Help Screen

by Taran March
Summer 1998

The More You Watch the Less You Know
Danny Schechter
(1997, Seven Stories Press, 632 Broadway, New York, NY 10012. 478 pp., $26.95). * * * *

Part exposé, part nostalgia album, part recipe for empowerment, this look at the media industry offers one commodity in short supply on the media-bashing circuit: Hope. Schechter, a media activist, former producer of ABC's 20/20 and award-winning director of numerous TV specials and documentaries, believes it's possible to reform the $150 billion per year information and entertainment economy. Using his own career as a timeline, Schechter explores how the rise of corporate media giants and hypercommercialism has destroyed effective journalism. Following a cannibalistic feeding frenzy of mergers and acquisitions, U.S. media conglomerates reduced themselves from around 50 in 1982, to about 10 last year. Unfortunately, the news-reporting portion represents a dimming light within these giant entertainment empires. Schechter underscores the need for media reform as a means of reclaiming democracy. The book includes an optimistic profile of the Media & Democracy Congress, which spearheads national education against media monopolies, as well as a "Declaration of Media Independence," a list of media reform groups, and a proposal for Schechter's own fantasy--a media channel devoted to monitoring and critiquing all the others. Check out the ongoing discussion at www.globalvision.org/globalvision/, the Web site of the author's TV and film production company.

Screen Smarts: A Family Guide to Media Literacy
Gloria DeGaetano and Kathleen Bander
(1996, Houghton Mifflin Co., 215 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 10003. 206 pp., $12.95). * * *

Worried about how much TV your kids watch? You should be. The basic cognitive development tasks children engage in prior to age five are sabotaged by television, according to the authors of this solution-oriented title. "Something is terribly wrong," observes one preschool teacher. "These youngsters have extremely delayed language and cognitive skills, attention spans of only several seconds, no imaginations." DeGaetano and Bander succeed in fostering a positive if defensive approach to screen viewing that allows parents to guide their children-and themselves-toward media literacy. The book combines information about child development with proactive responses to TV and video viewing, all shaped around media minefields of screen violence, advertising and stereotypes. Chapters are divided by childhood ages and growth stages, which allows quick access to relevant information. Sidebars list hands-on solutions for media literacy and fostering creativity in young minds. Three appendices steer readers through a media-literacy checklist, commonly asked questions from parents, resources-everything from books to lock boxes-even sample letters children can write to networks. Offering a best defense through a good offense, this book is a must-read for parents, educators and TV cynics alike.

Internet Family Fun: The Parent's Guide to Safe Surfing
Bonnie Bruno with Joel Comm
(1997, no starch press, China Basin Street, Suite 108, San Francisco, CA 94107, 160 pp., $14.95).**

This very user-friendly book targets families and newcomers to the Internet. The authors discuss pros and cons of home computers and provide an overview of online services and basic know-how, with special attention to setting up parental controls against undesirable Web sites. Then it's welcome to the wonderful Web world, beginning with a handful of useful tools such as MapBlast! (to find an address anywhere in the United States) and Virtual Tourist II (an overview of the world's major cities). The book lists family-oriented sites-complete with Web address, brief description and recommended age group-ranging from the Teenager's Computer Network to freebies, multimedia learning tours and brain boosters. Readers are encouraged to visit other families' home pages and learn how to create their own. In 1995 author Joel Comm launched an educational family Web site called WorldVillage (www.worldvillage.com), which has evolved into its own community and encompasses what this book aims to provide: an introduction to safe surfing for the whole family.