The other true crime

THIS POST HAS BEEN CORRECTED & UPDATED:

I spent the morning watching the non-stop coverage of the arrest of John Mark Karr, 41, in the JonBenet Ramsey murder case. All the usual experts suspects have been trotted out to spout their opinions on this guy's motives and psychological make-up. On Fox News around noon, I heard them actually peculating speculating that the suspect's confession was bogus and that Islamic terrorists were involved. SWEAR TO GOD!

Why this story led last night's edition of CBC-TV's The National -- Radio-Canada's Telejournal has far more serious priorities -- beats me. (A commenter below correctly points out that the AIDS conference and the drowning of a little Q uebec boy were ahead of the JonBenet story on the National. My bad. What I should have written was, why this story "preceded'' others.) There's a freaking war on! In fact, there are lots of them!

Anyway, here's part of today's pulpware effort on the subject of the media coverage of the case.

Tried and convicted by the media, and aided and abetted by an incompetent police force, the Ramseys were guilty! guilty! guilty!

That despite the fact that, aside from Patsy's wish to see her daughter high-kick in her own beauty pageant footsteps, there was nothing in this family's history indicating anything untoward.

But Patsy's mania for her daughter's winning Miss This or That ribbons was enough to do the trick.

For the better part of a decade, it was impossible to escape the unrelenting coverage.

JonBenet's luridly painted little face, Grand Ole Opry-style big hair and voluminous dresses became indelible and iconic images of the 1990s.

The videos of her prancing and dancing her way across stages were played and replayed by CNN, Court TV and the then weeks-old Fox News and MSNBC.

It was the Ramseys' great misfortune that both Fox and MSNBC had been born in the wake of the last "true crime" media feeding frenzy, the mother of all cable coverage marathons, the O.J. Simpson case, and they were determined to cash in on JonBenet's murder.

What's more, primetime was still filled with trashy tabs and more than a dozen network newsmagazines.

Of course, it must not be lost on anybody that JonBenet was white, and pretty, and her parents rich.

As we have seen with other cases — for example, the 2002 Elizabeth Smart abduction, which occurred at the same time as the African American Alexis Patterson, 7, was snatched from her tenement in Milwaukee — blondes get more play.

The JonBenet case also fuelled, and was fuelled by, the then-nascent World Wide Web. Entire sites are dedicated to the murder, to advancing various theories, to examining the evidence, and, most grisly of all, to presenting the autopsy photos.

And so, it became a multi-media perfect storm of pointing fingers.

The column has itself provoked a media feeding frenzy. Ironic, no? I have so far turned down five TV interviews and three radio gigs on the matter but I will be doing 10 CBC Radio One drive home shows across Canada between 3 and 6. Listen for me in Ottawa, Calgary, Halifax, Yellowknife, Toronto, St. John's, Victoria, Winnipeg and Edmonton.

And yeah, I have a bad cold.

UPDATE: Editor & Publisher has a couple of good analyses on this.

The first is a look at how a journalism professor played a key role in the arrest. But far more interesting is this examination of how the media -- once more -- are rushing to judgement.

Is the press going overboard in its coverage of the latest twist in the JonBenet Ramsey murder case -- and suggesting, too early, that the suspect suddenly in custody, John Karr, is guilty?

The front page headline in New York's Daily News today, for example, read: "SOLVED." The lead in the main arrest story in Denver's Rocky Mountain News reads: "The decade-long search for JonBenet Ramsey's killer came to a startling end in Thailand on Wednesday."

The same paper, in a headline over an editorial, declared, "Arrest is warning against rush to judgment." It meant the wide belief that one of the girl's parents may have killed her, but the same might be said about the early media coverage of the Karr arrest.

Investigators in Thailand told the Associated Press today that Karr has made several dubious statements to them, including claims that he picked JonBenet up from school the day she was killed and that he drugged her. Actually, she was on Christmas vacation at the time, and there was no evidence of drugs in her body during the autopsy.

Much of the media has downplayed assertions by Karr's ex-wife that he was with her in Alabama at the time of the murder.

