Tuesday, June 17, 2008

NO DISTRACTIONS 2

Well Aretha Welsh of Trinidad Express TV (or is it Rowan Gould as your editor would like us to believe?) we can see that you took to heart our suggestion that the striped shirt you wore last week for the business tv segment just was not cutting it. Well sort of.
This week we see you are wearing the same striped top with the suspenders under the arms, but thankfully someone decided to give you a close up shot so we are not seeing any distracting, um, assets.
http://www.trinidadexpress.com/

Much better. But.
The three stories you decided to do this week were still very long, at 3:48, including the headlines.
And are you writing for TV or print? Your first story began this way: "Governments must protect consumers from merchants who are price fixing if they want to help them deal with the rising cost of living said David Thompson, Prime Minister of Barbados. Speaking at the Caribbean Investment Forum at the Hyatt in Port of Spain last week,...".
And for your second story you also said "The incomes of citizens in Trinidad and Tobago need to increase if they are to continue enjoying a decent standard of living despite high food and transportation costs says senior economist Ronald Ramkissoon."

So the point is to just read the script as is from the newspaper story?
But if you are doing tv, then the script has to be adjusted for your tv audience.
For example, "Senior economist Ronald Ramkissoon says the incomes of citizens of this country need to increase if they are to continue enjoying a decent standard of living despite high food and transportation costs."
That's much easier on the ear than the newspaper version. We are not asking you to change the content, but writing for a newspaper is not the same as writing for tv or radio.

And if that piece with David Thompson was last week, why is it your top headline this week? We know the Business Express comes out weekly, but once again, tv news is supposed to be timely, so the first thing the viewer thinks is, "Why are they using that stale story?".
So back to the drawing board.