Almost-News
Almost-news is a message that does not sufficiently inform. "Tornado in the area, more at eleven." Almost-news might be an important message that is not sufficiently researched, or it could be more entertainment or advertising than news. Someone might also call real news "almost-news" if that was the fifteenth time they heard the information without any new revelations.
Types/Categories
1. Almost-entertainment: Almost "not news," and much more like entertainment. (Newsertainment: amusement, diversion, vicarious gratification. Perhaps, a missing persons reports.)
2. Almost-advertising: Not so much "news" as "advertising" that is purveyed by the press and other media because it is considered "important information." (The news organization reiterating a "press release" almost-verbatim. Infomercials.)
3. Almost-education: Not so much "news" as "education," as to where the legal lines are drawn. (Almost-nobody reads the Criminal Code, but everyone watches police shows and sit-coms where moral and legal lines are discussed.)
4. Almost-propaganda: Not so much news as the promotion of ideas to further an agenda, rather than a recounting of something that just happened. As events happen they can be shown to be illustrative of a point, usually: "This is the kind of thing we are trying to crack down on," or "We have the solution right here," and "Vote for me and there will be more (or less) of this."
5. Almost-recapitulation: Nothing new, or almost nothing new. (The news story is repeated just in a slightly different way, or the events are unfolding slowly and the final outcome is still uncertain.)
6. Almost-history: Nothing new. (The news story is so old that the History channel has already done a documentary on it.)
7. Insufficient news: News that merely scratches the surface, or deliberately avoids stepping on toes or questioning authority. Sometimes it's just a question of research no being done yet because of limited research time, air time, or resources. Maybe someone needs react-time. Maybe all the alternatives are not discussed openly.
More
Almost-news is neither good nor bad. When Walter Cronkite reported the news, there was just time enough to report on the major events of the day briefly. You can still get that if you go to the right source. But often today, people prefer to tune in to their own favorite blends of news (and almost-news) that allow for more of this, and less of that. It very much depends on what you are looking for in your news search at the moment.
Why we have Almost-News:
You see more almost-news on a slow news day. News organizations have large time-slots to fill, even if nothing happens. They must report something, so they turn to the almost-limitless supply of almost-news.
Most of what happens changes gradually, and so it doesn't attract the attention of a reporter. Sometimes really important trends don't get reported on sufficiently until something is ready to blow up. (Sometimes a monster is too big to fit on your screen.)
It is the role of some to prevent bad things from happening (in business and government especially). This "resistance to change" is called "maintaining the status quo." So it is only when someone or something fails miserably that real newsworthy events even happen. Also, good things tend to happen incrementally, whereas calamities usually strike suddenly. Reporters are left with the dilemma of either reporting about what everyone knows is happening (the good news, everyone behaving as they should), or revealing ever new information about something we already know is past and now unavoidable (the catastrophes).
Lastly, many people for a myriad of reasons prefer almost-news to the real thing. We seem to have an insatiable desire to know about murders, fires, and swim-suit competitions elsewhere that could never possibly affect our own lives.
Therefore, we might as well celebrate almost-news, and treat it with the almost-reverence that it almost-deserves.
The point (almost):
The almost-point is, almost-news sells a lot of soap, cars, and hamburgers. And we've noticed that when the Writer's Guild of America is out on strike, almost-news can temporarily take the place of regular shows that depend on writers.
Links
| Almost-News | Comment |
| www.fark.com | If it's not news, it's FARK |
| www.theonion.com | The Onion |
| www.wildapple.com | Almost News: The Wild Times |
| www.townhall.com | Larry Elder |
| www.tv.com | News about what's on TV |
| www.eonline.com | E Online |
| www.splashnewsonline.com | Splash News Online |
| www.projectcensored.org | Junkfood News |
Don't knock it, almost-news is usually better than real news.
