Mistakes by critics: Pain or laughter?

["Douglas J. Broda" <djbroda@mindspring.com>]

A question for the folks who are/have been broadcast pros... when a critic
who is slamming (or in rarer cases, it seems, praising) the product and the
critic makes his or her own obvious mistake(s), is/was it your first
reaction to laugh at the irony or get ticked at the critic? Reading this
list and NERW suggests that such mistakes are a common thing in the Boston
area....

(What raised this question in my mind was the number of print/TV critics
who, in expressing opinions about the Super Bowl broadcast, screwed up
themselves. Examples? One blasted the many "dot.com" ads, using the EDS
cat-herding ad as his prime example. Of course, EDS isn't a "dot.com" by
any definition. Another praised Al Michaels for his historical perspective
in pointing out the Rams' history in the All-American Football Conference.
Much as I do appreciate announcers with a sense of history, the only
trouble is that Al was wrong in this historical reference -- it's the
*other* ex-Cleveland team, the Browns/Ravens, that was in the AAFC. Another
blasted ABC for never defining the "red zone" for all the casual fans who
watch a Super Bowl. I checked the tape... they defined it not once, but
twice (once in each half) as the area inside the other team's 20.)
------------------------------------------------------------------
Douglas J. Broda
Broda and Burnett
Attorneys at Law
80 Ferry Street, Troy, NY 12180 USA
(518) 272-0580
djbroda@mindspring.com