It happened again, and again

There’s never a good time to write a story like this. We know there has been a school shooting in Texas, apparently between Houston and Galveston, and at least eight people have been killed. It’s a tragedy. We can blame security, gun laws, the National Rifle Association, and so on.

That’s not my point right now. We will be learning details in the next few hours and days.
A short time ago, I happened to be up and reading, with the TV on, so I heard what happened.
Of course, I hope I’m in the minority. It’s a Friday in mid-May. Most people were probably at work and school, and concentrating on what they were doing.

Then they found out. It was kind of like me being at a teaching seminar on a different Friday, Dec. 14, 2012, when I learned about the massacre in a first-grade classroom at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut.
What do people do for information these days? They usually go to the internet.
Let’s see what people found on a local news website in the Philadelphia area.

As usual, WTXF-Fox 29 did nothing but take a story from their sister-station. Notice how KRIV-Channel 26 wrote their headline for their own audience. Imagine what people here thought. There’s also a Santa Fe Community College in Gainesville, Fla.
Heck, imagine what people in Santa Fe, N.M., thought, for that matter!
I‘ve written about the laziness urged upon the Fox TV Stations Group web departments. I’ve even mentioned time and time again how their website doesn’t bother to list their TV stations! Click on  1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 for some, but probably not all examples, if you have any doubt.
But nothing seems to get through to these people to become a valuable information source.
If the stations don’t respond to viewer complaints, maybe the Federal Communications Commission will. Click here for its Consumer Complaint Center. (The FCC admits its “authority to respond to these complaints is narrow in scope.”)
For the record, 6ABC had an original story. NBC 10 and CBS3 both had stories from their networks. All three of their stories had the word Texas in their headlines to avoid reader misunderstandings. People at those stations did more than simply click a button to accept a shared story. So apparently three stations’ websites care about avoiding reader misunderstandings and one does not.
Pitiful.
But don’t expect anything different from Fox 29. I don’t think they’re going to change. These are my reasons.
Just three days ago, I posted the exact situation with taking a story and using the same, confusing headline online.

Sounds important! Is #AlisoViejo local to the #Philadelphia area? #FakeNews pic.twitter.com/tgh4IGWPzb

— Lenny Cohen (@feedbaylenny) May 15, 2018

Obviously the message didn’t sink in. They have no shame.
By the way, to make matters worse, they miscategorized it in their “Local News” section!
Let’s go to today. The story is exactly the same sidebar the Texas audience is reading. But of course for them, it’s local news that’s much more likely to involve someone they know in some way. They are expected to feel differently, so the story and placement should reflect that.

Do you see the section title, Local News? Very misleading. No students in our area are able to talk about the subject. They weren’t there!
By the way, was the man crossing Roosevelt Boulevard or the car?
And for those of you who feel any sympathy for the folks at 4th and Market — don’t.
You saw me discuss this stuff recently. I also mentioned this type of stuff when I worked there. I was told on several occasions to stop writing because another station was going to be taking care of it, even though I was faster and usually done or close to it. That was usually a national story with information from the Associated Press forced on the Washington DC station, WTTG-Channel 5, simply due to its location.
And I posted this example back in January.

HAVE YOU SEEN THIS GUY? I did, a whole lot. In fact, more than a dozen *identical* articles on him that needed major improvement! Let's go behind the scenes… https://t.co/o0pQgnw9Yo pic.twitter.com/UFXIezfT1h

— Lenny Cohen (@feedbaylenny) January 27, 2018

I know what I’m talking about.
If you hadn’t, then now you know where you can go for news on the internet. And you also know where to avoid, at least in the Philadelphia area.

Beyond excited to welcome @stevewchung as our Chief Digital Officer! Congrats, Steve! 🙌 https://t.co/RuR7FARM9j

— Emily Stone (@emilyfoxtv) April 12, 2018

Maybe Steve Chung will shake up the irresponsibility in Philadelphia and protect the folks in DC from their extra responsibilities, just because of where they are.
It’s now almost 2pm. I’ve dotted my Is and crossed my Ts. Yet WTXF-Fox 29’s main headline is the same (but the picture is different) and the sidebar is STILL in the Local News section. Does any manager at the station actually look at the website? Isn’t that part of managing? Looks like we’ll leave who does what and who doesn’t to Steve Chung and then perhaps lawyers.
They can’t be equal, much less better, as long as this is true.

Oh, my favorite line of today’s story? The one on the bottom of this Fox 29 article. Look for it in the red box.

Condolences to everyone involved in Texas.
The readers here deserve better.

To the students and faculty of Santa Fe High School, we are with you. #MarchForOurLives pic.twitter.com/3DYXOhmwsP

— March For Our Lives (@AMarch4OurLives) May 18, 2018

Not a single one of you should know me. Or any of my friends. But you do because we come from one of the hot school shootings of the month. Now we have another. Another community attacked that will only be further attacked by the NRA. Welcome to America, folks. This happens here.

— Cam Kasky (@cameron_kasky) May 18, 2018

Please, if you like what you read here, subscribe to CohenConnect.com with either your email address or WordPress account, and get a notice whenever I publish.