Boston University journalism professor Fred Bayles, a longtime national writer for The Associated Press and USA Today -- among other subjects, he covered the O.J. Simpson murder probe -- told E&P today: "The latest chapter in the JonBenet case offers a journalistic cautionary for both the past and the future.

In fairness, as I noted earlier, some media have already begun to question Karr's confession. That's fine. Trouble is, they'll be milking this one for a long time -- and, instead of closing the books on JonBenet's murder, this arrest may have merely opened another lurid media chapter.

UPPERDATE: Media coverage covers media coverage!

The View from over there

Way down deep in the comments section here, a debate on the meaning of anti-Semitism has erupted, and has, so far, remained totally civil. (Amazing. I plan to keep it that way.) The only reason I bring it to the fore is because of this column by my friend Danny Schechter the Media Dissector. His stuff always provokes. This time, he contends that the reason Americans are out of step with the rest of the world on the Middle East is because the media misleads them into it.

(S)urveys have shown over the years that ordinary members of the Jewish community are far more politically progressive about the need for peace than those who claim to be their “leaders,” self-righteous elite who sit on top of vast fundraising machines. They have well-paid jobs specializing in spreading fear and alarm about anti-Semitism as a tool for frequent solicitations and psychological conditioning. The memory of the Holocaust is still manipulated for political purposes.

There is a well-financed Israeli lobby that funds politicians and dominates the op-ed pages. What else explains the dramatic difference in public opinion in this country and overseas? Why do polls show Americans and Israelis backing the war while the world calls for a cease fire?

<SNIP>

Somehow many in our media have turned the words Israel and Jews into synonyms, as if all Jews are hard-line Zionists who automatically back the policies and practices of the Israeli government, every Israeli government. Ironically, there is more debate among Jews in Israel on these issues than is reported, or somehow allowed in the United States where Jewish critics of Israel policies are often ignored or labeled “self-hating” Jews.

Many organizations, especially in Democratic Party circles (and even the blogosphere) would prefer to ignore the issue for fear of being divisive or attacked. Notice how many in the Congress rallied to Israel’s side before the facts were even in. Notice how few, even in the anti-war contingent, had the courage to speak out.

<SNIP>

It's not surprising that many Jews are unaware of what’s happening largely because of the information diet they are exposed to, every day and in all media--just like the rest of us. They are expected to recite the “official” mantra—not think for themselves.

I have been reading opinion pieces from both Ha'aretz and the Jerusalem Post, which is further to the right, almost daily, and I have to say that their tone and content are inconsistent with the media here. For example, there we see calls for the heads of the Olmert government, with frank admissions that Israel botched the war. Here, the MSM tiptoe through the issues (with the exception of the National Post, of course) while the ''ethnic'' press (obviously I can only read the English-language versions) is screechingly partisan.

It's an emotional, existential issue. I know. But we have reached the point in the West where it MUST be discussed, openly and rationally, free of cant, rancour and hatred.

Is that even possible?

UPDATE (AUG. 18/06 @ 17:38): Apparently not. Another thread is biting the dust, the comments closed. If you think this means that I will not be continuing to cover the coverage of the Middle East, think again.

Comings and goings

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED:

CBC-TV current affairs staffers should have something to celebrate this week when the appointment of Doug Grant, formerly exec producer of TVO's now defunct Studio 2, to head of Current Affairs is announced. Grant, who was unceremoniously dumped after 12 years when Studio 2 was canceled in June, is an ex-CBCer and is well-regarded for his news judgment and managerial skills. He will replace Julie Bristow, who went on to become head of Factual Entertainment.

Actually, there was a duel over Grant at CBC. Word is that both chief news and information programming poobah Tony Burman wanted him (after a couple of internal candidates turned down the job) as did newly-named documentary mogul Mark Starowicz who tried to get him to replace a couple of veteran documentary overseers who, um, exited this year. I hear Burman made the better offer.

