Is the "Today Show" media and are they for sale?

This morning on the Today Show, they are broadcasting from aboard a huge new Royal Caribbean cruise liner. I've been on a cruise and the ships can be pretty spectacular, but I had to wonder about the timing. Cruise lines have gotten a black eye lately due to on-board security, pirates and outbreaks of illness.

I imagine Katie Couric putting on her perkiness for whatever the segment/topic is (though I am not sure how that makes me feel about the upcoming CBS Evening News), but et tu Matt Lauer? Please give us some kind of grumbly signal that you aren't into this overt display.

My cruise was great so I don't have anything against the industry. But this, what I am seeing o the Today Show, it isn't media, it's marketing. Am I wrong for expecting more?

Comments

• Anonymous
  May 12, 2006
  What if your PR department is writing the news?
  
  http://blogs.msdn.com/heatherleigh/archive/2006/05/02/588720.aspx
  
  :-)
• Anonymous
  May 12, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  May 12, 2006
  I think there is quite a bit of this type of thing that goes on.  Sometimes obvious, sometimes insidious.
  
  It's one thing for the press to shirk their responsibilities and just reprint a press release without any sort of investigation.  It's another to actively and unwarrantedly report favorably for a partner.
  
  (and I've used up my quota for -ly adverbs for the day)
  
  It really makes you rethink how much trust you ought to give to these 'news magazine' programs.  But a day without Roker is like a day without weather.  Oh, the dilemma...
• Anonymous
  May 12, 2006
  The Today show has never been about news.  It is an "info-tainment" show.
  
  All media are influenced strongly by PR.  That's the reason you have a PR function as part of your marketing.  Perhaps most people don't realize it, but virtually every bit of "news" that is published, certainly any about products or companies, started out as a press release at a company.  Some news items are barely changed from the press release, except that the news organization puts their own headline on it, and may edit it a little.  It's a myth that there is a big investment in research and digging for real news.  (Outside of negative stuff like Watergate or Abu Graib).
  
  Since the Today show makes little pretense about being news, why would it surprise you that Royal Carribean can get the new "biggest ship in the world, ever" on TV?  Is it any different than covering people lining up at CompUSA for the release of Windows 95, or camping out at Borders for the next Harry Potter book?  Doesn't Meredith Vierra being hired to replace Katie tell you something about what this show is?
  
  Even the majority of blogs are fed by PR.  How do you find out about most stories?  If you are reacting to something you saw in the media, it likely originated as a press release in PR.  Unless it is something you know about or experienced personally.
  
  Perhaps it is the transparency of the shilling that's going on that bothers you.
  
  Personally, I find cruise liners offensive on principle.  Any time I've seen one in a harbor I cringe.  For me, they are representative of everything bad about being out of proportion to your surroundings.  Like a monster house occupying three lots in a development of previously modest homes.  Anyway, that's a matter of personal taste, I guess.
  
  Heather, haven't I explained to you already that everything is marketing?
• Anonymous
  May 12, 2006
  "Heather, haven't I explained to you already that everything is marketing?"
  
  When marketing turns into the creation of hype from the spreading of awareness is when people feel just a wee bit turned off.
  
  To accept it merely because that is the state of affairs is to align yourself with the status quo...inertia!
• Anonymous
  May 12, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  May 12, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  May 12, 2006
  Heather, when will you heed my call to Turn Off Your TV? Maybe you should start small. Turn Off Your Today Show! Kinda makes you wretch, huh?
• Anonymous
  May 13, 2006
  Paul- I'm not naive about how the media works but in my opinion, it's a matter of degrees. And I found the Today Show to be too much this time. It was over-the-top. That's all. Don't take the fact that I am opinionated personally. If "trying to get through" to me is an objective, it's not one I would recommend ; )
  
  Tim- oh, that is never going to happen. But you speak as a very reposible father of 2, which I can appreciate. The TV is my "white noise".  And yes, the Today Show yesterday was wretch-worthy.
• Anonymous
  May 14, 2006
  I guess I should have ;) winked or something.  I'm sure there's a special place in heaven for idealists like us.