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Here’s a trendy little phrase for you to share with your friends and neighbors: climate porn. That’s what a (Labour-leaning) British think tank calls the U.K. media’s extensive use of apocalyptic descriptions and images of climate change, which the organization views as commercially motivated. Simon Retellack, who commissioned the study, told BBC News: "It is appropriate to call [what some of these groups publish] 'climate porn', because on some level it is like a disaster movie. The public become disempowered because it's too big for them; and when it sounds like science fiction, there is an element of the unreal there." The report laments that while climate change has been covered exhaustively "there had been no analysis of what the coverage amounted to and what impact it might be having."

The Institute for Public Policy Research categorized the coverage as such:

Alarmism, characterised by images and words of catastrophe

Settlerdom, in which "common sense" is used to argue against the scientific consensus

Rhetorical scepticism, which argues the science is bad and the dangers hyped

Techno-optimism, the argument that technology can solve the problem

The news outlets criticized (criticised?) argue that they are simply calling attention to an important issue. Ian Birrell, deputy editor of the Independent – which was identified in the study as one of the “alarmist” publications – told the BBC: "You put on your front page what you deem important and what you think is important to your readers.” He added that charges that the paper didn’t include more solution-oriented stories are inaccurate: “while we're campaigning on big issues such as ice caps, we also do a large amount on how people can change their own lives, through cycling, installing energy-efficient lighting, recycling, food miles; we've been equally committed on these issues."

Retallack argued otherwise: "Every newspaper is a commercial organization and when you have a terrifying image on the front of the paper, you are likely to sell more copies than when you write about solutions." Makes you wonder which of these two magazine covers sold more copies.

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The New York Times reports this morning on a new Internet ad campaign being launched by MSNBC this week, with just under $1 million directed at wooing Web surfers to the MSNBC Web site and, more importantly, the 24-hour cable news channel. Here’s how The Times’ Stuart Elliott described the effort:

“MSNBC … will promote the shows - with their hosts, Keith Olbermann, Rita Cosby and Joe Scarborough - in ads that are to start appearing tomorrow and continue all day Wednesday. Some ads will promote segments on the shows about life online, like how marketers sponsor ‘viral’ video clips that consumers can forward to each other.”

Well, today we’re getting a glimpse at the initial ad offering and so far, it’s a little different than what was described in The Times. Sites today like TVNewser, Buzz Machine and even Daily Kos are running the MSNBC ads. We’ve stumbled across a couple of variations so far, but the most common is a simple seedy-looking neon silhouette outline of a woman’s body with the following text:

“Porn. It's jumped out of the seedy theaters and back-alley video stores, and into the family computer. See where it's heading next.”

Readers are then urged to “learn more” at the MSNBC site, where a number of stories are featured, such as promotions for “Live & Direct” that promises “a unique look inside the Valley of Porn.” And there’s a promo for “Scarborough Country” that asks, “Internet addiction now an epidemic?” (I assume that has some “porn” component to it). Or you can read stories like, “Atheist group trades bibles for porn” and “former stripper starts ministry.”



Maybe we’ll get to those “viral” video promotions later in the week, but so far, it looks like MSNBC is making sure they get as much bang for their advertising buck as possible.

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