[downandout]

I don’t get what the issue is here. I have seen this message on my local television stations. What is missing from the YouTube video is an invitation at the end of that message for viewers to contact the station with any concerns about bias in its own reporting. In fact that is the entire point of the script, and it has been cutoff of the YouTube video, presumably because it appears to be more controversial that way. Oh, the irony!

So a large media company recognized the problem of bias in the media, which could become a business problem if it affects confidence in their news reporting, and invited people to contact them if they noticed this problem creeping into the individual news stations’ reports. Where is the controversy here?

[jedimastert]

I think the problem here is that if Sinclair can coerce these news organizations, what else can Sinclair coerce them to say? What if they were told to say something blatantly false, or to endorse one person over another. It's also not made clear at all in these broadcasts that they're being made to read from a script, which is a perfect recipe for astroturfing[1].

[1] https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Astroturfing

[downandout]

If I own a station, I’m not “coercing” it when I tell that station that it is our corporate policy to advise viewers of certain features that our channel offers. In this case, they wanted to make sure that viewers understand that there is a specific way to contact the station to complain about any bias they feel the station’s own news reports may have, as this has been an issue with the media recently. I see nothing wrong with that, and in fact I think it’s a positive thing. I have to say that I feel better about and more trusting of the local station I have seen that message on than I do about other local news stations, specifically because they have recognized this significant issue and are attempting to address it.

[specialist]

You may own the gear, but you wouldn't own the airwaves.

In fact, you'd only be granted permission to use the public's airwaves to serve the public interest.

[downandout]

Is it not in the public interest to ask people how they feel about your programming, and call their attention to significant problems in our world (such as media bias)?

[specialist]

Rather than file complaints directly with the FCC?

[maxerickson]

A lot of people, uh, fail to take what Sinclair says at face value.

[downandout]

And why would that be? That message is basically a feedback request. They are attempting to address a legitimate issue that may cause them a decline in viewership and resulting revenues.

[maxerickson]

It probably stems from an awareness of the broader context within which they issued that must run script.

[downandout]

If, like the Democratic senators who signed the letter, I enjoyed mostly glowing media coverage, I suppose that I would be upset when a company dismisses that glowing coverage as being the result of bias - even if I knew they were correct. But that’s a hardly a reason to abuse your power as a senator to attempt to damage the company that is doing that, especially when they are trying to solve a legitimate problem for the public at their own stations. That’s pretty evil if you ask me.

[IAmEveryone]

Do you really believe Sinclair doesn't have the manpower to watch their own programming to check for any 'biases'?

And if you believe they are somehow incapable of noticing biases: how would they adjudicate any complaints they get?

That request for comments is either a McGuffin needed to have a reason for the preceding rant slamming all other media outlets.

Or it's a ploy to get local stations in line with Sinclair's corporate agenda, by asking their viewers to rat them out to headquarters.

[makomk]

How would that even work? Like, sure they could watch their own programming, but the people watching it would come from essentially the same pool of people, with the same set of shared biases, as those who chose to run the story that way in the first place.

[downandout]

Umm...wut? Would you not agree that bias is in the media is a major issue today, and that it may cause a significant percentage of viewers to abandon a given station or website if they see too much of it? Before the 2016 election, I regularly watched CNN and visited its website. Now it’s such a den of partiality and clickbait headlines that I have relegated it to HuffPo status and cannot trust anything I read there, so I simply don’t go there. I’d imagine there are others that feel this way too.

So if I’m a media company and I see complaints about my stations or a decline in news viewership, I’m going to take steps to stop it from happening. Companies often don’t know that they have problems until customers express their opinions about them, and so Sinclair is trying to keep an open dialogue with their viewers. Since when is asking customers how they feel about your service a bad thing?

[IAmEveryone]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_balance

[downandout]

So you’re saying that media is not biased, that in fact all of the people saying that there is a bias are trying to portray a “false balance”? Have you looked at the CNN homepage recently? If you u don’t see bias there, there’s no point in continuing to discuss this with you.

[willstrafach]

> I don’t get what the issue is here. I have seen this message on my local television stations.

One message went pretty viral recently, but I am unsure why you are focused on that single message. Many scripted messages are being passed to local stations with the requirement to read the script without informing viewers that it is a script the local newscasters are required to read. That is the issue, not the message itself.