Issue Area: PR Industry

The drive to maximize profits compels corporate news outlets to produce more and more news with fewer and fewer reporters. With less time to do each story, journalists are increasingly pressured to rely on the public relations industry to do much of their work for them: Reporters can rewrite press releases rather than do their own independent research, and TV stations can broadcast promotional videos that are designed to look like news footage. This symbiotic relationship between news outlets and the industries they cover, however, is a bad deal for the public.

Next in What's Wrong With the News: Pressure Groups

Extra Articles and Studies
Fear & Favor 2007: How power still shapes the news (March/April 2008) By Janine Jackson and Peter Hart

Is Undercover Over?: Disguise seen as deceit by timid journalists (March/April 2008) By Aaron Swartz

Destroying the Forests to Save Them: Media myths fuel Bush wildfire plan (November/December 2002) By Karen Charman

Less...
The Power of Conservative Spinning: How the right outguns the left in the PR wars (September/October 2006) By Karl Grossman

Applying the Knowledge: The Leadership Institute (September/October 2006) By Karl Grossman

Fear & Favor 2005 -- The Sixth Annual Report: Outside (and inside) influence on the news (March/April 2006) By Julie Hollar and Janine Jackson and Hilary Goldstein

Sidebar: Strictly Personal (March/April 2006) By Janine Jackson

Sidebar: Prepackaged News: Straight From the Source, No Journalism Required (March/April 2006) By Janine Jackson

Strings Attached: Telecom industry’s spin machine casts net over community broadband (September/October 2005) By Michelle Chen

Fear & Favor 2004 -- The Fifth Annual Report: How power shapes the news (March/April 2005) By Peter Hart and Julie Hollar

Fear & Favor 2000 -- The First Annual Report: How Power Shapes the News (May/June 2001) By Janine Jackson and Peter Hart

Fronting for Big Coal: Halting global warming would be racist, PR insists (September/October 2000) By Robert Weissman and Russell Mokhiber

Digital Divide Provides Opportunities for Corporate Spin:: How to Win Puff Coverage by Donating Computers (March/April 2000) By Jessica Brown

Global Smokescreen (Update August 1998) By Michael Dolny

Media Zapped: Journalists swallow food irradiation PR (March/April 1998) By Amy Poe

Corporate Enemies, Corporate Friends: Did Food Industry (May/June 1997) By Ken Silverstein

Is it Real...Or Is It Astroturf? PR Firm Finds "Grassroots" Support for Breast Implants (Update August 1996) By Laura Flanders

Beware: P.R. Implants in News Coverage (January/February 1996) By Laura Flanders

TV Lets Corporations Pull Green Wool Over Viewers' Eyes (July/August 1995) By Jay Letto

Henry Kissinger: The Walking, Talking Conflict of Interest (October/November 1989)

Radio Broadcasts
Dahr Jamail on the Iraq surge, Karl Grossman on nuclear power resurgence (2/1/08)

Heather Boushey on Census poverty report, Scott Horton on 'Coups 'R Us' (8/31/07)

Bob Dreyfuss on Iraqi politics, Ken Silverstein on 'Their Men in Washington' (7/13/07)

Action Alerts and Advisories
NPR Touts Pro-Nuke 'Environmentalists': Network's own nuclear links undisclosed (8/22/07)

Cutting Wal-Mart a Break: NY Times goes soft on retail giant (8/18/06)