To lay out the mess....ZDFheute Live (news update, public TV)came up on 12 June 2026 and was moderated by Christina von Ungern-Sternberg. Rather than say she's a talking 'head'....no, she's also a editor....so she writes her own stuff.
So for this update....she says... „Ein brutaler Mordversuch auf offener Straße in Belfast. Jemand filmt, das Video geht viral. Ein rassistischer Mob macht daraufhin Jagd auf Migranten. Dazu aufgerufen hatten ein britischer Rechtsextremist und Tech-Milliardär Elon Musk.“
Translation? “A brutal murder attempt on the open street in Belfast. Someone films it, the video goes viral. A racist mob then hunts down migrants. A British right-wing extremist and tech."
Problem? In the art of 'framing' (this is when you insert non-facts to get a viewer to your way of thinking.....she suggests that Elon said.....'hunt on migrants'.
At the time, I went back to Grok/AI and asked.....did Elon ever say such? No....Grok says never.
So Elon has put his lawyers onto ZDF.
How this will play out? I suspect Elon wants three things.....ZDF will have to pay for Elon's lawyers....pay some guilt-money (I'm guessing a sum greater than 1-million Euro), and have some ZDF employee on the news admit they created fake-news.
ZDF lawyers? I would assume they are deep into this and shaking their heads. There's probably some poor English translation BS involved, and no one really supervising the news staff.
So...step one....try to just issue a written apology, and find that this will not be enough.
Step two....offer a 100,000 Euro and legal fees....and find that will not be enough.
Finally....near half-a-million Euro....the door will open, but admitting creation of fake news is a problem. They will eventually reach a point where someone is dragged out and forced to make a statement live on the air.
I'll add this....after this mess is squared away....there will be some management 'rule' established....if you are going to utter anything on Elon Musk, you need to clear the text 24 hours prior with network lawyers.
None of this is 'funny'....but it lays out the problems of framing the news, and why you have to pay attention to what you perceive as facts....when it might not be a fact.
No comments:
Post a Comment