Talk:Media event

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I started this article a few weeks ago. I think it's a worthy topic, but it desperately needs refs to bring it away from "original research". Most of the existing statements are very commonly agreed-upon by "media historians" and the like, but the sources need to be shown. Yes, I should do it myself (and will try to over the coming months), but unfortunately I am seriously ill and can only work in tiny bursts. So, if you're someone with some knowledge in the field, please consider helping out with both editing and finding/listing references. Thx. JDG 18:50, 17 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This article is flawed in so many ways - riddled with inaccuracies, misconceptions and invalid examples. Whoever added the citations obviously did not read the works they are citing either. I'd do something about it, but you know, WP is a sinking ship; and I got rid of my account for a reason. I'm bringing the fact that the article is buggered to heck and back to attention here, so if anyone else can be bothered, the book by Dayan and Katz describes the concept of media events very well. It's just a shame none of the previous editors here ever bothered to look inside it. --80.213.208.24 (talk) 15:56, 3 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Direct, but valid Flarehayr (talk) 22:55, 3 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have flagged this article as needing expert attention and notified the Journalism project on their talk page. Veriss (talk) 23:21, 29 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Completing an incomplete merge proposal from last year. The two topics aren't identical -- "pseudo-event" has a performance art connotation, whereas "media event" has a commercial or political connotation -- but they're close enough, and small enough, that it would be better to leverage their commonalities with one page. --Sneftel (talk) 23:40, 22 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

• Support merge: We should have one article per concept, rather than per term or phrase. User:King4057 23:57, 27 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  "Media event" is an established term in media studies that does NOT mean the same as pseudo event. I added a paragraph about this. I think the two articles should be unmerged. ~~~ Lijil (talk) 13:46, 24 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

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==Wiki Education assignment: CMN2160C== This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 13 January 2022 and 16 April 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): MichaelaIanni (article contribs).

I've added an 'updates needed' marker.

To be blunt there is some good and some bad/ inaccurate/ vague/ unhelpful work that exists on the page currently.

The previous choice by editors to merge pseudo-events and media events to one page is understandable and I agree. But the page treats the two theories as interchangeable when there are numerous nuanced differences between the two theories, the most obvious of which (academically) is the fact that (generally) pseudo-events as a theory largely have been superseded in the modern literature by media event theory. I would argue a core reason behind this is due to media events being a better representation of the mediated nature of PR related televised events, as opposed to pseudo (not real) events, as opposed to media event theory which has elements of reality and mediation/ fictitious/ dramatic elements contained within it, as opposed to being 'outright made up and not real'.

I have a good understanding of several parts of the literature on this and will look at doing another pass on it soon including:

1- Looking at committing the page more fully to the 'media event theory' overall (as it should be- considering the page's title)

2- Looking at formatting the 'etymology' section into a new 'history and theory' section (in order to delineate between pseudo-event theory and media event theory, to show some of the similarities and differences between the two similar, but distinct theories).

Best, flare. Flarehayr (talk) 22:50, 3 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I like the idea of "media event theory" because it's the only thing that links a pseudo-event to a media event. When Boorstin coined the phrase "pseudo-event" in "The Image" (great book, by the way) it was to described something staged and contrary, in most cases, to fact, standards or worth. The World Cup and a plane crash are media events. A presidential debate and a red carpet show before the Academy Awards are pseudo-events, staged as important -- but one is not a debate and the latter is self-promotion of celebrities presented as news. Middleground1 (talk) 04:30, 11 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I love this analysis, some really great points here. I would note though that a plane crash doesn't qualify as a media event under Dayan and Katz' 'media event' framework, because unlike a scheduled political debate, a plane crash is a sudden developing story, that isn't culturally and ceremonially experienced en masse by a society/ country, that is created by a cultural/political elite e.g. a coronation or a scheduled competition like the world cup. I think in the next version of the article it will be key to obviously include scholarly examples as opposed to own research. Flarehayr (talk) 21:46, 11 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]