I have been contacted by one of our regular readers with a very interesting story. I have reprinted the entire contents of his email as it has a very familiar ring to it; the subject being raised earlier in the year regarding the same players playing prominent roles in these previous stories.
Using today's electronic and technilogical tools, the ability to electronically erase logos is commonplace. The question of ethics is thereby the ruling factor.
But with the number of alliances between our local networks and overseas partners, the question of "who's first?" can be complicated and somewhat nebulous. In the case described below, the Nine Network can be absolved if they ran the story first and did not know of the ABC's purchase, thereby using the word "exclusive" correctly. But if they did know of the ABC's access to the story, then the use of "exclusive" is misleading and false.
The ABC should have taken precautions and run with the story as soon as they received it and then pointed to it during their viewing day, thereby "stamping" their "first in, best dressed" claim to the story.
The other networks did the right thing as they received the tape from the ABC and aired the ABC logo for their viewers to see. But, you cannot fault Nine as they did show the US ABC logo, as that is where they received the story, not from the local ABC.
An American freelance reporter (who did the Pol Pot story) sold the rights to the footage in the USA to ABC America and in Australia to the ABC. Nine gained the footage from their USA affilliate ABC America, Nine then put their logo on the footage as well as the ABC America logo and branded it as exclusive footage from the USA. The ABC aired the footage on their 7pm news and the 7.30 report, well and truly after it had first gone to air on Nine's Today show. Which brings the question: Was it worth the ABC (Australia) buying the rights to the Pol Pot footage in the first place? What Nine did is almost like, if Nine obtained Olympic footage from the NBC and broadcast it in Australia as 'exclusive'.
Where did this leave Seven, Ten and SBS?, when they aired the tape from the ABC (Australia) with the ABC logo on it?
I hope no one takes this to our esteemed High Court, as their pre-1900 rulings will play havoc with our modern day media, as witnessed by their recent State and Federal tax rulings.