Now watch for Grant's wife, Paula Todd, the ex-cohost of Studio 2, to try for a job at CBC. She'll have to get in behind a long line of other fantastic anchor-type females -- Heather Hiscox, Nancy Wilson, Carole MacNeil, Susan Ormiston, Wendy Mesley, Diana Swain, Dianne Buckner, Alison Smith, Jacqui Perrin, and on and on.

(An aside: A few years ago, when one of CBC's many anchorish females suddenly quit the broadcaster, I asked her why. "Because there are too many blue-eyed blondes in line ahead of me," she said.)

Speaking of which, former CBC Montreal type, and ex-cohost of Discovery's @disovery.ca Gillian Deacon has been tapped to front the network's new daytime lifestyle show. Still untitled, it sounds like a home and garden version of Oprah's O mag. Here's what the news release says:

The program will openly and often humorously scrutinize what the experts and laymen have to offer in the areas of health, decorating, child rearing, relationships and romance-to mention a few.

I know Gillian's work, and Gillian personally. (She lives in my 'hood.) She is bright and talented. But I wonder if this show is what CBC needs in the daytime. I would rather see something a little harder hitting, and more on the edge.

But then, I am going by the news release.

UPPITY DATE (Aug. 17 @ 2 p.m.): It's official. Doug Grant has been appointed, and insiders are feeling great that someone of his integrity is willing to take on the job in the much beleagured CBC.

Licence to kill

Last month, when CHUM axed local newscasts across the country -- killing nearly 300 jobs -- it went in default of its conditions of licence. At least that's what the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada (CEP) charges. (Boldface is mine.)

Chum Limited is in violation of its TV station licences and the CRTC should call an inquiry into the issue and require that the broadcaster fulfill its licence obligations and commitments, says Canada's largest media union.

The Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada has filed a complaint with the Canadian Radio/Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) in which it is asking the CRTC to declare CHUM Limited in violation of its TV station licenses as a result of recent program cancellations at various stations across the country.

"The dramatic reductions in local programming run counter to explicit commitments made by CHUM to the CRTC. The cuts also have the effect of reducing local content to such a level that at some locations, CHUM is no longer in compliance with its conditions of license," a CEP complaint filed with the CRTC states.

Stations most dramatically affected by the cuts, mainly in local news coverage, include A-Channel Ottawa; A-Channel Victoria; CityTV Calgary; CityTV Edmonton; CityTV Vancouver; and, CityTV Winnipeg. Local news coverage, the complaint adds, has also suffered at the A-Channel in Barrie, Ontario.

Recall that the news cuts came on the same day of the announcement that CHUM was being sold to Bell Globemedia for $1.4 billion. At the time, CHUM CEO Jay Switzer insisted -- and I still believe him -- that the job cuts had nothing to do with the sale, and that they had been in the works for 9 months.

Still, they were draconian and, in some cases, eviscerated local operations.

I haven't had a chance to study the licences of all the relevant stations but I have looked at this, the 2004 CRTC decision which awarded CHUM the Craig group of stations, which included some of the operations hard hit by the cuts. Boldface, again, is mine.

13. CHUM stated that it would increase the quality and extent of coverage of local news and other events for the newly acquired stations in Alberta and Manitoba. CHUM added that it would bring its "street-front/store-front" style of television to as wide an audience as possible by establishing storefront bureaus in Red Deer and Lethbridge, Alberta. CHUM submitted that these bureaus would help ensure that viewers in rural areas are reflected in the local programming broadcast on the Edmonton and Calgary stations.

14. CHUM anticipated that at least a half-hour per week of programming would come from each of the storefront bureaus. This programming would highlight and showcase the opinions and events in the more rural areas of Alberta, where a significant proportion of the audiences for the Edmonton and Calgary stations resides.

Seems like a slam dunk for the CEP, right?

But will the CRTC let CHUM and, by extension, Bell Globemedia get away with it it?

Of course.

H/t to Carla.

 

The hardest story to cover

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED:

Via Canadian Journalist:

Dunno how I missed this in yesterday's New York Times (sub. req'd), considering everything that has happened on this blog in recent weeks.

Wars in the modern media age often come complete with their own journalistic difficulties.

