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Congratulations are due to Jonathan Swift. His journey to the
Country of Lilliput is now complete. The feared Lilliputians are
finally in the game. Those little people he faced are about to take
over the world of entertainment, news and sports. Here is why. The
National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences – the vaunted
organization that now gives out Emmy’s for practically everything —
is about to start giving awards for what hundreds of thousands of
people see on screens that are almost too tiny to believe, their
cell phones among other miniature devices. According to an Academy
news release, there will be an award for “original programming
created specifically for non-traditional viewing platforms,
including computers, mobile phones, PDA’s and similar devices.”
The announcement is one of the silliest I have ever read. If I did
not know better, I would believe it is a hoax. Sadly, it appears to
be an honest attempt at inclusiveness for all things creative.
Gulliver was much better off in Lilliput than we are in the new
world tiny pictures barely visible on any of the aforementioned
devices. At least Gulliver was able to escape and go onto other
adventures. There is no escape for us.
I am sure the Television Academy will look for originality, quality
as in how something looks, the camerawork, writing, even directing,
and certainly producing. This latest Emmy will have its debut at the
Sports Emmy Awards in 2006, followed by awards for all the other
categories, also in 2006.
The world in minuscule is on us and there is no place to hide, or
better yet, for me to hide. We are all aware of how the I-pod, now
with picture capability, and cell phone cameras rule the younger
generation. The small cell phone screen and the screen on the
slightly larger Blackberry (and other similar devices) gets filled
with everything from pictures of ones baby and ones dog, the latest
ball scores, music videos, e-mail, text messages and soon, TV shows
that only aired the night before. Maybe it is generational. Maybe it
has something to do with my eyesight. Everywhere I turn, the once
nearly empty space on our cell phones will have pictures and text
where none previously existed. Now, in what I can only call
pandering, the Television Academy will give out awards for material
– because that is all I can honestly call it – presented on the
smallest of screens possible, where the information is barely
readable.
Seeing recent commercials for cell phones and others of these
devices with tiny screens, solidified for me how advertising is
doing its best to stretch the truth, especially when the ad shows up
on a 25-inch screen, pretty much the standard these days. The cell
phone on screen is usually in close up. The screen on the device is
as big as a person’s head. The image on the screen is perfect, the
color is sharp, the definition, has depth and of course, it is in
optimum light. Maybe this is what the Television Academy saw and
thought, cool, we should give this work an award. Maybe, but I hope
not.
I do not know how many times I look at my screen in bright sunlight,
let alone in normal daylight, at dawn or dusk, or inside a normally
lighted room, that in spite of the often-bright background, I can
barely read what is in front of me. Translate any of those
advertisements into truth and they fail by a wide margin. Is the
academy watching the ads and judging what it sees in them as their
criteria for the new awards? If so, it too fails in its feeble
attempt at pandering to this new audience for the sake of
recognition.
I have no objection to any entrepreneur filling those screens with
anything they think will make them money. People can watch all they
want, when they want, however they want. They can get sports scores,
movie times, the weather, pornography, and addresses for
restaurants, train and bus schedules. But to award people for
producing material that has no quality now, and never will, causes
me to shudder.
For many years, I have been a judge for the news Emmy Awards. I
usually spend two days watching long form programs, documentaries
and TV programs devoted to explaining events and issues the affect
our lives. In other words, I look at some of these programs and vote
on what I think of them. Most of what I see is not very good. Some
program's work, but many do not. Now and then, something startling
appears and it gets my vote. Later when I look to see who won,
sometimes I picked the winner and sometimes not. It is, after all,
subjectivity based on experience and each judge is different.
We watch the videotapes on television sets, as we should because
that is how the audience sees them. How does the academy propose we
watch material made for the cell phone or a Playstation or an X-Box,
or whatever? Surely, we should not view any entry on the handheld
devices where they originally appeared. We should view them on their
original platforms. It is only how we can judge their value.
However, I will not sit for eight hours on any given day and view
the world on a 2X2 screen. So here is my thought to the Academy. Do
not ask me to judge a news or documentary entry in this new
category. Do not ask me to judge something on its picture quality,
or its sound quality, or even its story telling on, a two plus
square inch screen. I refuse on the grounds of its idiocy.
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At NBC News for 35 years, Ron Steinman was bureau chief
in Saigon, Hong Kong and London, was a senior producer on Today and wrote
and produced for Sunday Today. At ABC News Productions, he produced
and wrote documentaries for A&E, TLC, Discovery, Lifetime and the
History Channel. He has a Peabody, a National Headliner award, a
National Press Club award, a International Documentary Festival Gold
Camera Award, two American Women in Radio & Television awards and
has been nominated for five Emmy's. He is a partner in
Douglas/Steinman Productions, whose latest documentary, "Luboml: My
Heart Remembers," aired on PBS' WLIW/21 and the History Channel in
Israel, April 29, 2003. He is the author of, "The Soldiers 'Story",
"Women in Vietnam," and most recently, "Inside Television's First
War: A Saigon Journal," University of Missouri Press, 2002. |
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