Xbox burned down house -- three years ago

'Only you can help prevent stupid local news reports.'

amen....

FOX News rocks, watching it now, and waiting for Conan since I just finished gutting out a G3 mac to build into a fish tank, I know, I know, I'm about 5 years late on that.

Id second that

Since I know that it will be coming, I always like to comment on these stories and remind people that not all journalists are sensationalists like these guys are.

I know, personally, I go out of my way to avoid doing the same story on each newscast, just because some new angle pops up.

Please don't lump real journalists, like myself, in with these attention-whores. We are not all like that.

Oh, and another thing. Taking a 3-year-old news story and putting a "fresh spin" on it, isn't a slow news day. It's lazy journalism.

I mean, come on, if I can find fresh local stories every day in my town of 21,000, then surely the CBS affiliate in Boston should be able to come up with something.

I actually live in Hollywood, FL. I remember hearing about this on the news...had to have been at least a year ago. can't believe someone recycled the story for current news...

Actually, in this case the station that ran the story, WBZ-TV, is a CBS O&O. NOT an affiliate station.

An affiliate carries programming from a particular network but is not owned by them. For example, KBFK-TV in Bumblefuck Iowa might carry CBS programming, but is owned by Crazy Ernie's Used car Emporium of Bumblefuck. Whereas a station in New York, LA, or any major metropolitan area is owned by the network they carry. Like KCBS-TV being owned by CBS themselves, and it would carry CBS programming.

"I mean, come on, if I can find fresh local stories every day in my town of 21,000, then surely the CBS affiliate in Boston should be able to come up with something."

Hi everyone! Late night perusing of Joystiq, and this article caught my eye because I'm from Boston. Sadly Chris, the news channels in Boston really are that lazy and unoriginal. Honestly, the most passionate journalism from the stations are sports related.

"Oh my God - these guys are such losers for running a news story about something that happened three years ago! So I better run a blog article about a news article about a three year old event! That's not hypocritical at all!"

"they took a three year old story -- from another state -- and repackaged it for Boston audiences"

Don't bloggers take news from other sites and repackage it for THEIR audience?

@9 and 10

Dudes, get a f*cking clue. Neither of you have a valid point at all.

First of all, Joystiq is a gaming blog and hence, has no obligation to report news (unlike a news broadcast...which is supposed to report, um, news) so, hell, joystiq can feel free to report on stuff that happened 50 years ago if they want - as long as it is related to gaming or gamer interests in some way, they are justified.
The news station in question is supposed to report news, ie, things that have happened at least somewhat recently. That is lazy lazy journalism.

Even so, that is not even the case here as joystiq is not reporting on a 3 year old story. The joystiq post is about the news story that just aired. They are reporting on the negative spin that some modern media sources put on video game-related issues and are attempting to show why such a news story is completely trivial and sensationalistic.
It is a valuable look at what sort of press video games get in the mainstream, outside of our little bubble here at joystiq.

I know that ripping on Joystiq posts is the new cool thing to do and makes you feel big, but, seriously, unless you are going to make a valid criticism, STFU.

I live in Boston and saw this last night, it was laughable. Their are several sites that track this re-packaging, including using PR clips and videos from companies as a 'news story'.. lazy journalism, yes, questionable ethics reporting things that a) have been resolved and b) doing so right around the holidays, is an absolute YES.

What I find more odd, CBS4 (formally WBZ) is a wholly owned viacom/cbs station.. which if I remember correctly, something about CBS inking a deal for Video Marketplace on the 360, hahaha.

It's like they want to shoot themselves in the foot.

OMG PS3 0WNZ XBOX!!!!1

Hey, why the long faces, didn't you say PS3 would burn down a house? Just hasn't done it yet ;)

My parents always have the TV on in the afternoon, and this was obviously a ploy to improve ratings for Sweeps Week. They have a cryptic comment and say "The Xbox Warning. Tonight at 11".

I laughed and told my parents how Microsoft already issued a recall.

The fact that this is not an affiliate, but a station owned and operated by the network makes it even more embarrassing. An affiliate I can understand...the owner of the station reads something in a magazine, while they're sitting on the toilet, and calls the News Director with a "hot tip."

But, if it's owned by the network, then there's no excuse. They're lazy journalists that give the rest of us a bad name.

Although, I suppose I can think of one way in which they shouldn't be accused of lazy journalism. It's possible that this was written, shot and packaged months ago and wasn't needed then. Following standard journalism procedures, it would be shoved in a desk or a directory on the computer and left there. Eventually, some other big story might have dropped out, leading the News Director to ask all of the reporters if they had any old package that could be used.

However, if that scenario is true, I doubt this thing is much older than a half-a-year. Old packages usually don't make it longer than that.

chowda!

DWells, this is completely different.

WBZ 4 ran this story as a sensationalist piece - the problem has been solved, everyone knows the problem has been solved, and there have been no problems since it was solved. And it was solved 3 years ago. Yet they make it sound like it's still a problem - poor journalism.

Joystiq, on the other hand, has found a claim and used pure fact to debunk it to allow for the truth to get out. That's actual journalism.

Now cue "The More You Know..." graphic here.

Maybe they should have done a story on the guys faulty wiring in the walls, not the xbox.

wait till the first fire resulting from candles... er, homemade Wii sensor bars.

i live in the boston area, i saw the ridiculous promo for this story, it has NOTHING to do with public safety, everything to do with splashing that "XBOX WARNING" w/ logo all over the place. disgusting.

Chris (post 15) I couldn't agree more as I used to work in a station, not in Boston, but I don't remember the news director, or even reporters pulling off something this bad.

As pixelate said, they ran promos for this thing as early as Sunday night I believe all about 'xbox warning'.. not clarifying the issue. This is something more akin to stations like WHDH in the area, than WBZ now CBS4 which has a ridiculously long standing tradition of great journalism behind it.

It frustrates me that this story ever made it to air, or that other PR pieces packaged by companies make it to air in a lot of smaller markets and sold as news.

This story was all about scaring people, about a problem that no longer exists, that took place 1,500 miles from the station reporting it as 'local news' or at least letting us presume it is by airing it to begin with.

That, and to do it so close to the holidays, what parent, not knowing any better, or knowing the difference between all these consoles would go out and get an Xbox or Xbox 360 now, thinking it might be 'dangerous' and thanks CBS4 for 'keeping them informed.'

Just email the story to The Daily Show and have them bash the station for this stupid crap.

We got this story (Cant remember if it was the same people, it was a townhouse somewhere) yesterday in Dallas, c/o the local CBS station. I found it rather odd, since the video was from 2003 of the burnt-out townhouse. So the story was spanning the nation, 3 years after the fact! How odd.