Tasteless coincidence: Jon Eydmann death
An unfortunate, and tasteless coincidence of reporting and advertising
I received an e-mail from a band called "Show without Punch" today. I get their circulars, as does Clare, because we saw them once at a gig and signed up to stay in touch. Today, though, the news was sad. Their manager, Jon Eydmann passed away. A quick Google pulled up the Telegraph version of the story.
What I couldn't believe was (what I thought was) the accompanying image. It is of a man floating face-down in water. The significance of this cock-up cannot be overestimated, and is perfectly clear when you read the article and see how Jon died. I now realise that the tasteless picture is in some way "arty" and alerts readers to a review or critique. A shame no one bothered to look at the article in place on the website.
Thursday, September 17. 2009 at 12:21 (Link) (Reply)
Hmm... Not ideal, to say the least. Of course, due presumably to the changing nature of web content, the picture is now not juxtaposed in this unfortunate manner. You would think, especially for a respected news outlet like the Telegraph, that it would be an absolute necessity (and an obvious one at that) to ensure that this sort of unfortunate occurence does not happen. The nature of automatic content is such that, if left unvetted, unpleasant and inappropriate contextual clashes will, inevitably, occur, and "new media" outlets should not only have thought of this, but also taken steps to prevent it.