So, as most people realised within 30 seconds of hearing the unlikely balloon boy story, it was a hoax.
Balloon boy was a non-story from the start
The father’s decision to call a TV company on thinking his child was missing in a weather balloon, rather than the emergency services, sounded strange and should have alerted CNN that this was a publicity stunt from the very start.
Image Credit: The Daily Telegraph
Then, when the networks find out within minutes, that the father was also a contestant on a reality TV show, (and that he had his children performing on Youtube), it seemed even more like a publicity stunt from someone obsessed with being famous.
The odds of there ever being anyone in that balloon were close to zero. BUT this did not stop CNN covering the event live – AND let’s face it, there’s plenty of REAL news happening right now.
Why broadcast the balloon boy story when it was so flimsy?
A few years ago, stories were researched before they were broadcast and that’s the first we would know of them. Today, every time a big story breaks, it’s picked up on Twitter first and the news companies / TV networks are left playing catch-up. This is BAD NEWS for the networks, as it means they no longer get all those valuable viewers / listeners to advertise to. Remembering, advertising revenue is what funds the networks. (Excluding The BBC here in the UK.)
Whilst Twitter is a super fast way of getting breaking news, it has one well-known, massive weakness – It’s extremely unreliable as a news source. You hear of a celebrity dying, (like Jeff Goldblum recently) and you know there’s a good chance that he’s probably water-skiing or in the gym training for a marathon. Like most people, I’ve lost count of how many disasters I have seen on Twitter as breaking news, which never actually happened.
That’s why whenever a big news story breaks on Twitter, the first thing most intelligent people do, is check to see if the news networks are confirming it. The news might break first on Twitter, but like the boy who cried wolf, we never know if we can trust it or not.
News outlets playing to Twitters strengths
The strength of the established news outlets and TV stations is their highly trained staff, their network of contacts and their researching skills. However, rather than play to their strengths, the news outlets and TV stations are trying to compete with Twitter on speed – a race that they can not win, if they want to remain a trusted, reliable source. That’s why we can expect to see more balloon boy non-stories in the future. From here in, I think I’m going to refer to this speed over facts bullshit as ‘ balloon boy journalism.’ (You saw it here first folks!!)
I’m hoping that this dumb-ass story isn’t the starting pistol, as the news outlets take their places for a ‘race to the bottom’. Yes, there has always been political bias in the news and yes, the news outlets have often got things wrong. However, focusing on speed rather than facts is hardly going to improve the quality and reliability of the news we watch or hear.
Balloon boy journalism plays into Twitters hands
If this really is a sign that the news outlets are going to focus on speed, rather than facts, Twitter could become our most valuable news outlet. At the moment, the only thing Twitter has over the traditional news outlets is speed. However, if the news outlets become just as unreliable, no one will bother checking a story out via their TV, radio or the website of one of those currently, trusted outlets.
People will see a story break on Twitter and stay there, until it’s either called out as a hoax or confirmed as a fact. After all, as in the fake Jeff Goldblum death story I mentioned earlier, many TV stations report Twitter hoaxes as facts anyway. Surely, for the news outlets to compete and survive, they need to play to their strengths and spare us more balloon boy ’stories’?
What do you think?
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CNN knew all along this was fake and they knew it would get viewers. When a stations on its ass it will do anything to get attention.
Your point about speed over accuracy is a good one. Thanks
I think it’s possible they suspected it was a hoax. The interesting thing will be so see what they do with the next non-story.
Judging by the huge interest in their live coverage of what was in effect, a balloon floating; there’s little to news outlets in future.
BTW: This is not a CNN thing. I see this more as a TV news issue. I’m sure there are worse examples from other networks.
Of course this was hoax from the start as the first thing I noted .. The balloon was not big enough to lift a small child that far or more that fast it was Mylar pieced together with glue that had weak seams it would not have lifted a kid that look to be around 30 to 40 pounds and plus they would have got them fine for sending it up in the fist place as its illegal to send up a balloon that can do damage and the fact it was shaped like a UFO didn’t set some alarms off as this being some kind of stunt it beyond me. As to what will happen to the next non-new story it will air just like some many be fore it as the news media is in they to entertain us not info us any more.
People seem to like to be fooled these days maybe to take their minds off the fact they are losing there home or jobs. These people are about to do this as well they owe the state of Calif money and are near broke so ya it was stunt ya they want to pull off a great hoax to make money.
Its sad but the Media seem to just want to give us a story that they can go both ways with first to wow us then to shame those who did wrong then to acted like they the media are the victims.
some days it just better to miss the news that is on if it isn’t local or about something that affects you personal.
GC
Pro Tip: Don’t get Greene Consulting to do any writing for you. That was impossible to read. Try punctuation.