Today Show

[Linda_Merims@ne.3com.com]

Betty Edgar said:

> As I watched NBC's Today Show I could hardly believe
> my eyes and ears. What a disappointment!  And what a
> waste of an opportunity to give the world a glimpse
> of our sport.  I can only imagine Valerie's disappointment
> after her efforts, time and dollars to bring 2 horses to
> the center of NYC.
>
> Valerie Kanavy should have had a proper interview in
> the studio as did Serena Williams, both world champions
> in their sports.   She should have had opportunity to talk
> about endurance riding and what it means to her and so
> many of us.  Film clips of her winning with Jedi or Cash
> could have been aired. Then if NBC wanted to clown around
> with Barry Matson and Katie Couric for a couple of minutes,
> OK.  Instead, we get inane jokes about horse manure
> and wasted minutes of Matson showing off his stupidity.
> Valerie had only the briefest of coverage.
>
> So, let's all tell NBC how we feel about this--OK?
What was not immediately obvious was that the segment on
endurance riding on the Today Show on Monday was actually not
a segment on endurance riding at all--it was an "advertorial" for
the National Geographic Explorer series.

An "advertorial" is an advertisement dressed up to look like a
news story.

National Geographic Explorer with Boyd Matson has been airing
on the Turner Broadcast System (TBS) for many years.  Well,
TBS and NBC have merged.  National Geographic Explorer
will now be airing on the CNBC cable network.  The first CNBC
airing of Explorer was to be that Monday night.  The Today show
was being used to promo Explorer's debut.

Thus the presence of Boyd Matson at center stage and not Valerie
Kanavy.

People think all these mergers don't have an effect on the quality
of the news that is presented to them.  But it does.   Boy, it does.

One is left wondering what actually happened.  Did they want to
promo Explorer, and it was somebody at the Explorer series who
remembered the Tevis endurance show they did several years ago
and thought that horses in New York would be a good promo?
(In which case we should probably thank Explorer for thinking of
endurance at all.)

Or was Valerie Kanavy scheduled because of her world championship,
and then some NBC dweeb figured out they could turn it into
a commercial for CNBC?  Exit Valerie, enter Boyd.

Personally, I think Valerie and the horses did marvelously under very
difficult circumstances.  I think Boyd Matson did a good job of getting in
the essential facts of the sport (100 miles, one day, vet checks prevent
people from abusing their horses), and they did give Valerie a
fair amount of air time to "tell us about these horses."  (I noticed
she didn't mention that they were Arabs!)   I thought Katie Couric
was brave to get on a horse that 15 minutes before had been
skitting around.  I was furious at the poop comments, but I think
it teaches us what we have to deal with in the general public that
sees no difference whatsoever between a pile of dog poop and
a pile of horse poop.  For them, our horses are nothing *but* that
pile of icky poop, and we have to get them to see our beautiful
animals as something more.  Great athletes that even Katie Couric
can ride is a good start!

Linda B. Merims
lbm@ici.net
Linda_Merims@ne.3com.com
Massachusetts, USA









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