Comments on: Jamie Lynn Spears and the cult of idiocy http://greeleysghost.brian-fuller.com/2008/10/08/jamie-lynn-spears-and-the-cult-of-idiocy/ Brian Fuller's blog on the state of media and communications Fri, 27 Aug 2010 16:04:52 -0700 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.3 hourly 1 By: Ryerson http://greeleysghost.brian-fuller.com/2008/10/08/jamie-lynn-spears-and-the-cult-of-idiocy/comment-page-1/#comment-608 Ryerson Tue, 14 Oct 2008 20:44:00 +0000 http://brian-fuller.com/blog/?p=366#comment-608 Loring,<br/><br/>You may be right. Though when I want the absurd or to be amused I go to fark. <br/><br/>While CNN tries to become the national enquirer, why don't I just go there if I want that, and to a real news site if I want that? Loring,

You may be right. Though when I want the absurd or to be amused I go to fark.

While CNN tries to become the national enquirer, why don’t I just go there if I want that, and to a real news site if I want that?

]]> By: CraigM http://greeleysghost.brian-fuller.com/2008/10/08/jamie-lynn-spears-and-the-cult-of-idiocy/comment-page-1/#comment-607 CraigM Mon, 13 Oct 2008 07:30:00 +0000 http://brian-fuller.com/blog/?p=366#comment-607 Neil Postman: Amusing Ourselves to Death. It's not meant to be that depressing a book, but when you realize it was written in 1985 (before blogs, before 24-hour cable news became a sensation), you get depressed.<br/><br/>It's about how, thanks to TV, our society now expects everything to be entertaining: our news, our elections, our schools, our religion. It seems like a brutally obvious point, yet so many people glued to Fox/CNN are so oblivious to it. Neil Postman: Amusing Ourselves to Death. It’s not meant to be that depressing a book, but when you realize it was written in 1985 (before blogs, before 24-hour cable news became a sensation), you get depressed.

It’s about how, thanks to TV, our society now expects everything to be entertaining: our news, our elections, our schools, our religion. It seems like a brutally obvious point, yet so many people glued to Fox/CNN are so oblivious to it.

]]> By: Loring Wirbel http://greeleysghost.brian-fuller.com/2008/10/08/jamie-lynn-spears-and-the-cult-of-idiocy/comment-page-1/#comment-606 Loring Wirbel Fri, 10 Oct 2008 02:30:00 +0000 http://brian-fuller.com/blog/?p=366#comment-606 It's been proven through a bunch of CNN web site click studies with focus groups. Yes, even with the intelligentsia. Give them a choice of studying hedge funds, understanding the surge strategy, or finding out who's in rehab, and rehab wins every time. And all of you who say, "Oh, not me," I'll be anything you have Valleywag and TMZ.com bookmarked. It’s been proven through a bunch of CNN web site click studies with focus groups. Yes, even with the intelligentsia. Give them a choice of studying hedge funds, understanding the surge strategy, or finding out who’s in rehab, and rehab wins every time. And all of you who say, “Oh, not me,” I’ll be anything you have Valleywag and TMZ.com bookmarked.

]]> By: Ryerson http://greeleysghost.brian-fuller.com/2008/10/08/jamie-lynn-spears-and-the-cult-of-idiocy/comment-page-1/#comment-605 Ryerson Thu, 09 Oct 2008 17:09:00 +0000 http://brian-fuller.com/blog/?p=366#comment-605 I think this is what happens when you have 24 hours of news to fill, but perhaps only a couple of hours of something serious and useful to say.<br/><br/>So you fill it with talking heads blathering about anything they can think of to try to keep you glued to the screen. Fear! Sex! Chiuauas! <br/><br/>I think 24 hour news would work great if they realized that at least 20 of it needed to be in-depth stuff that wasn't just 'breaking' news.<br/><br/>But what producer can bring himself to do an interesting feature on the state of the US power grid say, when he could have breaking news of Britney's latest beaver flash? <br/><br/>Particularly when I fear his audience is much more interested in the flash.... I think this is what happens when you have 24 hours of news to fill, but perhaps only a couple of hours of something serious and useful to say.

So you fill it with talking heads blathering about anything they can think of to try to keep you glued to the screen. Fear! Sex! Chiuauas!

I think 24 hour news would work great if they realized that at least 20 of it needed to be in-depth stuff that wasn’t just ‘breaking’ news.

But what producer can bring himself to do an interesting feature on the state of the US power grid say, when he could have breaking news of Britney’s latest beaver flash?

Particularly when I fear his audience is much more interested in the flash….

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