Fixing Chyrons Won’t Fix TV: Why We Need To Quit The Perfection Game
Fixing Chyrons Won’t Fix TV: Why We Need To Quit The Perfection Game - NewsLab
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One of the first emails I got working in a TV newsroom was a “discrepancy report.”
It was the first in a countless series of form emails filled out by show producers to document mistakes during their newscast. “Typo in chyron,” “audio issues during live shot,” “batteries died in anchor mic” – that sort of stuff. Most of the emails read: “Clean show.”
I found the “discrep reports” odd. First, as far as I could tell, no one read them. Second, if you watched the show and read the report, they rarely reported actual mistakes. They certainly never crossed into the digital world, where a reporter would promise “more information” in their tag without ever providing more information for the web copy.
Finally, the reports were sent to everyone, like a public shaming. There was no equivalent “wins report” documenting the many things that went right or people did well. Just this email inbox-stuffing record of minor errors that fell well within the fallibility of human beings.
Going through the Table Stakes for Broadcast program at Arizona State, I explained this to program lead Doug Smith. A brilliant guy, he knew immediately what was happening. He called it “managing to perfection.” It doesn’t sound so bad, right? It’s an absolute innovation killer, and we need to stop now if we have any hope of solving 2025.
Managing to perfection seems like the path of a true professional. We’ll wring every flaw out of our work until we’re left with the Platonic ideal of the newscast:
Related Knowledge Center: Climate economics
Climate change is now a driver of the world’s economy. The impact is profound:
- Catastrophic weather events — hurricanes, floods, droughts, high temperatures — are more frequent and more extreme. The cost can be measured in both the initial damage caused and the longer-term impact on the economy.
- Vulnerable communities are increasing climate-related investments, hardening infrastructure and taking other protective measures.
- Investment in carbon capture and storage technologies is increasingly rapidly.
- Governments are making investments and crafting regulations to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.
On top of all of this is the cost of uncertainty. As the Fourth National Climate Assessment, released in 2018 by the U.S. Global Change Research Program, says, “The assumption that current and future climate conditions will resemble the recent past is no longer valid.”