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In the linked article a member of NPR discussed how the flavor of their sound is modified based on NPR's perception of their consumers' behaviors.
by jsprogrammer 10y ago
In the linked article a member of NPR discussed how the flavor of their sound is modified based on NPR's perception of their consumers' behaviors.
- kasey_junk 10y agoThat's not pandering though. Even content targeting isn't pandering. Pandering requires doing something distasteful.
- vertex-four 10y agoDistasteful to who, precisely? Even the fact that NPR exists is distasteful to many. On top of that, any choice it makes as to what to broadcast prevents something else, possibly even equally worthwhile, from broadcasting.
- kasey_junk 10y agoDistasteful was probably not the right word. Pandering means that you are giving something to someone, that they want but it is something that is immoral or improper to give and the judge of that morality or properness is the society the pandering is happening in. In this case the USA. Choosing to compress your audio, or to play classical music instead of jazz is not immoral, at least not as judged by reasonable Americans, so it isn't pandering. If what you are really getting at, is the idea of the US federal government providing tax revenue to NPR is distasteful to many, that may be true, but it doesn't mean that NPR is pandering to anyone. Similarly, FOX News may or may not be pandering to someone, but their acceptance of federal tax breaks isn't evidence of it.
- jsprogrammer 10y agoThe person I was responding to supplied their own definition of pander: >By this I mean, consider the leaders of the organization have demographic data on who is most likely to pledge support during their quarterly pledge drives. By this definition, NPR has admitted to pandering (would only need to establish that NPR consumer === pledge supporter) in this article alone.
- dredmorbius 10y agoLook up the definition. A perverse appeal or suck-up. Trump or Fox News would both be examples of highly successful (and distasteful) pandering.
- LBXrRkxx 10y agohttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandering_(politics) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandering_(politics) "Perverse" to you and most HN commenters/readers, maybe. Trump and Fox News may "pander" to groups who you find distasteful, but they DON'T "pander" to many groups who you don't find distasteful. Trump was the FIRST PERSON to bring up many issues that had previously been censored by the media. He didn't change his views for the approval of others, he single-handedly SHAPED THE NARRATIVE. Many career politicians started talking differently after he came along. THAT'S pandering.