So You Think You Can Cover A Violent Protest?

CNN’s Don Lemon (L) and Chris Cuomo (R) deal with uninvited guests (center) in their Ferguson, MO live shot. Vine screen grab courtesy Tim Burke. 11-24-14.

Don Lemon of CNN’s such a douchebag. He’s so douchey he’s trending on Atlanta Twitter, and not in a good way. Mostly he’s trending for being too white-ish and jabbering on-air about smelling weed burning in Ferguson, MO last night, 11-24-14, as the non-indictment of Officer Darren Wilson news broke. Everyone loves to hate on Don Lemon. Me too!

That said about Lemon’s douchiness, as an aspiring cub news producer I once got caught-up in the midst of a downtown Atlanta protest that turned violent. Blacks were angry (Maria Saporta reminded me of what sparked the outburst) and were massing, yelling, marching, and breaking windows along Peachtree Street, and assaulting, brutally, innocent people who just happened to be near the protest and thus convenient targets.

When it became crystal clear there was no one around to protect me (I don’t think I ever saw a single cop in the mix), and after having had someone I thought was a friend scream ugly things in my face (she was part of the protesting crowd; I was news media covering the event; that’s what unnerved me the most), and my crew concentrating solely on getting the shot and not giving a rat’s ass if I was attacked, I immediately dropped my assignment like a scalding hot potato, ran to the edge of the protest, hailed a cab, and beat a swifty retreat back to the newsroom.

Never again would I put my own life in danger just to “get the shot.” I clearly got culled from any future potential war correspondent herd that day. Whew!

In other words, a violent protest in America is a very scary place to be in the middle of. Kudos to anyone in news who lasted through the night in Ferguson. (Including His Douchiness, Don Lemon.) They’re a hell of a lot braver than I’ll ever be.

The Hypocrisy of CNN. Seriously.

Oh this is classic! CNN mocks all-things Occupy Wall Street, as a movement. But with its other hand doesn’t hesitate to solicit the movement’s media – without paying for it! Via iReport.

I hope no one’s stupid enough to give away their media to a corporate hater. At least charge ’em for it. Jeez.

Note the insertion of the iReport ads soliciting free media stuck in here.

Practice safe media, kiddies!

Atlanta Media Folk on Social Media

What do a few longtime Atlanta media folk have to say about social media? What blogs do they read? How social media savvy ARE they? And what about Twitter? Their answers may surprise you. This has been a WaySouth Media quickie production: waysouthmedia.com

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CNN Broke Twitter?

I bet @ricksanchezcnn finally broke Twitter for good. The fragile thing wasn’t meant for heavy MSM lifting. Between Sanchez on CNN at 3pm and the anti-Motrin ad moms today, the damn thing may never recover. Call some lawyers quick!

McCain Supporters Say No To Intolerance

This is the most hopeful thing I’ve seen in months – conservatives refusing to drink the Rovian-esque Kool-Aid! Amazing video of McCain supporters as they (some Muslim some Christian) shut down anti-Obama protesters at a recent Virginia McCain rally. It’s all here from the equally amazing ANP, American News Project. ANP has been doing the best street-level political reporting. And they’re on a reality roll now.

UPDATE: CNN’s Rick Sanchez led with the above video today on the 3pm show. They had ANP’s Davin Hutchins, live by phone, explaining what had gone down, and the Muslim VA Maryland McCain staffer standing-by to go on-air too, but the McCain campaign put the kabash on their VA Maryland Muslim staffer (seen in the video here) going on CNN live. The McCain campaign hates Rick Sanchez after this little number last week.

Gee, I wonder how all this happens…

New Citizen Journalism Platform – Allvoices

You’re in the New Journalism Army now with Allvoices! A citizen journalism platform I, gasp, have yet to submit content for, but I’m sure I eventually will. Have you? Seems a little “globally” for my typically southern-fried focus, but should anything ever happen around this neck of the woods…

Allvoices has a better interface than iReport. You can see that right off the bat. But unlike iReport, there’s no lure of getting your stuff on a CNN global property, either broadcast or, for instance, the Politics page… as has happened to me on occasion. See circled headline I wrote myself on screen shot below. (If you can’t make it out, it reads “The South Is In Play”:

However, Allvoices does promise cold hard cash! And who doesn’t love that? Only thing is, you have to garner about a zillion views to your CJ product to start raking in the dough.

