Reno Gazette Journal Aspiring To Be National Enquirer

A consistent irritation for me every time I pick up the Reno Gazette-Journal in its traditional print form is the fact that they regurgitate Associated Press stories incessantly. It is done so much that on any given day they comprise the majority of the stories. This is especially the case in the Business Section.

I understand that reporters are a significant operating expense for the paper. In fact, any employee is within any organization. But when the RGJ goes so far as to send a reporter on the trail that Darren Mack followed on his flight to Mexico, I question the RGJ’s priorities.

The paper is willing to pay the expenses associated with sending a reporter and photographer down to Mexico to cover a sensational story that costitutes almost a week of papers for what? Sensationalism sells papers. The guys shot a judge, killed his wife, fled to Mexico, and eventually was caught. Story done. To RGJ’s credit, I guess they know what commands readers’ attentions in this town.

But therin lies the rub. Are people that apathetic? How many stories ran in the RGJ on Darren Mack verses stories focusing on education, urban sprawl, traffic problems, political maneuverings, and various other social and environmental issues? The same goes for much of the news on TV. Everyone tunes in to watch some reporter stand on the side of the road and talk about how it is raining. I can look outside and see that it is raining! Or tune into the weather channel online or on TV. Forget the idea of discussing something that actually has some substance.

To further illustrate my point, can you remember the last time the RGJ ran a series of articles on one particular subject? If my memory serves me well, I believe it was on UNR and the deaths of sheep. I appreciate that the RGJ poured their resources into uncovering some of the administrative issues affecting UNR, but in their pursuit of the truth they further sensationalized the issue and adversely effected the national reputation of UNR. And, I don’t remember them allocating an equal amount of reporting devoted to the other side of the story i.e the University’s perspective.

Local media’s sensational and occasionally senseless and simplistic portrayal of human life is frustrating because they have such incredible control over the filtering of information. Consumer generated media like blogging is helping to lift the veil, but it is still primarily for intellectuals and early adopters of technology, and not for mass consumption.

Keep up the good work Discontents!

Domestic Violence is Terrorism
Wife Beaters are WMD’s.
If only we could all live in the Dan Quayle land of “Family values”, then the world would be a better place.
But to be fair to the XY-chromasomaly afflicted males of the species- maybe there is a biological reason that men “go loco”? I dont know, but maybe they sometimes have legitimate issues too?
Personally, I never beat my women unless they want me too (sorry- a little shakespearian black humor- to call attention to a serious issue)

Read this other “ripped from the headlines” “True Crime Detective” supermarket Hollywood tabloid tale-made for TV story…

http://www.lukeisback.com/stars/stars/mimi_miyagi1.htm

I haven’t seen mentioned perhaps the worst part of the RGJ’s “Trail of Mack” mini-series.

Forget about for the moment the luridness of the topic, and instead focus on the actual writing. The damn thing read like a “How to see Mexico on $500 a Day” travelogue. Did we really need to know about, and see a picture of, the infinity pool at one of the resorts or how most seem to have open-air lobbies(?). Mack was almost a secondary part of the story.

For chrissakes, they even included sidebars describing each resort, the high- and low-season rates and pertinent tidbits like avocado face scrubs!

Quite frankly it made me think the RGJ traded these “ads” for comped stays for their “reporters”. So much for journalistic integrity.

Derek, come on. Paying for news is not something they invented on that trip. I’d be willing to bet that’s exactly what happened. But let’s not fool ourselves into thinking the RGJ is the only organization doing it. Ever watch Nevada Newsmakers?

The story was written in a way more appropriate for the travel pages. And, for that scenario, it’s well known that a lot of services are comped for travel writers.

But this was under the guise of some journalistic trip into the mind of a killer, yet played out as an ad for the wonders of Baja.

Paying someone for an exclusive report on Mack eyeballing them in a club is one thing (and “checkbook journalism” is a topic for debate), but it is an entirely different creature to do what they apparently did. Saving money on lodging by trading glowing sidebars on the resorts’ amenities while doing a story on a guy who slaughtered his wife and tried to assassinate a judge would be a new one. Even Sam wouldn’t do that.

The point of adding information about the hotels was to show that this is where Darren Mack stayed within the last year, and after he filed for bankruptcy. No ad trade involved. Look at the information provided. That’s was the point of the story: $36,200 in his pocket; the key to the Ford Explorer; etc.

The RGJ devoted exactly one sentence to Mack’s bankruptcy! I was interested when I read that, but there was nothing else said about it.

And pointing out the extravagant lifestyle while on the run needn’t include multiple sidebars for the different resorts. The reporter could have just mentioned the cost in the story (perhaps in just one line, like the bankruptcy warranted). Putting up multiple ads (like it was some keyword-loaded Google Adsense site) was poor journalism and smacks of a quid pro quo.

If the reporters were so enamored of the places, as they apparently were, write a side story for the travel section.

It was a poorly-written story.