Eric Longabardi writes on ERSNews.com:
Spears may have just lost custody of her two young children in a bitter custody dispute with her former husband Kevin Federline. That is a story that not many are really interested in says editor Shelby Grad of the Los Angeles Times. "We wouldn’t have put three reporters on a story just about her custody case — which is sad, but similar to hundreds of others? What made this especially newsworthy is the role of the paparazzi in L.A. — it’s big business here and it affects people; if you live in L.A., you see it."
That may be true in one sense, but what is it about the Spears saga that makes her case more compelling, more interesting to readers of the LA Times?. I have an idea but the LA Times editor just won’t come clean and admit it: it’s called "selling papers". He should talk to Adnan Ghalib for some "media product" marketing pointers. A story in the LA Times about a bitter custody dispute involving a formerly married couple of an accountant and a bus driver who lived in Santa Monica, just wouldn’t have the same sales appeal. LA Times editors know that, but they’re not being honest about it. Britney Spears gets coverage because she sells papers, and moves the product as the purveyors of media outlets, as well as paparazzi and even used car salesman like to say.
The Times, Los Angeles’s major newspaper had to defend itself from an onslaught of criticism from its readers when it assigned three reporters to the Spears saga when the pop singer ended up having the police called to her home in a custody dispute with her former husband. The rest you can read about on TMZ.com, the real paper of record when it comes to chronicling the every move of celebrities and would-be celebrities.
But the LA Times was not alone, even the Associated Press got into the act when a memo from one of its west coast editors was leaked to the media website "Romenesko" showing the AP also needed to be all over the story. See the AP memo here…
Enter paparazzo Adnan Ghalib: he and Spears have been (if you believe what TMZ says … which ERS does not most of the time) have been an "item" for sometime. The pop starlet somehow falling for one of the very horde of photographers that chase and stalks her every move. Adnan. it seems, is a man with a good business plan. He becomes Britney’s new "boyfriend" and low and behold he seems to come up with "exclusive" photos of the couple, wherever they go. Ghalib, has his own "media outlet." He works with, Finalpixx, (http://finalpixxceleb.com/) an LA based paparazzi photo agency. His photo agency is getting a lot of attention these days since he started dating (or whatever he is doing) Britany Spears. On the Finalpixx website, rumors and claims and denials about the paparazzo’s relationship with Spears are all the rage…
It all sounds a bit much in our book. But at least paparazzo Ghalib is clear, he’s going to make some money on all this and this is America so why not; at least he’s honest about it! Now maybe the AP, LA Times, TMZ (well they admit what they do, and don’t apologize for it (most of the time) and the rest of the “mainstream” press should just go take a shower and stop acting like Spears is some sort of "news" story: she’s not, she’s a "news product."
