TheLebrons.com

“There is a subtle, but significant shift, in the networks’ news agenda as they make the transition from pure television broadcasters to multi-platform providers of video news,” writes the Tyndall Report, which spends every waking hour analyzing broadcast news programming. “The shift is dictated not by journalistic judgment but by the demands of the media. It presages a future of diminishing coverage of a pair of favorite feature beats.”

Um, where is this going? We had no idea either, until the second graph, which says this: News programs’ sports stories are not appearing online.

Huh-What-Huh?

We know, it’s terrifying stuff, but Tyndall has some evidence to back it up: Even though CBS had a reporter covering the a House committee’s hearings on “the shortfall of disability coverage for former NFL athletes” and ABC had a reporter covering the murder-suicide of WWE wrestler Chris Benoit, his wife, and their 7-year-old son … none of that coverage made it to the web.

It’s not what you assumed — that is, the news programs aren’t just being lazy. Their lawyers, however, are on high alert. Because copyright doesn’t allow the transfer of intellectual property from one medium to another (who knew?!), the news programs fear any use of, say, showing an online clip of Benoit in the ring wearing some Lyrca outfit that came from TV.

Which means, says Tyndall, that entertainment coverage is also suffering the same fate, since networks can’t (or don’t have the resources to) clear copyrights with the footage they show in their TV broadcast.

All of which we call bullshit on: Fair use is fair use.

And also: The day crappy entertainment coverage stops infecting our web browser will be the day we believe this scenario plausible.