vol. XX no. 3
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Emmy-Award-Winning
Atlanta TV Reporter Talks about Covering Business News and Gives Tips
on Making the Most of What You See, Hear, and Read
At a time
when many Americans are feeling, at worst, betrayed and, at best,
confused over the current economic situation, one Atlanta television
reporter has made it his mission to cut through the blizzard of
information and give straightforward commentary on what it all means.
His
name is Bill Liss, and he’s been providing business and consumer news
for 20 years at Atlanta’s NBC affiliate, WXIA-TV. In addition to
reporting on the top business stories of the last two decades
(everything from the demise of ValuJet and its reemergence as AirTran
to the privatization of Georgia-Pacific to the Delta merger last year),
Liss also helps individuals deal with a variety of problems reported
through the WXIA News Tip line.
A three-time Emmy winner, Liss
sat down with State of Business recently to discuss how business news
is covered and what we, the viewers and readers, can take from what is
being reported.
State: What can viewers expect to learn from watching business news today?
Liss:
Viewers must pick up hints – hints as to what is happening in the
marketplace. The current economic situation offers some great examples.
When the home mortgage crisis began, what journalists should have been
telling people is that “if you have a mortgage for which you made no
down payment, or have one with a very unrealistic interest rate, this
could be a warning call that things are beginning to fail.” Only a few
reporters were throwing out the hints and, therefore, the audience was
not picking them up. When journalists, however, do throw out the
appropriate hints, consumers need to react.
State: Who are some of the most interesting personalities in business today?
Liss:
I’m going to turn that around. I don’t think being an interesting
personality has anything to do with it. I think the question should be
who are some of the most knowledgeable? Being an interesting
personality isn’t relevant to anything, except they are fun to listen
to and they are fun to watch, but they don’t teach us or tell us a
thing. The people you want to listen to are people like Warren Buffett.
You don’t want to be taken in by people who may be perceived as
interesting. Bernard Madoff. He had an enormous persona but was nothing
but a fraud, a complete fake.
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