Best advice I can offer if you’re looking to spin the CJ wheel o fortune? Have your cam(s) always at the ready. You’re a soldier in the New Journalism Army now, kiddo. I’ll let CNN’s Major Generalissimo Paul Ferguson rap to you about the hard reality dope: you really gotta be the only cam on the scene. In America at least.

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Missing John-John

Watching the Democratic National Convention last night did nothing for me except make me miss John Kennedy Jr. He should have been there. It’s his legacy after all. And he should have married me and not that bleached-hair woman, but I diverge…

Lots of should haves, would haves and but fors… all lost to a flicker of circumstance. Sigh. I’ll go back to regularly scheduled programming tonight no doubt. Dems are even duller on Big TV than in real life.

As for media coverage, AC was neutered by too many really boring people on the set babbling away. And way too much Wolf Blitzer. The passive-aggressive attacks and retreats, from outright hostility to odd guilt-ridden patronization, between Juan Williams and Brit Hume on Fox News made for more interesting and uncomfortable viewing.

Fortunately for us media insatiables, we can escape the confines of the utterly predictable political media Pepsi palace and roam the streets of Denver for excellent street protests via numerous Internet sources. Whew.

TV Today: Good Thing, Bad Thing?

Oh dear. I am not sure how to react to all this breaking TV news today. Item #1, and of utmost importance in the big scheme of things. From Reuters:

CBS is saying aloha to a new installment of “Hawaii Five-O.”

The new take on the popular crime drama, which aired on CBS from 1968 to 1980, is being developed by Ed Bernero, executive producer and showrunner of “Criminal Minds.” He is such a big “Hawaii Five-O” fan that he has the Ventures’ iconic theme song from the show as his ringtone.

Bernero is writing the project, which he describes as “‘Hawaii Five-O’ 2.0.”

It’s no secret that my favorite TV show EVER was/still is Hawaii Five-O. Item #2: look at this about CNN’s big reorg. Seems they are barking way up the new media tree. From a NYTimes blog:

CNN announced Tuesday that it would “double its domestic news-gathering presence” by assigning journalists to 10 additional cities across the United States.

But the journalists will not work from news bureaus; instead, they will be stationed at local television affiliates and other office locations. Using inexpensive laptops and cameras, they will file stories for the Internet and report live on television. One “all-platform journalist” will be assigned to each city.

The strategy reflects the increasingly portable and flexible nature of television production. Expensive bureaus with camera crews and satellite uplinks are increasingly being downsized by TV news divisions, in favor of so-called “one man bands” that interview, write, record, edit and report live.

So much new. So much re-vamped. So much changing outright. We just need to take a moment, take a deep breath and ask… what would McGarrett do?

Amani Talks With Soledad O’Brien About “Black In America” – Part 2

Amani Talks To Soledad O’Brien About “Black In America”

Anderson Cooper for VP!

CNN posted some astonishing numbers on June 3rd. Almost as many people watched CNN Tuesday night as watched “The Mole,” a stat virtually unheard of for TV news viewership. And note the way CNN trounced Fox News in the most critical demo. From the Washington Post:

CNN clocked more than 3.5 million viewers in prime time. That’s a 34 percent lead over MSNBC‘s more than 2.5 million viewers. It’s also a 47 percent advantage over Fox News Channel‘s prime-time crowd of 2.4 million viewers.

Yes, it appears MSNBC edged out FNC in prime time Tuesday.

Among CNN’s prime-time audience, 1.4 million fell into the 25-to-54 age bracket that is the target audience of news operations. MSNBC’s prime-time crowd included just over 1 million 25-to-54-year-olds. CNN logged a whopping 91 percent lead over FNC among 25-to-54-year-olds; FNC’s prime-time audience included 739,000 in the age bracket.

CNN also wants you to know Anderson Cooper‘s 10 p.m. program snared more than 4.5 million viewers and was the only cable news program to top 4 mil for an hour Tuesday night.

Full story here.

Ignore The Sunday Paper

Atlanta’s The Sunday Paper has a cover story that, in the print edition at least, bizarrely claims that “moderates are tuning out the partisan cable news networks.” A quick check to the Tuesday June 3rd (the very last primary night) viewing stats shows anything but such a whoppingly off base and densely-presented claim.

Guess these things can happen when you have print-minded people attempting to report about the broadcast media. Come to think about it, I have never met a single print political reporter who ever watched ANY political broadcast news in any form or fashion on a regular basis. Mostly, printees are so disdainful of the broadcast medium they tend to brag, yes brag, about how they never, ever watch TV news. Nor am I the only one to notice this disdain.

