WHBQ-13, FOX (TV Station)

WHBQ-13 is is a Memphis, Tennessee television station and an affiliate of the FOX television network.

Station Owner
Fox/News Corporation

Use of Video News Releases and/or Satellite Media Tours
In the 9pm news bulletin on June 12, 2005 the station broadcast an edited and re-voiced version of a video news release produced by MultiVu for the American Dental Association on saliva testing for diseases. The broadcast version was a FOX national edit. 

The New York Times documented WHBQ-13's use of government VNRs:
 * On Sept. 11, 2002, WHBQ, the Fox affiliate in Memphis, marked the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks with an uplifting report on how assistance from the United States was helping to liberate the women of Afghanistan. ...


 * What the people of Memphis were not told, though, was that the interviews used by WHBQ were actually conducted by State Department contractors. The contractors also selected the quotes used from those interviews and shot the video that went with the narration. They also wrote the narration, much of which [then WHBQ reporter Tish] Clark repeated with only minor changes.

The March 2005 Times article reported WHBQ's vice president for news, Kenneth W. Jobe, "could not explain how his station came to broadcast" a State Department VNR. "It's the same piece, there's no mistaking it," Jobe told the Times, before "insisting that it would not happen again." 

Contact Details
WHBQ-TV Fox 13 485 S. Highland Memphis, TN 38111 Phone: 901-320-1313 Fax: 901-320-1252 Web: http://www.foxmemphis.com/default.asp

SourceWatch Resources

 * Audio news releases
 * B-Roll
 * Brand Hype
 * Branded Entertainment
 * Media releases
 * Satellite Media Tours
 * Radio Media Tours
 * Public Service Announcements
 * Video news releases: PR for California's Schwarzenegger administration