Title isn't misleading at all.

"It happens all the time" doesn't make it misleading, or invalid. In fact that makes it far worse.

It needs to be declared. It doesn't matter if they're reading from Amazon's packet or the Pentagons, a declaration is appropriate and even vital to help maintain a healthy democracy.

What's odd is that if a YouTuber did this the FCC's regulations[0] require they disclose it, but not local TV stations evidently?

[0] https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/ftc...

I think you don't understand the difference between a press release and an advertisement.

This is a press release, the FTC link is about endorsements (which are advertising).

YouTubers would not be required to disclose this.

It is an advertisement distributed in the form of a press release (or more accurately a media packet with included script and video content).

Using the term "press release" like it is some kind of legal shield is non sequitur. It doesn't matter if the ad is a billboard, graphic, sidewalk spinner, or press release it is still an advert designed to promote Amazon, and an undisclosed one at that.

If a YouTuber wasn't required to declare it, that would be wrong too.

Can a company issue a press release talking about their products or business without it being an ad by your standard?

Like what would a hypothetical press release for the release of the Xbox 360 that isn’t an ad look like?

> Can a company issue a press release talking about their products or business without it being an ad by your standard?

I think you've lost sight of what we're discussing.

We're not discussing the morality of press releases, what we're discussing is a THIRD PARTY media organization reading from a script and re-showing video footage sent to them from a company without declaring that they're doing so. It is the repetition without source-context that is the sin, not the original company's media publications.

So are Microsoft's press releases about the XBox 360 ads? Yes. Is that wrong? Absolutely not. The "wrong" is a different media company taking that content and repeating it verbatim without declaration or contextualization (e.g. quotation marks).

If money (or other benefits) changed hands between the company benefiting and the media company reporting, that only compounds the immorality of it.

Has the title been updated? Nothing about “Local TV stations pushed the same Amazon-scripted segment” seems at all misleading to me. Amazon has confirmed that they scripted the segment and produced the content. And there’s clear video evidence that 11 news stations aired the Amazon-produced content verbatim.

Pushed implies someone with power over the network made it happen to benefit Amazon.

Change it to "used" or something like that and it would be reasonably accurate, if completely lacking in context.

Business Wire isn’t a news wire service, though. Examples of those would be the Associated Press and Reuters. It’s a wire service for the distribution of corporate press releases, which by definition are going to be biased.

That’s not to say there isn’t a place in the news world for services like Business Wire - corporate press releases can be valuable sources of information. Just that any reporter who would take something off Business Wire and run it verbatim as a news item is not very good at their job.

Company press releases are used as news stories all the time.

Look what happens when google/Apple/Microsoft announces a new product.

You may not consider press releases news but they are. Not all news needs to be investigative in nature.

>> News package elements without narration for local anchor voiceover.