Weather wars
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Weather wars, sometimes called TV radar wars or Doppler wars, are a kind of sensationalist journalism primarily concerning weather news. The term is an idiom and does not describe an actual war. The "war" is typified by competing local TV news stations engaging in technological one-upmanship to increase viewership.
News outlets have even been known to concoct footage and endanger public safety themselves to promote their public mission of "notifying their viewers". Even if they are not guilty of fabricating newscasts, some do not bother to check their sources in order to broadcast the story before their competitors. As a result, irresponsible newscasters promote a state of mind, one of unmanageable fear or emotional excesses for some persons viewing their broadcast. This is especially evident in tornado-prone markets, such as those in the Great Plains.
Exploitation of fear by falsified reports from storm spotters have resulted in legal action, and in some U.S. states has been considered as inciting a riot. [citation needed] A bad reverse reaction by the public from too many sensationalized reports would be the possibility of either apathy or ambivalence toward real storm reports.
[edit] See also
- Collective hysteria
- Damsel in distress syndrome
- Fad or trend, this article as a type of
- Herd behavior
- Hysteria
- Infotainment, this article depicts a type of
- Media circus
- Moral panic
- Socionomics
[edit] References
- Pittsburgh Tribune - Weather wars brewing again
- Cincinnati Enquirer - TV weather wars rain radar hyperbole
- The Daily Times - Neal Zoren: Channel 3 closing the gap in the battle for TV ratings
- The Poynter - The Little Bug That Could
- The Toledo Blade - Channel 36 finds humor in local TV's 'radar wars'
- WSI In the News - Weather Tech: Sizing Up the Latest Goodies
- Pioneer Press - KSTP on top with its big, bad weather radar
- Steve Minutillo - Is this the final blow in the Doppler wars?
- WCBSTV - Explaining Doppler 2 Million: CBS 2's Enters A New Era In Weather Coverage
- 13ABC.com - 13ABC Doppler 13,000
- WHOTV - First Alert Mega Doppler Radar
- Kansas City Star -That LIVE POWER DOPPLER looks more like a snow job
- KFOR - About our 4 Warn South Doppler Dual Doppler
- Tornado Database - Service-J is the pseudonym for an infamous storm chaser with a well-deserved reputation for exaggerated and false reports.
- U.S. Federal Communications Commission, FCC: What types of communications are specifically prohibited?, FCC 97.113