Live Coverage Takes On a Life of Its Own

It was the best of live, it was the worst of live. . . .

Howard Rosenberg’s appraisal of how television handled the O.J. Simpson case described some of the inanities that marred coverage, especially on June 17 (“The Art of TV News Speculation, or How to Fill Air Time,” Part A, June 19). However, in pointing the finger at reporters and anchors, Rosenberg looked only at the symptoms and neglected the fundamental causes of the day’s weird melange of the remarkable and the terrible.

The remarkable--the freeway procession (hardly a chase), culminating with Simpson’s arrest at his home in Brentwood; the terrible--the endless, pointless and newsless daylong surveillance of Nicole Brown Simpson’s condo, O.J. Simpson’s estate and the LAPD’s Parker Center.

Inherent in both phenomena are the technology that makes possible continuous, wall-to-wall live coverage and the news management that makes decisions about its use. Portable cameras and microwave and satellite transmission have transformed how the subjects of news act, news managers allocate resources, reporters gather material and viewers process the news.

That day’s events demonstrated once again that when it comes to the television camera--if you point it, they will perform. Amid all the speculation--instantly by reporters and anchors, later by critics such as Rosenberg--no one has posited that the overpass wavers and sign-holders (if not Simpson’s slow-motion flight itself) were influenced by the live coverage. There’s even a term for such behavior: iatrogenic news, news caused by the availability of coverage.

All-out live coverage has also altered the way news managers allocate resources, often to the detriment of news content. Keeping crews on the scene at three locations throughout the day--the two residences and Parker Center--tied down personnel that could have been working on other aspects of the case.

What wasn’t covered? We didn’t hear much about the crime itself or see in-depth interviews with forensic experts or former homicide detectives. We learned little of substance about the victims. I’m sure anyone can think of many angles left unexplored while live coverage of non-news occupied the attention of the newsrooms.

The result of management’s misallocation of resources is that reporters and anchors must somehow tap-dance to fill the empty hours and minutes. Under terrible pressure, without scripts, attending to chattering directions in one ear while monitoring their own and their teammates’ performances with the other, all the while on the air, it’s a wonder they do as well as they do.

It’s true that they frequently do look ridiculous and make inane and even misleading statements, as Rosenberg so cleverly details. However, when anchors have the opportunity to take a more measured approach and resources are allocated to finding knowledgeable individuals for commentary, the results can be excellent. Rosenberg correctly cites the work of Manuel Medrano on KNBC-TV Channel 4. Another example was the extended special on KCAL-TV Channel 9, hosted by Tawny Little and Steve Edwards. Edwards has distinguished himself in recent years as host of a radio sports talk show and he, Tawny Little and their guests provided thoughtful and articulate observations of events and their coverage.

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Finally, the large crowds that gathered at the various locations suggest that extended live coverage is changing the way viewers respond. When questioned, people say things like, “I wanted to be a part of this.” Whether it’s the Gulf War, the coup in Russia, the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings--and now the afternoon when O.J. Simpson vanished and reappeared--the public internalizes media events as part of their personal and social experience. This process is quite different, in both intensity and orientation, from the more detached viewing that characterizes audience response to most news and entertainment programming.

I think some of the lessons that might be learned from this are these:

* The technical staffs in Los Angeles’ newsrooms perform flawlessly. The reporters and anchors do as well as they can under the circumstances. It’s the management people who need to improve.

* Television cannot tolerate a vacuum. Live coverage when nothing is happening encourages poverty of substance and mindless speculation.

* Knee-jerk criticism of the police by the press needs to be replaced by self-criticism and reform. There should be as much concern about possible preferential treatment toward O.J. Simpson by the media as by police. Since TV news managers were unwilling to commit the resources to substantive journalism, what was left was the endless reiteration of O.J. Simpson’s status as a hero--and verbal tap-dancing.

* When they are good, they are very, very good. . . .