Dilemma

OK, so I produce a weekend morning show for a local TV station. We're a CBS affiliate so we get national pieces from CBS. One of my pieces for this morning has the wrong information. The reporter says Mitt Romney got third in South Carolina, which is just not true. Fred Thompson got third. Romney came in fourth.

So do I use last night's piece, that isn't necessarily dated and hasn't run yet, but is still from last night and not this morning?

 

Can you cut it, so the mistake is edited out?

 

I don't pretend to know TV but I wonder why you would think twice about running something you know to be incorrect.

 

WWJRD? (What would Janine Roth do?)

 

If I know it's wrong... But, it may make me look good, I say go with it!!!
Current and inaccurate is better than old and wrong?

 

Sometimes to my station, current and wrong is better. I went with the older piece. I'm glad it happened to me and not the weekday morning show producer, who wouldn't even have read the script because she doesn't think about things like that.

 

Why not just have your anchor do an on-camera after the piece saying that you'd like to correct one piece of info in the report, etc. etc.
Also, have you fired off an email to the Newspath folks to let them know?

 

I did send an e-mail to Newspath. I was shocked that they didn't correct it before the morning news shows started.

It's OK. The stuff they sent late last night worked. It didn't air before my show and still had the same information, though, the correct information.

The news director won't be happy that I didn't use the newest piece, but when I tell him I paid attention and the information was incorrect, he'll back off. I just needed confirmation that I was making the right decision, despite what management would say.

 

You don't need our confirmation.
You know what you are doing, and you know that.

 

Spup,

If it's me, I probably have the anchor retrack the morning network piece, fixing the mistake. That assumes you've got an editor with the time to edit the retrack, and on a weekend morning show that may not be the case.

Option two is I don't use a national package at all, and simply break down the information into a vo/sot and graphics. It sucks time-wise, since I'm guessing you're not exactly bursting with new content on a weekend morning.

Option three is the previous night's piece, but only if it's completely undated and doesn't feel old by the next morning.

Running the package with the error isn't an option, and if your news director doesn't get that he shouldn't be in the business.

I feel your pain - Newspath is a giant pain in the ass some days, and they've been using some second-rate reporters lately. They're getting really slow in putting the reporter pieces on the server, too. I've been doing a noon show the past few weeks, and the 11:30 updates keep rolling in at 11:55.

 

I used option two and three. With an hour-long show, I was able to use the package the first news block and the others used our new election graphics.

PCLoadletter is right, Newspath has been shit lately. Gwen Belton has really dropped the ball lately on her packages. And don't tell me you're going to have a 5:30et pkg when it doesn't come down until 5:20 central time.

He's also right that we hurt for new news on weekend mornings especially when it's cold as balls outside and we live in a low crime area anyway.