I mentioned a book called We know what you want by Martin Howard. It has vanished from long tail, which is kinda of a shame, because it's a good reference for shady consumer marketing tricks circa mid-2010's. (There's a prolific children's author with the same name who started writing about the same time as the book was published, but I can't be sure it's the same man.)
This list is an extract from that book. It's twenty years ago. I've changed some of the examples...
Brand Name News - Britney Spears, Brad Pitt, Madonna, Taylor Swift, Greta Thunberg
Sex News - Anything Trans, LBGTQ+, MeToo scandals...
Yo Yo News - the Stock Market is up or down; the crime rate is up or down; unemployment is worse than it has been since the last time it was this bad; inflation is up or down; interest rates are up or down.
Show Biz News - say no more
Fashion News - say no more
Craze News - the latest internet thing, the latest drugs, the latest diets, the latest serial killer...
Anniversary News - hey, it's fifty years since the opening of a packet of Corn Flakes...
Sports News - Football manager sacked / hired; players traded; heavily sponsored sports star loses to unknown...
Political News - Minister will say this later today; Minister visits somewhere outside Westminster; NHS needs more money
To which I would add...
Freak Show News - look at what these weirdos are doing
Hype News - Climate Change; charity releases report saying things are getting worse (please donate); this year's Tech Thing that will take all our jobs; new drug will cure old disease...
Business News - company makes or loses money; man or woman in a suit gets a promotion; Mega Corp buys Smallfry plc; Mega Corps trade bits of each otehr to each other; senior manager does something stupid and steps down
Prognostication News - the future will be worse / better if this or that trend continues
Nothing has changed. Except the names.
Nothing.
If anything, it's got worse.
Take a look at your newspaper, or (shudder!) mainstream TV. How much of it is Fake News? How much is a de facto PR piece for some cause or person. v What is real news? I think it has to affect our lives in some immediate way. The recluse has no news, except the weather report. When the UK had an Empire, with military bases everywhere, and people had relatives working in businesses and farms all over the world, world news was local news. Not so now, when, with or without invitations, the world comes to us, bringing its disputes with it.
What I want to see in a newspaper, or equivalent source, is:
War, disease, famine and disaster (anywhere in the world)
Workers vs Management (anywhere in the world)
The Budget (in the UK)
Corruption (in the UK)
Government Waste (in the UK)
Actions by the Establishment against the interests of the working man and woman in the UK (crazy legal judgements, outsourcing of jobs, etc)
Starts, progress and opening of major infrastructure projects (anywhere in the world)
Harvest conditions (anywhere in the world)
Which will do for a start.
Which will do for a start.
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