been most controversial, most VNRs are paid for by corporations; non-governmental organizations also put out VNRs. [1] [2]
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MoeFaux said:
Was it John Oliver or Trevor Noah who did a great edit job of Sinclair Group pieces and mashed them all together in a grid to highlight their identical content? I can't remember. Someone with better google-fu could find it.
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I remember that too. I seem to remember that it was marginally different, in that the Sinclair pieces were statements that it forced anchors at the local channels to read as if it was their own words - although, I think Sinclair HAS also made pre-recorded right-wing editorials that it requires local stations to play during their news broadcasts as well.
 
MoeFaux said:
Was it John Oliver or Trevor Noah who did a great edit job of Sinclair Group pieces and mashed them all together in a grid to highlight their identical content? I can't remember. Someone with better google-fu could find it.


Amazon is scum. Jeff Bezos is an evil, horrid man.
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John Oliver did a show on them. Trevor Noah might've also done something but I didn't see it.

I don't if scum and evil are the right words but Amazon has waaaay too much control over waaaay too much of our lives. And it's gaining more power.
 
Evil because he has the means to do right for his employees, and he does not. Evil because his employees work their bodies until they are broken, injured from the pace they must maintain. Evil because his employees have to piss in bottles because they can't leave the factory floor. Evil because he thinks $15 an hour is an appropriate wage, when he has the means to pay more. Evil because he is seen as somehow a virtuous man, yet he chooses to use the human labor earning his dollars without care for their well-being. He is a bad, bad man.
 
I'm glad I'm not the only one that this scares witless.

It's 2020. Cyberpunk corporatism is supposed to be here by now (according to original rulebooks). It may not be far away. When advertising and news are indistinguishable, that's what I would call a ******* problem.
 
3point14 said:
I'm glad I'm not the only one that this scares witless.

It's 2020. Cyberpunk corporatism is supposed to be here by now (according to original rulebooks). It may not be far away. When advertising and news are indistinguishable, that's what I would call a ******* problem.
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But that has been the case ever since we’ve had mass media news, i.e. popular news papers. I would argue that it is now easier to tease out the “planted” stories than at any previous time. If say a cabal of, sorry not meant to call them cabals, a pressure group for a particular industry had come up with something they wanted pushing a 120 years ago, they probably only needed to button hole half a dozen proprietors at their club. And because people would only read one paper they wouldn’t have any inclination that the same story was being run in all the other papers. Nowadays we can all do comparisons across pretty much all mass media.
 
I'd like to see Amazon's divisions broken up into smaller companies but not now. In a new administration it should be examined. Trump and his Trumptrash can't be trusted with this. It's personal for Trump and people who work for him lack integrity. In a new administration breaking up Amazon might be a really good idea if done by honorable people with the public good in mind.
 
Craig4 said:
I'd like to see Amazon's divisions broken up into smaller companies but not now. In a new administration it should be examined. Trump and his Trumptrash can't be trusted with this.
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If you can't trust your political opponents with a government power, then the government shouldn't have that power at all.
 
Ziggurat said:
If you can't trust your political opponents with a government power, then the government shouldn't have that power at all.
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Trump and his supporters are more than mere political opponents. They are enemies of the country who don't share our values.
 
If an organization produces and packages a segment in a way that a news organization can simply plug in without actually fact-checking it, the news will use it. Like all people everywhere, they take whatever shortcuts people allow them to.

If you wrote a plausible press release and sent it to my local paper when I was a kid, they would publish it.
 
Craig4 said:
I'd like to see Amazon's divisions broken up into smaller companies but not now. In a new administration it should be examined. Trump and his Trumptrash can't be trusted with this. It's personal for Trump and people who work for him lack integrity. In a new administration breaking up Amazon might be a really good idea if done by honorable people with the public good in mind.
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Please provide a detailed analysis of the current structure of Amazon and the specific "not good" stuff it does. Provide links to all the studies you are using to provide proof that the "not good" stuff exists solely as a result of Amazon and why changing the structure of Amazon would solve these "not good" things.
Please provide a detailed cost-analysis of this restructuring you are wanting.
 
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