NewsSpeak

The New Face of PBS

PBS has taken another bold step in expanding our concept of public broadcasting. This past year they introduced a new character for the three- to eight-year-old set who is surpassing even Barney in popularity. The new star is a cuddly aardvark named Arthur who popped on the scene with a herd of associated products. Yes, you can get talking dolls, toothbrushes, underwear, puzzles, pajamas, and Play-Doh all bearing Arthur’s likeness, thanks to the foresight of producing station WGBH in Boston which planned the product licensing from the beginning. Critics have been dredging up old PBS statements about their educational mission to question whether public TV should be marketing just like the commercial boys. But director of PBS children’s programming, Alice Cahn, had a quick rebuttal. "I don’t see anything wrong," she said, "in children trying to hug a character from a television show that is important to them." Sadly, she had less to say about the adults trying to make money off the "children trying to hug..." A minor oversight, I’m sure. (NYT 9/24)

Best One-Liner From the Tobacco Settlement

It was a tough job culling out the best joke from this year’s $368 billion settlement with the tobacco companies, but researchers at the Federal Trade Commission went ahead with the job. First, the runner-up, the vanishing $368 billion. It turns out this widely published figure has been made using mythical future U.S. dollars of lower value. The actual figure in today’s dollars, admittedly an old fashioned concept, is $100 billion, a figure the FTC says would allow the industry to thrive financially while enjoying immunity from litigation. No small feat. But the killer punchline is a small anti-trust provision allowing cigarette makers to "jointly confer, coordinate or act in concert" to achieve the goals of the settlement. Not that they have ever needed permission. But wouldn’t just a tiny fig leaf be appropriate to cover such open price collusion? (NYT 9/23)

The Ghost of Kissinger Past

The United States found itself virtually alone at the recent international conference in Oslo, convened to ban land mines. The mines which once laid, just keep on ticking like Timex watches, kill thousands of people every year and have been denounced by over 100 nations. But not by the United States. Fortunately, the Clinton administration was able to find a compromise they say could "pave the way to a treaty they could sign." The compromise had a few minor clauses of Catch-22 quality. First, our proposal would ban anti-personnel mines except for one minor purpose, that of protecting anti-tank mines (which are not covered by the treaty). Seems only fair that legal land mines should be protected. Then in the very fine print comes a proposal to allow nations the right to withdraw from the treaty during an exceptional time, known as war. So land mines would be banned when we don’t need them and allowed when we do. A perfect demonstration of the U.S. meaning of the word "compromise." (NYT 9/16)

The Return of Ben Hur

Actor Charles Heston has been putting his keen analytical skills to work for the National Rifle Association. The result—a breathtaking discovery that in our Bill of Rights, the right to bear arms is "the first among equals." The second amendment earns this promotion because, says Heston, "it’s the one right that allows rights to exist at all." The discovery that freedom of speech rests not on respect for law but is possible only because every whacko has a loaded gun reportedly had many right-wing pastors handing out copies of Chairman Mao’s Quotations. (You will, of course, remember his "Power grows out of the barrel of a gun.") Meanwhile, Heston has a new spin to put on the attacks made on Saturday night specials, plastic guns, and cop-killer bullets. These are, it turns out, examples of "nit-picking." Just "nit-picking little wars of attrition," says Heston, "made-for-prime-time non-issues invented by some press agent..." (NYT 9/12)

Recruiting Travel Agents

The corporate clients of many travel agencies will be able to realize great savings thanks to the discovery of a valuable new source of cheap labor. Travel Wholesalers International will be booking trips for other travel agencies using a dozen female inmates from Leath Correctional Institution in South Carolina. Co-owner Daniel P. Bohan has discovered that our prisons are not only "filled with a lot of smart people," but "Better yet, prison labor is cheap." How cheap? Try 50 cents an hour for starting salaries. And, says Bohan, "you don’t even have to pay them benefits." Fortunately, Bohan was wearing a drool protector when he said this. Trans World Airlines was so inspired by this prisoner rehabilitation project, it went one step further. TWA opened an airline reservation center inside a youth detention center in Ventura, California. (WSJ 9/16)

