Rosie O’Donnell Is Leaving The View, But Why Do I Need To Know That?
Rosie O’Donnell is leaving The View. Apparently she couldn’t come to a contractual agreement with ABC and therefore will leave the show in mid-June.
Why do I know this? Because of the screaming headlines all across the major mainstream media Interwebs.
ABC News, on its bright red Breaking News banner: Rosie O’Donnell Will Leave “The View” In Mid-June After Failing To Reach New Contract Agreement
Fox News, top story, above-the-fold: ABC Ends Rosie ‘View’
CNN, number one Top Story: Rosie O’Donnell leaving ‘The View’
MSNBC and CBS News also run the story above-the-fold.
I’ll ask my question again, but in a slightly different way: why do I know about this breaking development in the Rosie O’Donnell saga? I take it that the angle is that Rosie is apparently a “raunchy” and “controversial” figure, so therefore updating the public on developments in her career are, for these news organizations, paramount in importance.
But it’s not very important, is it? The View is a daytime talk show where four female hosts gab about the news of the day and occasionally interview someone. It’s light infotainment.
That all of the online outlets for the big television news networks chose to run this story loud and proud – particularly as breaking news on ABC – is telling. Sadly, it’s infotainment coverage of an infotainment television program presented as the-most-important-thing-you-should-take-note-of-thissecond.
No wonder why so many people now turn to the blogosphere and online independent news sources first for news these days.
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April 25th, 2007 at 12:34 pm
I spend my days writing about infotainment, you got a problem with that?
April 25th, 2007 at 12:39 pm
Not in the slightest! You know I love you and Glosslip, Dawn, and I know that I can get great gossip, snark, and celeb psychoanalysis there. BUT when I head to ABCNews.com and see the flashing red Breaking News banner flashing, I’m expecting something of the hard news variety: peace in the middle east, the aliens have landed, that kind of thing. There’s a place to dish about Rosie and The View, and my take is that above-the-fold on traditional online media outlets is not that place.
April 25th, 2007 at 1:31 pm
You can add Anna Nicole Smith to the list. What nonsense to lead off to see which of seven suitors were the father of her child. More insignificant than this is hard to top. The funny thing is this:the mainstream media is so omnipotent that even though I have no clue who she is or what she did in life, they managed to still let me know about her through headlines. It’s hard to ignore the utter garbage they feed us. Some of us manage to simply go past this but it’s not surprising many more get hooked in.
Seriously, to think they (the networks) get paid a lot of money to post this crap.
April 25th, 2007 at 5:23 pm
You don’t think they’re featuring stories about that dope because they want to, do you? I doubt the news editors at ABC graduated Columbia Journalism so they could keep track of breaking news at The View. It’s because the audience for MSM online skews young and shallow. Do an Alexa traffic ranking on tnr.com vs. perezhilton.com if you really want to hurl.
BTW, that Rosie ODonnell tag in your post was a glitch, right..?
April 26th, 2007 at 1:58 am
Alesandro - You’re right, it’s very interesting (disturbing?) to note how many stories I end up following because the headline/storyline ends up being jammed into my consciousness through reptition. Blanket-covered legal stories, high profile murder cases and the like, are certainly one example.
Sprague - No doubt that money is chasing everybody down the rabbit hole. That said, I’d argue that it’s not working. Everybody can’t cover everything all the time and win. Leave gossip to Glosslip, I say, and let ABCNews cover real stuff. The Note has been in “mini-Note” mode for weeks. Let’s get going with the great political coverage again, kids, and give the Rosie 24/7/365 a rest for a little while!
April 26th, 2007 at 7:47 am
Not only do I not care that Rosie is leaving The View, I really don’t care if I ever hear from her again. When people were all up in arms a few weeks ago about her right to free speech, etc., my thought then was the same as now: of course she has a right to free speech. But do I have the right to be spared her speech? As any American citizen, I believe her right to say what she thinks is protected by the first amendment. I just wish that people with a public pulpit were actually intelligent. You ask why we know Rosie is leaving The View. I ask “Why do I even know Rosie’s name?” She’s stupid and talentless.
October 31st, 2007 at 2:34 am
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