The toy department?

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I read kind of a surprising story in today's Burlington Free Press. It's a note from the publisher, Jim Fogler, and the headline reads “Free Press partners with UVM”.

 Here's what he says:

 We are proud to announce a partnership between the University of Vermont’s CatamounTV and FreePressMedia. This partnership gives Free Press readers real access to UVM sports like never before through sports action video of UVM hockey and other teams. We’ll have you covered with CatamounTV bringing you the best video highlights on BurlingtonFreePress.com. Or, if you’re looking for a segment of a previous game or the winning goal, those video clips will be right at your fingertips. It’s as simple as going to our website BurlingtonFreePress.com under the Sports tab and clicking UVM Sports. Check it out. You won’t be disappointed.

 Now I know that the sports section has traditionally been called the Toy Department, and not quite taken as seriously as “real” journalism, but I can't help but be a little skeptical about this. 

Doesn't this “partnership” sound like the dominant local newspaper signing up to be part of the public relations department of an institution it covers?

We've just seen earlier this month that The State, a newspaper in South Carolina, had muzzled one of their sports writers because the football coach at South Carolina State didn't like what he was writing about him.

Even though sports reporting isn't necessarily taken that seriously, corruption in the NCAA, big-time sports coverups of life-threatening brain injuries, and other issues have demonstrated that news consumers need unbiased and honest reporting on sports issues. Is this really going to be possible when the local paper is doing PR for the team?

 

6 thoughts on “The toy department?”

  1. I agree. It places the newspaper in the PR realm of UVM — too many hats for one paper. MSM already has a hard time reporting the truth faithfully.

    Difficult to believe a paper that takes seriously its position as 5th estate could not see the potential journalistic conflict involved here.   Or that Burlington Free Press could allow themselves to be a mere usefull tool & wondering if it’s legal. I sure hope not & do hope it will be axed.  

  2. Sports, particularly football, in South Carolina is big business.

    The reporter was actually a columnist and I imagine wrote some unflattering things regarding Coach Spurrier and his team to the point he would not talk to any reporter when this man was present. Pretty eye-opening stuff. And yes, unsavory.

    http://jimromenesko.com/2013/0…

    I think the BFP streaming highlight videos, well, I just don’t see that leading to all the things you think might happen. The paper is providing a link to see videos, that presumably, UVM produces. I guess if the highlights are streamed on Youtube,  they would be part of the PR team, too.  I am a bit underwhelmed at this being characterized as a “partnership.”  

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