Empowering Our Schools

Channel One, the news program that brings advertising to over eight million students in school, has found a way to be more participatory. No longer will students, teachers, and administrators be mere passive observers of the show. Channel One is enlisting teachers and principals to help in marketing campaigns. Teachers, for example, are being engaged to help students write commercials for Snapple and design art for Pepsi vending machines. Principals are being sent coupons for Subway sandwiches that they can hand out to students. Says Channel One sales director Martin Grant, participating in these ad campaigns is a way for teachers "to make the lesson relevant." Answering actual criticism of turning teachers into marketing partners, CEO David Tanzer says they are "sensitive about turning schools into merchandisers, but it only runs promotional campaigns that benefit advertisers and students alike." "But Mr. Tanzer, aren’t all ad campaigns of benefit to students?" asked Beaver Cleaver. (WSJ 9/15)

Crack Down on Loiterers

The ACLU has once again stuck its nose into a fine piece of American legislation and filed a pesky court challenge. Citizens in Salida City, Colorado, in an effort to wipe out the scourge of "loitering," passed a bill earlier this year stopping adults from spending more than five minutes in a public place after 11:00 PM. The ordinance outlawed the disgraceful practice of people staying too long in one location, which it defined precisely as "any two points within two hundred feet of each other." Despite trivial objections that this makes waiting in lines at theaters illegal, supporters have stuck to their position following a few initial compromises. The original bill, for example, not only prohibited "loitering," but also "lingering," "tarrying" (my personal favorite), or "standing idly about." It covered the entire day as well. Unfortunately, the language about "standing idly about" may have proved to be too descriptive of the city council that enacted the ordinance and so had to be dropped. (ACLU Press Release 9/2)

Wilderness Justice Returns

Louisiana has declared open season on carjackers, allowing owners of autos a year round hunting season against anyone threatening their property. A recently passed bill thoughtfully allows the state’s upstanding citizens to use not only their handguns on miscreants, but also their squirrel guns or assault rifles. (Howitzers and anti-tank weapons were inexplicably left out.) The bill declares "deadly force justified" when committed against a person "reasonably believed" to be making an unlawful entry. To fully appreciate the mood of Louisiana’s lawmakers, it’s important to know the word "reasonably" was not in the original bill. However, this obvious liberal addendum to "believed" failed to water down the legislation. Its intent was best captured by the stirring words of a Republican candidate for governor in Georgia named Michael Bowers: "Carjackers shot dead won’t be carjacking anyone else." So true. And likewise, jaywalkers shot dead won’t be.... (NYT 8/31)

Privatizing of Big Brother

Yet another corporation has learned the value of customer surveillance. Harrah’s Entertainment has unveiled a giant databank that tracks the buying and gambling habits of six million of their customers. Their computers can now tell hotel clerks what you eat in their restaurants, what sweatshirts you buy in their gift shops, how much you spend on slot machines or even the amount of your mortgage. This valuable information, much of it bought from credit card companies, is provided, says the Wall Street Journal, because it "helps clerks decide how to treat [customers] based on how much they are likely to lose." I mean, why waste friendly "hello’s"? Besides all the financial information, Harrah’s computers also contain "emotional data" indicating whether you had a good time. Just how personal does their information get? Well, according to Harrah VP Reg Mallama, "It depends on how valuable to me as a customer you are." (WSJ 9/2)

Student Censorship

It’s sometimes a challenge for school administrators to come up with convincing rationales for censoring student publications. Fortunately, some brave souls are mapping out fresh turf, like principal Tom Paulsen of Naperville Central High in Illinois. Faced with student reporters who unearthed evidence of administrators over- spending on travel during a budget crisis, Paulsen did the only thing possible. He censored the students’ news story. His reason? "My concern," he said, "was that there may have been an appearance that these administrators’ did something wrong, and that would affect their ability to lead." An appearance of wrong? Tsk, tsk. But remember, according to the Supreme Court’s famous Hazelwood decision, principals can censor material that interferes with a school’s "basic educational mission." Hordes of embarrassed administrators would certainly undermine any basic educational mission. (AP 9/7)

Hot Adjectives

Are you wondering what superlative terms to use to describe a new product? Tired of "new" and "improved?" Well check out Glenn Gunderson’s new guide to the latest trends in trademark applications to the U.S. Patent Office. In the year’s biggest development, he reports that "extreme" overtook "ultra," "mega," and even the perennial powerhouse, "super." Also hot were brand names that included "global," which rose 31 percent, and "silver." Leading the declines were "authentic," followed by "international" and "gold." The biggest gainer though was "genuine," which gained 51 percent, much of it at the expense of "authentic." Marketers report that "genuine" has a truer ring to it. Similarly, "international" has fallen on hard times because it "doesn’t cover enough" anymore. Such is the life and death of concepts in the global marketplace. (WSJ 9/4)