Although doctored and stage-managed photographs out of Lebanon garnered their share of headlines last week, they are just a part of a larger, underlying issue: the role of images in fairly portraying the conflict incited nearly five weeks ago by Hezbollah’s raid into Israel and its kidnapping of two soldiers.

Particularly vexing for many American news organizations is the struggle to determine how and in what proportion images of civilian dead and injured should be displayed in their coverage, when one side’s casualties greatly surpass the other.

The journalistic calculus is made tougher by the involvement of the Arab-Israeli conflict, a topic that bedevils news editors like no other, and an organization, Hezbollah, that is considered a terrorist group by the United States government.

<SNIP>

Editors and executives at newspapers, newsmagazines and the broadcast and cable networks say they do not impose a formula for fairness on coverage of this conflagration. “This is not a sporting event, where we’re toting up the scores of both sides,” said Jonathan Klein, president of CNN for the United States.

But, they concede, they are very conscious of keeping a rough balance over time, whether that is a 24-hour cable news cycle or a week’s worth of evening broadcasts and newspapers. And they pay special attention to images because of their potency.

“Photos are trickier than words, because their content is in large measure emotional, visceral, and because you can’t edit their content,” said Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times. “You can’t insert a ‘to be sure’ paragraph in a photo.”

<SNIP>

Jon Banner, executive producer of “World News With Charles Gibson” on ABC, said he could not think of a news event in recent memory more difficult to cover, given the complexity of the issues and powerful nature of the images. Usually ABC has run one segment from Lebanon and one from Israel as a way to tell both sides of the fighting.

That, to some, is a dereliction of journalistic duty. Some critics of Israel argue that because the death tolls and destruction are greater in Lebanon, a proportionality of sorts should inform the resulting reports; anything else betrays a pro-Israeli stance. But supporters of Israel say such an approach bestows a misguided moral equivalence. Israel is a democratic nation exercising its right to self-defense, they argue, while Hezbollah is a terrorist organization that uses the Lebanese people as human shields.

<SNIP>

Executives at news organizations, long steeled to complaints about their Middle East coverage from various sides, said they tried to avoid pandering to critics. “They don’t want you to be balanced in your coverage,” said Mr. Keller of The Times. “They want you to portray the morality of the war as they see it.”

I can agree with that.

UPPITY DATE: Further and further to those allegations of staged Qana photos, here's (YouTube) a very interesting German-language deconstruction of the propaganda that went into the making of some of them. Note the warning of potential inaccuracies.

UPPERDATE (Aug. 16 @ 5:40): Unlike the right-wing pajamahadeen, AP reporter Kathy Gannon worked to track down the infamous "Green Helmet'' that the flogosphere has been using to make themselves feel better about the slaughter of civilians at Qana.

After hours of digging in the blistering heat, Salam Daher emerged from the wreckage with the body of a 9-month-old baby, a blue pacifier still pinned to its nightshirt.

He held the infant up and, click, an Associated Press photographer snapped another picture of Daher, in his trademark green helmet, displaying a civilian victim of Israeli bombs for the world to see.

Daher, a member of the civil defense for 20 years, has been photographed with bodies of the dead in two wars now — first in 1996 and most recently with the baby on July 30 __ both times after Israeli attacks in the village of Qana six miles southeast of the city.

For that reason, some Web sites have labeled him the "Green Helmet," and accused him of being a member of the Hezbollah guerrilla group, and of showing off bodies as propaganda.

"But that isn't true," he told The Associated Press. He is not affiliated with any party, he said. "I am just a civil defense worker. I have done this job all my life."

<SNIP>

After hours of digging, Daher emerged with the youngest victim. In a parched voice, he shouted something in Arabic and held the child up for the photographer.

To many in the West, such photographs are surprising; but they are not unusual in the Middle East, where grief and drama are often intertwined, and that can include displaying of bodies.

Bloggers have accused rescue workers and volunteers of showing off victims for the media. The Lebanese make no apologies for wanting the world to see the civilian suffering in the Israeli onslaught aimed at uprooting Hezbollah.

Needless to say, the chairborne commandariat chose to discredit both Gannon and her dispatch.

