Confessions of a VNR user

The Post-Standard of Syracuse profiles a local TV station that used a Medicare video news release in February.

How did it happen? The general manager says since they got it from the CNN Newsource news feed, they thought it was legitimate news. CNN’s Newsource transmits not only news but news releases to subscribers around the country. He says the Medicare VNR was not clearly marked as such. The GM also said his station added its own narration to the Medicare-provided video.

But John Stauber of the Center for Media and Democracy in Madison, a nonprofit media watchdog group, says taking someone else’s reporting and pretending it’s your own is plagiarism at the very least.

Comments are closed.