| ||||||||||||
Have you had your media distraction today -- if you dare?
Fox News Channel has made a meal of its recent sparring with the White House. Fox commentators and others have said the White House should be talking about more important things. According to reports, there is even a Fox News promo about this issue.
Maybe the White House is to blame; maybe Fox News as well. All of it is a waste of our time.
ABC says it is going to air a new reality show called "Obese," taking NBC's "The Biggest Loser" to another level by focusing each episode on a different person's year-long weight-loss journey. NBC is already doing a spin-off of "Loser" with one of the show's trainers, Jillian Michaels.
All this seems like more distractions. Aren't there other kinds of TV shows to consider -- like another new crime procedure or medical drama? (I'm short in this area. I'll check my DVR.)
We are driven to media distraction -- most times because content creators think we are bored. Thus the rise of texting while driving.
This is a serious concern, so much so that Verizon Wireless has started an advertising campaign telling mobile users to stop the practice, to keep their thumbs on the steering wheel, or their XM Satellite Radio, or that latte.
New digital outdoor billboards seem to be adding to the distraction chain, no doubt interrupting those who are texting in moving vehicles at 70 mph. The analog job of driving? Oh, that's way down the list now.
Multitasking seems to be the rage -- or the problem. Turns out multitasking people seem to perform all their chores poorly.
If everyone regularly multitasks media and/or daily errands poorly, it surely doesn't make sense to distract them with irrelevant content.
Think before you create content. One's life and slowly scrambling, media-oriented mind may depend on it.




I think you've got your cause and effect confused. Our insatiable appetite for distraction notwithstanding, content doesn't, and can't controld anybody, because in an on-demand world, we "choose" our distractions. Case in point, online advertising CTRs of less than .1% and the growing preference for time-shifted TV viewing.
The fact that the vast majority of what's out there is mindless drivel has nothing to do with our insatiable appetite for distraction and/or media's addictive forces, and to suggest that somehow we're being force fed anything is like blaming McDonald's for a weight problem.
Furthermore, a quick look at current prime time TV ratings would suggest that not everybody is so easily seduced by mere distraction.