Age old questions

Greg O'Brien, editor and publisher of CARTT (sub. req'd.), a Canadian media industry website, recently reflected on whether we, as a nation, can afford to fund our own television.

If you look at the numbers, the answer would be no. That's because, as O'Brien reports, it's impossible for Canada to compete with the big U.S. dollars that go into television. Consider the invetsment announced this past spring by A&E networks alone: $500 million U.S.

That's half a billion American dollars for shows to be carried on A&E, History Channel, Biography and a few other smaller channels.

Half a billion dollars. With the Canadian TV consultants in full swing now preparing for the TV Policy Review this fall, I thought I'd do a little comparison to what we spent here recently on Canadian programming, to what Mr. Raven has approved there.

According to the CRTC's 2006 Broadcast Policy Monitoring report, the eligible expenditures on Canadian programming among all conventional Canadian TV stations, the CBC and specialty and pay, totaled about C$1.54 billion in 2005.

But if you break it down by our TV broadcast regulation categories, it gets a little more interesting, or alarming or depressing, depending on your point of view. I figured the "A&E categories", if you will, sounded like category 2 (analysis and interpretation and long-form documentary), category 7 (drama and comedy) and category 11 (general entertainment and human interest).

In 2005 in those categories, the eligible expenditures for Canadian programming was a little over $680 million. That's for all of our channels across the country. All of our English and French and other local stations, the CBC and the private networks and the 141 pay and specialty services that filed statements with the Commission last year, combined.

This year A&E is spending – with today's exchange rates – a little over C$560 million. On seven.

How does the Canadian system compete with this? Should it?

It can't. But it must. How can we afford to allow Americans to tell our stories? We know they won't anyway.

But do we need Canadian versions of cooking, dating and decorating shows? Should we be putting resources into those? Or should we be focusing on those programs that are uniquely Canadian? Or maybe just pour the money into CBC-TV for high-risk dramas and arts programming?

I really don't know the answers. I don't think anybody does.

There may not be any.

One for the road

Looks like the Canadian version of The One: Making of a Music Star is off CBC-TV's fall schedule.

Both ABC and CBC had poor ratings for the show, and the U.S. network cancelled it after only two weeks.

However, the Canadian version of the reality show is "still under development," according to CBC spokesman Jeff Keay.

"I'm able to confirm that it is not in the fall schedule for 2006," he said.

The public broadcaster has bought rights to the show, which is a hit in several countries, and originally said the Canadian edition of the talent search would air in the fall of 2006 or early 2007.

At the time of the cancellation, CBC held out hope the Canadian version of the show would go ahead. However, on Tuesday Keay could not confirm whether it would ever appear.

"I'm not able to say what the long-term plan will be," he said.

Maybe CBC discovered there was less risk in writing off this disaster than in actually putting it on the air and eating all the production costs as well as whatever they paid out for the rights?

H/t to Carla.

Video not so verite

This may seem like deja vu to the more regular readers among you but I did want to write it up for the main event, the Star. Today's treeware column is basically a follow to my post of August 8, in which I show how Stephen Taylor used YouTube to eviscerate CBC-TV News' Christina Lawand over her coverage of the Conservative caucus meeting in Cornwall. I'll cut to the newer stuff, since the Lawand stuff is available via the links above:

Queen's University biochemistry student Stephen Taylor, who in 2004 ran for the Conservative nomination for Kingston and the Islands, deconstructed Lawand's report for the National on his political blog.

As he argued, the packaging of the piece took Harper's words out of context, made it seem as if he did not care for the Lebanese-Canadian perspective, and closely tied him to the pro-Israel constituency.

To be honest, once you see the raw footage of what Harper actually said in response to a question by a Star reporter, it is hard to refute Taylor.

And that's the key.

Because, instead of providing a written critique of Lawand's report, he eviscerated it using YouTube.com, the video hosting service founded last year by three former PayPal employees and which has gone from zero to maybe a billion in worth since.

Some 100 million viewings of clips occur daily on YouTube.

