• calliope@retrolemmy.com
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    3 days ago

    Yeah… you can tell the media hype is more about where the storm is heading than anything. It’s cold AF here (Midwest) but it happens.

    The entire Midwest, Great Plains, and all of the states between have been warned “two thirds of the U.S. will be hit by a massive storm!” by various media, and so far it hasn’t come close to being true. They were literally even warning the Great Plains last week.

    It started in Texas. It’s exceedingly rare for a winter storm to go straight north.

    I’ve been watching the weather maps. For days now the maps have projected that it will mainly affect the southeast. Current projections barely have it getting to New York City, let alone the rest of the state. The storm skirts every northern state until it gets to New Jersey.

    Two hundred million people will be affected!” How are they counting this?

    • gustofwind@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      It’s crazy how weather reporting has come to almost dominant news stuff now

      Turn on the tv news and they flash to the weatherman more than the news caster

      Every news site has this storm plastered as the front page

      • calliope@retrolemmy.com
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        3 days ago

        This is what I’m so shocked by! I naively thought they’d just report the weather. Not use it as “if it bleeds, it leads”-style reporting.

        I don’t know why I thought that they’d maintain the integrity of their weather reporting. I am foolish.

        This is the first time I’ve very clearly noticed a discrepancy in what the media was reporting and what was actually happening.

        • OpenStars@piefed.social
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          3 days ago

          I recall a (more localized) media hype event twenty years ago that caused people to literally die (mainly the most vulnerable too - infants and the elderly).

          The ethical juggling went something like “well, people needed to be informed just in case the worst would happen”, which while it contains a kernel of truth is also pure bullshit.

          Money money money, may the buyer beware.