Caution: You’re live on the web
Cory Bergman October 11th, 2006
One of the learning curves for traditional TV news staffers is the fact that during breaking news, you may be streaming live on the web. It’s all part of the unbundled universe. For example, “adm” in comments posts this tidbit about today’s plane crash in NYC:
Reuters video (I think) was carrying WABC’s “NewsChopper7″ feed live via Yahoo News. The reporter’s mic was on continually for an hour or more, but she didn’t seem to know her comments were being broadcast over the internet.She referred to her chopper’s camera as “a hunk of junk,” teased her colleagues for being “useless,” and ridiculed an eyewitness who (somehow) passed on the tip that helicopters can’t be steered after running out of fuel (”We’ll be sure to thank him for his expertise.”) And — this is the kicker — when told that LaGuardia wanted her to leave the airspace because they had “lost radar”, she said, “Well, tell them we left. They lost radar? Tell them we left. Tell them we’re in Newark.”
So when it’s breaking news, assume you’re always live — on the web. And as Joe adds in comments, “It doesn’t hurt to remind them of it right before the stream goes live. A little backup goes a long way.”
6 Comments Add your own
1. Joe | October 11th, 2006 at 5:55 pm
And it doesn’t hurt to remind them of it right before the stream goes live. A little backup goes a long way.
2. adm | October 12th, 2006 at 12:03 pm
The other thing I wanted to say about this incident is that I’m sure her bosses would be pretty upset if they found out about it, but while I was listening, I was IM’ing my friends and telling them “You’ve got to hear this.” Probably not the kind of attention they wanted, but it sure made for compelling listening/viewing. Although her comments were “inappropriate,” it was a great window into “real reality” vs the sculpted reality the official broadcasts like to present. Besides that, having the live, unedited video feed was better than what everyone else was offering.
But, yeah, someone should remind these folks their mics are on.
One other interesting bit was the weird pass through from WABC -> Reuters (or was it AP? Sorry) -> Yahoo.
3. G Man | October 13th, 2006 at 5:22 am
OLD TV rule I learned from the grizzled engineers - “All mics should be treated as live.” And you don’t know who’s listening on the other end. Kinda like the firearms safety rule of all guns are to be treated as if they were loaded.
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