But in the days after Taylor employed it to attack CBC, one of his favourite targets, his seven-minute Lawand video was one of "the most linked-to" clips on YouTube.

As CBC producer and web guru Tod Maffin pointed out on the public broadcaster's official blog Inside the CBC, YouTube, and similar sites such as Google Video, are "effective means for getting the message out."

Which advertisers — as well as propagandists — have already discovered.

They can pose as ordinary citizens doing their own thing with their mobile phone cams, downloaded music, graphic text generators and some archival clips to make mini-movies and send them shooting to computers all over the world.

For example, last week, one video making waves on the triple-w was a spoof of former U.S. vice president Al Gore's well-received feature documentary on global warming, An Inconvenient Truth. It depicts a bloated Gore bloviating about temperature spikes and the like, while putting even penguins to sleep.

The parody was presented as having been made by a 29-year-old geek nicknamed "Toutsmith" in a Beverly Hills basement. But, when the Wall Street Journal tried to track him down, it discovered it actually originated from the computer of a slick Republican public relations firm called DCI, whose clients include oil behemoth Exxon.

"A DCI Group spokesman declines to say whether or not DCI made the anti-Gore penguin video, or to explain why Toutsmith appeared to be sending email from DCI's computers," reported the Journal.

As for Exxon, it denied any connection to the video.

As PR Watch reports:

What is certain is that "political operatives, public relations experts and ad agencies" are increasingly using video-sharing websites like YouTube to shape public opinion. Ogilvy & Mather "plans to post amateur-looking videos on Web sites to spare word-of-mouth buzz about Foster's beer," and AT&T has used YouTube to post videos against net neutrality.

You just can't get around these guys.

Pavement politics

On the one year anniversary (grammar! grammar!) first anniversary of the day that CBC management tossed 5,500 production workers out on the streets, Canadian Media Guild president Lise Lareau reflects on the good, the bad and the scary that's happened since.

(T)he truth is that the long-term health of the CBC depends, more than ever, on Canadians’ commitment to public broadcasting. That means an end to government neglect of the CBC. It means real steps to fix the broadcaster’s structural problems. Because the CBC cannot afford any more bad decisions in this climate of uncertainty.

In the end, it probably makes the most sense to mark this anniversary with hope: the experiences and experiments that frontline CBC employees and their bereft audiences made together last year should stand as a model for reinvigorating public broadcasting. That’s something no private-sector behemoth can replace.

Speaking of which, CBC bloggers, some of who started up during the lockout, have banded together to sign a manifesto. (H/t to Joe Clark.) Oiumet explains the reason for it here.

Here are the rules:

If you blog about the CBC, it's assumed that you are doing so out of love and perhaps frustration.

It's only natural. The CBC is a wonderful institution with a long, proud history, going through an interesting and difficult time. By blogging about the CBC your colleagues, senior management, and the public will all be enriched by your expert opinion. Your insight, experience, and will will only help the world at large better understand a corporation that at times appears stodgy, arrogant, and faceless.

For better or for worse, you are representing the CBC when you blog about it. Keep this in mind with every word.

   1. Use common sense and don't do anything stupid. Blog to make the CBC better, not to kill it. There are plenty of others who want to do that for us.

   2. Ad hominem attacks should be avoided but disagreeing is expected.

   3. Be brave. Be honest and tell it straight. Talk about new ideas and revive some old ones. Don't be afraid to challenge the “experts,” and certainly not the anonymous ones.

   4. Use audio, video and images fearlessly, but responsibly. Use judgment if asked to take it down.

   5. Acknowledge and link to your sources. If it is a rumour, say so. If your co-worker says something you'd like blog, ask them first. If it was another website, link to it. Do your research. Be fair. Get it right. And change it if it is wrong.

   6. Blog wherever and whenever you want, but don’t let it detract from your job.

   7. Eschew advertising. Plugging the CBC, yourself, and your work is cool. Banner ads are tacky.

   8. During the next strike or lockout, you may feel urged to ignore any or all of these guidelines. Do so at your own risk, knowing that your words can harm yourself, others, and the CBC itself.

