How to improve TV newscasts?

[Aaron Read <aread@speakeasy.net>]

Dan Kennedy has a piece in the Boston Phoenix about a study done that 
supposedly shows that quality newscasts are the best way to get viewers, 
but that to go totally tabloid news is the second best way.  All or 
nothing, apparently.

One thing about this article is that it left me scratching my head as I 
couldn't quite get the point.   Maybe it just seems so obvious to me as a 
media geek because we follow this kind of stuff really closely?


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Aaron "Bishop" Read             aread@speakeasy.net
FriedBagels Consulting          AOL-IM: readaaron
http://www.friedbagels.com      Boston, MA


An excerpt:

There may be hope for local-television-news viewers whove been turned off 
by a never-ending cavalcade of crime, meaningless live shots, and video of 
tornado damage from places theyve never heard of.

Because according to Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Project for Excellence 
in Journalism, the most surefire way to success is to offer (get this) a 
quality newscast. By a variety of measures, based on a five-year study of 
242 stations in about 60 different markets, the best local newscasts also 
have the highest ratings and the most desirable demographics for advertisers.

http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/this_just_in/documents/03266631.asp