Careful if you see a The Sunday Paper cover claiming low voter turnout in ‘08.

CNN’s iReport – All About It

Here’s a feature that aired on CNN-International about CNN’s citizen journalism platform, iReport. It includes bons video motes from me, SpaceyG. More about reporting on iReport here.

Tornado Rips Downtown Atlanta

If It’s Opinion You’re Wanting…

Not only has “regular” CNN outpaced Fox News in primetime numbers for the first time in six years lately, little sis Headline News is bopping to the top too. From Cox Plantation News Service’s David Ho:

In February 2005, Jautz, CNN Worldwide’s executive vice president, began overhauling CNN’s sister network (Headline News), injecting prime time with loud opinion shows. First came legal talker Nancy Grace and then conservative radio host Glenn Beck.

Three years later, the network is celebrating its makeover anniversary with bigger audiences, even as its hosts continue to rile critics and stir questions about the boundaries between opinion and news.

“It was a huge experiment and it was hugely successful,” Jautz said in an interview. He said Headline News has 81 percent more viewers between 7 p.m. and midnight than it did before the format change, which also includes “Showbiz Tonight.”

Full story here.

Touch My Screen, John King Baby

Doing what we iPhone users do all day long, CNN’s John King wowed his “Best Political Team In The Universe” viewership last night with his deft hand on the push-pull touch screen during nail-biting primary returns. Whoever sold CNN that lovely piece of gear trained King well on it.

UPDATE: Turns out the “Magic Wall” creator himself, Jeff Han, was present last night at CNN headquarters for personal tips ‘n tricks. From TVNewswer:

On the far end of the studio, Abbi Tatton was running through her script for her segment, and the accompanying work she’d have to do with CNN’s newest sensation, the “Magic Wall.” Standing a few feet away, was the Wall’s creator Jeff Han. Not its technical name, we learned what it’s actually called and what the Magic Wall can do.

Han is the founder and CEO of Perceptive Pixel, which manufactures the technology for the Multi-touch Collaboration Wall. It is more prominently used in other areas, like defense, finance and health care.

“Everybody knows about the wall now,” Han says. “People are scrambling to come up with something similar.”

He also credits John King, the master of the Wall, as a great demonstrator of his product. Han was on hand for primary coverage in case there were any problems. Before King’s segment about the Texas counties in play, he works with Han to see how closely the map can zoom in, and how quickly it can zoom back out.

Now everyone’s gonna have to have one of those babies!

iReport Just Rocks

CNN’s new iReport is a news new media multimedia-ist’s dream come true. Watch out YouTube.

Advice For Indie Media Hunter-Gatherers

The Oversized Mouth Of Chez Pazienza

And boy don’t we love it! Young Chez Pazienza will not shut-up with the pooping on the heads of CNN bigshots. My kinda guy. If I was hiring, I’d snap Loudmouth Chez up in a second… if CNN hired him back. Which they’re not likely to ever do. From the scene of the blogging crime, The Huffington Post:

My only hope is that Ed Litvak’s departure from American Morning will somehow be good for the show, although I’m inclined to think that until someone puts an arm around Jon Klein, writes something nice about him, then pushes him out the door, nothing’s going to change. It’ll just be more of the same nonsense.

(FYI, Jon Klein is the Pres. of CNN. I love how Chez just by-passes all the little people and goes straight to the top.)

Screw ’em, hon… you were born to the blogosphere. Now go take your rightful place in one of the many mansions to be found here.

UPDATE: Well, he already has. Should have known. Chez’s delightfully titled blog is here. Which of course makes me want to now, instead of going to the gym where I should be, commence digging around for an old, dusty photo of this editor as a teen in that the same Parisian place Chez’s blog is double-ententred for.

That’s Our Tom! On CNN Tonight

Atlanta’s main PR-man-about-town, Tom Houck, was featured on CNN in a video package available here, remembering his days with MLK, Jr. and the Civil Rights movement. Text story here.

Houck’s still out and about in the ATL, making all the right scenes and outpacing younger PR guns who seem cluelessly, ahem, somewhere else. In other words, in the fake, processed world most contemporary PR operates in, I wouldn’t look for any of them to get arrested at the front lines of fighting for something they believe in… as did Houck when he was the young gun. Unless of course it would get their client on GMA the next morning, but I diverge…

Tom will be live at 6pm tonight on CNN to take your email questions too.