CNN offered an apology on Tuesday after an apparent technical glitch put a big black “X” over the face of Vice President Dick Cheney. The mishap only lasted a fraction of a second but leave it to the blogosphere to turn it into a major diatribe.
As with other forms of modern media, the Internet has become particularly astute at finding small rodent mounds and dramatically alters them until they are something akin to Kilimanjaro.
The Drudge Report is one of the culprits this time as they picked up this hard breaking news story, stating, “One top White House source expressed concern about what was aired.”
The furor may have mostly ended when CNN issued its apology, claiming a computer bug of some kind was behind the incident. They said they normally have such markings in there as a cue for graphics and it’s not to be seen. It’s just that this time it was.
Doing a little research on how this topic goes over in the blogosphere, I went into Google Search and typed in “Dick Cheney” and “X.” Over 8,600 entries popped up.
One blog, the Reid Report, defended CNN, saying, “They’re hunting CNN like a three-legged dear in a man-made clearing, and they think they’ve got the “liberal media” bastards in their sights!”
One commentor called Nick on the Brutally Honest blog said, “Glitch? By definition a temporary or random hardware malfunction. Like, audio with no video, video with no sound I am certain that glitches do not appear as a big black “X” that appears over someone’s face with a quote beneath it. Without question this was intentional. At very least it demonstrates that CNN is not in control of its own signal.”
It’s amazing how quickly a story like this can spread and be all over the blogosphere in a manner of hours and then continue for days. While some feel this is somewhat serious, what about other, bigger issues hitting the blogosphere? Many political blogs are rants but that goes in most blogs to an extent.
This is also a good example of viral marketing and how, if someone has something to generate buzz, it can move extraordinarily quickly. Heck, it doesn’t even have to be something of quality, the perception just has to be there.
John Stith is a staff writer for Murdok covering technology and business.
