Enraged by cable news channels insensitivity in reporting events, a group of professors and graduate students will lead a protest tomorrow in front of the TVBS building to show their unhappiness with the country's six news cable stations.
"We can't stand it any longer. The treatment of [New York Yankees pitcher] Wang Chien-ming (
Lin was referring to the open letter issued by Wang last Thursday, announcing that he will no longer accept interview requests from the Taiwanese media.
Wang said that he was disappointed by the way that the furor created by the local press had affected his family's privacy.
Lin said that in order to boost viewing figures cable news reporters often interview people against their will and their insensitivity has been damaging for some interviewees.
"We will continue with the campaign until we receive a suitable response from each and every cable news channel," Lin said.
Deputy manager of the TVBS Pan Tsu-yin (
Ma Yung-jui (馬詠睿), deputy manager of ETTV, said: " I believe that the cut-throat battle for ratings is wrong and that everyone should strive for `cleaner' news reporting."
"As for Wang Chien-ming, he is the pride of Taiwan and I don't think any domestic press meant to present him in a bad light. The Taiwanese press has been friendly toward him," Ma said.
He added, "I don't think the decision to write the [open letter] statement was Wang's own."
SETN's news department manager Yu Chao-wei (余朝為) said that its reporters always adopt high moral standards and that SETN has demanded their reporters respect the wishes of interviewees when seeking approval for interviews.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,