True enough on the last one. Trouble is, sometimes it's CBC's own management who does the most harm, especially lately.

UPDATE: Tod Maffin weighs in on the lockout anniversary here.

... I’m ashamed of it. I’m ashamed that it got that far and that we put ourselves at risk of losing audience share — yes, I believe ratings do matter if we are to demonstrate we’re a vital part of the Canadian dialogue.
    
And frankly, I’m not sure what was achieved.
    
I know “management” believes it won (a senior manager whom I trust told me once over drinks that the deal signed was basically what management wanted all along and that their victory came from just wearing everyone down). The Guild believes it won; today, on its web site it posted a letter from the Guild president that says “the experiences and experiments that frontline CBC employees and their bereft audiences made together last year should stand as a model for reinvigorating public broadcasting.” Don’t get me wrong — as a contract employee, I benefited directly from the Guild’s efforts, and I was proud to back them. I’m still impressed as hell at their tenacity and efforts.
    
But frankly, I neither know nor care who technically “won.” We all lost.

And here are Ouimet's:

The obvious question is: has anything changed one year later?

I think some of senior management are genuinely reaching out and trying to make things better. Not all of them are evil. Some were pretty shaken up over the whole thing, and they've taken it upon themselves to repair the damage.

But these are small victories. As a corporation, as a whole, I don't think we've learned a goddamn thing.

And when it comes to the workerbees, any effort has been a matter of too little, too late. Many of them are still angry. Some of them won't be satisfied until Stursberg and Rabinovitch are gone. I can't blame them.

The day the lockout started, one year ago, I didn't understand what was going on, or what it meant, even though I was blogging about it. Over the months to come I would learn the hard way that a lockout is very different from a strike. A lockout is a brutal, cruel, demoralizing tactic to use on your employees. Your family. One that can tear a place apart.

Others understood this better than I did. That first day, a very senior manager stopped into my office, looking beat down and worn out. He told me wearily: "This place will never be the same."

At the time I thought he was a melodramatic old fool.

But as time goes on, and the more I see, and the more people I talk to, and the more I blog, I realize he might have been right.

Any CEO who uses this tactic as a way to deal with employees has got to go. And yet, CBC president Robert Rabinovitch is still in the job.

Crossed out promotion

Here's just one reason media concentration is bad news: TV critics who work for papers affilitiated with networks don't write the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Consider today's column by the Globe and Mail's Andrew Ryan, who is backfilling for John Doyle.

Headed "ABC Suffers Nightmare after Nightmare," it's an account of the dismal summer season suffered by the Mickey Mouse network which has launched, if my count is correct, five reality shows this summer, including the ill-fated The One: Making of a Music Star.

Ryan not only once again catalogs the grisly details of The One, which was simulcast by CBC-TV, but he also dumps all over ABC's equally ill-fated One Ocean View, Buy It Now, Master of Champions, and How to Get the Guy.

This summer has been one long bad dream for ABC. The Disney-owned network was riding high in recent years, but ABC has been knocked down a peg this off-season with a string of tasteless TV mistakes. Each week, it just keeps getting worse for ABC -- and the summer isn't over.

Tonight, for example, should have yielded the third episode of ABC's One Ocean View, a summer reality series about New Yorkers who spend each weekend sleeping with each other in a Fire Island beach house. How could it miss? ABC canned the show last week, citing wretchedly low ratings. Starting tonight, ABC replaces One Ocean View with rebroadcasts of Supernanny.

At first it appeared ABC's summer campaign had simply gotten off to a bumpy start. The network tried something a little different with the reality-dating series How to Get the Guy, in which two relationship experts coached a gaggle of single women trying to find their Mr. Rights -- in San Francisco, where they say it's raining men. It lasted two weeks.

Now here's the thing: Nowhere does Ryan mention CTV which is owned by Bell Globemedia which also owns the Globe. And yet, CTV bought One Ocean View and How to Get the Guy -- something else Ryan neglected to mention.

Don't forget, the Globe went ape over CBC's simulcast of The One, making it front-page news.

So ask yourself this: If they're willing to obfuscate the little things, how will they handle the big ones?