Stop ads on CNN Student News

[Gary Ruskin]

Commercial Alert                March 11, 2002

Commercial Alert and opponents of commercialism in schools sent letters
today to the chief executive officers of the top 50 U.S. advertising
agencies, asking them not to advertise on CNN Student News, formerly
known as CNN Newsroom.

CNN Student News is shown in about 18,000 schools each schoolday.  Ted
Turner launched the program in 1989 as a non-commercial news source for
schools.  This month, AOL Time Warner is expected to put ads on the
program for the first time, according to company sources.

Following is the text of the letter to Steve Blamer, president of Grey
Worldwide advertising agency.

Dear Mr. Blamer:

We write to request that Grey Worldwide not place advertising on the
program CNN Student News, formerly known as CNN Newsroom.

Ted Turner intended CNN Newsroom to be a commercial-free news service
for schools.  In 1989, Mr. Turner promised “There will be no advertising
whatsoever” on the program.  However, following a change in executive
leadership, AOL Time Warner has decided to add commercial “sponsorships”
to the program.  Commercials are expected to debut this month, according
to company sources.

At that time, schools and teachers that show CNN Student News will be
forcing captive audiences of students to watch commercial advertising
during class time.  The program is shown during class time in about
18,000 schools.

The use of class time for marketing is wrong and indefensible. Class
time should be used for teaching and learning – not selling.  It is
wrong for corporations to deprive students of valuable class time.  Nor
should taxpayer funds subsidize advertising to schoolchildren.  We hope
you agree that the education of our nation’s children is far more
important than the delivery of commercial messages.

Several companies that have injected commercialism into the schools have
come to suffer for it.  For example, the ZapMe! Corp. was restructured
and renamed because of public humiliation and parent rage at their
advertising and privacy invasion of schoolchildren in classrooms.  They
have now exited the “education business.”  N2H2 Inc. was forced to halt
their advertising and privacy invasion schemes as well, following parent
anger and negative media coverage.  Primedia’s Channel One is
increasingly becoming a corporate pariah. Unfortunately, AOL Time Warner
seems slow to grasp the import of this history, and is set on having CNN
Student News repeat these mistakes.

The commercialization of schools is a widening flashpoint for more and
more parents across the country.  If Grey Worldwide places ads on CNN
Student News, then it and its client may find themselves facing negative
publicity and indignant taxpayers and parents.

If you have any questions about this letter, please contact Jim Metrock
of Obligation Inc. at (205) 612-3376 or Gary Ruskin of Commercial Alert
at (503) 235-8012.

Sincerely,

Enola Aird, Director, The Motherhood Project, Institute for American
Values
Peter Barnes, Co-founder, Working Assets
Charles W. F. Bell, Programs Director, Consumers Union
David Bollier, author, Silent Theft
John Borowski
David Bosworth, Associate Professor of English,  University of
Washington
Michael Brody, Adjunct Professor, University of Maryland
Bettye Caldwell, Professor Emerita, University of Arkansas for Medical
Sciences
Nancy Carlsson-Paige, Professor of Education, Lesley University
Peter DeBenedittis
Charles Derber, Professor of Sociology, Boston College
Jonah Edelman, Executive Director, Stand for Children
Leon Eisenberg, Professor of Psychiatry Emeritus,  Harvard Medical
School
Roy F. Fox, Professor and Chair, Department of Middle & Secondary
Education, U. of MO-Columbia; author, Harvesting Minds and MediaSpeak
Todd Gitlin, Professor of Culture, Journalism and Sociology, New York
University; author, Media Unlimited
Mark Hickson, Professor and Chair, Department of Communication Studies,
University of Alabama at Birmingham
Carol Holst, Program Director, Seeds of Simplicity
Michael Jacobson, founder, Center for the Study of Commercialism;
co-author, Marketing Madness
Sut Jhally, Founder and Executive Director, The Media Education
Foundation
Carden Johnston, Chairman, Task Force Against Commercialism in the
Classroom, Alabama Chapter, American Academy of Pediatrics
Joe Kelly, Executive Director, Dads and Daughters; Publisher, Daughters:
The Newsletter for Parents of Girls
Jean Kilbourne, author, Can’t Buy My Love: How Advertising Changes the
Way We Think and Feel
Naomi Klein, author, No Logo
Velma LaPoint, Associate Professor of Human Development, Howard
University
Diane Levin, Professor of Education, Wheelock College
Jane Levine, Founder, Kids Can Make A Difference
Susan Linn, Judge Baker Children’s Center; Instructor in Psychiatry,
Harvard Medical School
Dana Mack, author, The Assault on Parenthood
Bob McCannon, Executive Director, New Mexico Media Literacy Project
Robert McChesney, Research Associate Professor, U. of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign; author, Rich Media, Poor Democracy
Bill McKibben, author, The End of Nature and The Age of Missing
Information
Carrie McLaren, Editor, Stay Free! Magazine
Michael Mendizza, Co-founder, Touch The Future
Jim Metrock, President, Obligation, Inc.
Alex Molnar, Professor And Director, Education Policy Studies
Laboratory, Arizona State University
Mark Crispin Miller, Professor of Media Ecology, New York University
Diane M. Morrison, Research Professor & Associate Dean for Research,
University of Washington School of Social Work
Peggy O’Mara, Editor and Publisher, Mothering Magazine
Ralph Nader
Alvin F. Poussaint, Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School
Raffi, the children's troubadour, Founder and Chair, Troubadour
Institute for Child-Honoring
Susan Rogers, Founder and Publisher, Medialiteracy.com
Jonathan Rowe, writer
Douglas Rushkoff, Professor of Virtual Culture, New York University;
author, Coercion and Media Virus
Gary Ruskin, Executive Director, Commercial AlertDiane Samples,
Director, Media Knowledge, Inc.
Phyllis Schlafly, President, Eagle Forum
Tamara Sobel, Project Director, The Girls, Women and Media Project
John Stauber, co-author, Trust Us, We're Experts and Toxic Sludge is
Good for You
Bill Talen, creator of "Reverend Billy and The Church of Stop Shopping”
Vermont Media Action Coalition
Donald E. Wildmon, President, American Family Association, Inc.

<----letter ends here---->

BACKGROUND:
More information on CNN Student News is available at:
<http://www.commercialalert.org/cnn/index.html>.

WHAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP:
1) Find out if CNN Student News is played in your children’s schools.
If it is, then encourage your children’s principal & teachers not to use
the program.

2) Ask Lucy Levy at AOL Time Warner not to put ads on CNN Student News.
Her email address is: <lucy.levy@turner.com>.


Commercial Alert's mission is to keep the commercial culture within its
proper sphere, and to prevent it from exploiting children and subverting
the higher values of family, community, environmental integrity and
democracy.  Commercial Alert’s website is at
<http://www.commercialalert.org>.

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<http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/commercial-alert/2002/000106.html>.

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PLEASE DISTRIBUTE WIDELY
--
Gary Ruskin | gary@commercialalert.org
Commercial Alert | http://www.commercialalert.org/
Congressional Accountability Project | http://www.congressproject.org/
phone: 503.235.8012 | fax: 503.235.5073

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