March 27, 2004

BBC Boners The content of this article has already been done, but what do we think of the BBC using an image from Boners?
posted by Skrik 20 years ago
  • well, boners doesn't actually make its own content. Chances are someone submitted that from some legitimate news site to boners. So, not too bad, really.
  • Can anyone place the language on the hamburger sign in the background? So far it looks like Armenian to me; looking at it mirrored, the first two characters could be "vo" and "ech," according to OS X's character palette, but I can't place any of the other characters. In any case, it would help to lend some context to the picture.
  • *cough*
  • So the script is Georgian. While I didn't think that it looked Cyrillic, the alt-text on the photo in the BBC version claimed that the McD's was in Moscow. Of course you can't make out the script on the poster in the BBC's tiny rendition.
  • It is still sleasy of the BBC to feature a picture that is very much intended to look like they are typical children at McDonald's, not unusual children who are wrestlers. I would hold the BBC to higher standards, because I respect them so much.
  • Its a nice antidote to the pictures McDonalds would have you believe represent there usual customers, though.
  • Indeed, DNG. If McDonalds were to reach its publicly stated goal of having all current consumers of McDonalds eat there at least 20 times per month, one suspects the avergae consumer would be a lot closer to the Russian wrestler than the PR images. Hell, they may be already. I see nothing wrong in the BBC undermining the images McDonalds send out with their PR packs; it's hardly uncommon for the BBC or the Economist to publish such little digs.
  • Also, there's no denying the fact that those are children, and they are in a McDonald's.
  • That particular image is of a boy who is a wrestler in Russia (I could be wrong about the country). He made big news along with that picture not too long ago. I can't believe I remember that. Here's a link to wrestling pics of the kid.
  • Re-reading that, I wasn't posting the links to say, "hey, look at him," but just to point out that this picture isn't a Boners domain picture. It was a news organization's picture for some story they did on that kid a while ago. It's probably public domain and the BBC used it because of the McDonalds link.
  • If you look at the lower right of the BBC's photo, you'll see that it's from the AP. However, the tag is missing from Boners' pic...
  • Yep, that was in the pictures of the week section at yahoo sometime back. They used it to make a point about health concerns, but it was a bit misleading. Though im not so sure about having 3 and 4 year old wrestlers, but hey im not russian. or Georgian. In fact, i have never been to Georgia, U.S.A. on the other hand...