Charter Cable: Media Malpractice

Charter News, 'Isn't'

(Still working on a lengthy 'aircraft/F-35 maneuverability' post, but this HAS to go up tonight.)

Charter Cable is my cable provider. NO complaints about the internet speed or connectivity, not even though I suspect their move to 'all digital' last week wreaked havoc with signals (off and on) as thousands of users finally added even more thousands of cable boxes and cards to the network in just a few days. It now seems to have stabilized, so 'no problem'.

But Charter Cable's 'homepage' has a section with rotating 'news' headline pictures and captions. All too often the caption and photo make it appear that some tragedy has happened in the US or even just the 'Modern' world, and you click on the link talking about a school being bombed with what appears to be a typical American elementary school (they've done school buses too if I recall correctly) and the story is about a school in some war zone in a 'turd world' country. The Chief and I just chalked it up to lazy web content developers and editors.

Today, they went beyond 'lazy' and deep into 'media malpractice' . I got home and booted up the laptop to check the web and this is what greeted me (left headline):



Charter Home Page 9 April 2013 ~1920 Hrs CST

 



WTFO? "Veteran Kills 13"?

I clicked on the link, and this is what popped up:

Charter 'Article' 9 April 2013 ~1920 Hrs CST

Oh. A Serbian 'vet' in Serbia loses it and goes on a rampage. Tragic in it's own right. Why the 'trick' headline?

You would have to be either incompetent or agenda-driven to put this one up.  Either way it doesn't 'inform' but misleads and distorts several issues in one nice swoop.

Besmirching veteran's mental health? Check!

'Tragedy' as background for upcoming 2nd Amendment legislation? Check!

The Chief likes to try and calm me down when some unthinking slug nearly kills us because they're doing something clueless in traffic. She says something like "I'm sure they didn't see us". She forgets what makes me the MOST angry is the fact that they probably were clueless as to what was going on around them. If I assume Charter was just being 'brain dead' in this, it just p*sses me off more. tell me again: What business are they in? Do they have any standards?
 
Either way, Charter's website is Media Malpractice writ large in a Low Information Consumer world.

Are There ANY Adults At Charter Cable?