"Pop Fiction": The Next Step in News?

Alright, so admittedly I don’t really watch the E! Network and I caught this show mostly due to the fact that my girlfriend made us watch the season premiere of “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” (that’s my story and I’m sticking to it). But due to the nature of the show, I couldn’t help but comment on “Pop Fiction,” Ashton Kutcher’s new show which could revolutionize the news media business. And yes, using the word revolutionize and Ashton Kutcher in the same sentence seems terribly wrong to me, but he is a fellow Iowan and hey, even a blind squirrel finds an acorn eventually.

The premise of the show is simple. Kutcher and business partner Jason Goldberg recruit high-profile celebrities and have them come up with false news stories that spread like wildfire due to the pressing news demands of celebrity media and the “overbearing” presence of the paparazzi. The first show was a success, getting multiple celebrity gossip blogs, news outlets and entertainment reporters for major networks such as CNN Headline News to cover a fake guru appearing with Paris Hilton, leading to lots of speculation over Hilton’s marital status and if she were switching religions.

Now clearly, celebrity news networks and blogs represent a unique sector of the media in that the paparazzi present a 24/7 news information source going to almost any length, and even crossing the line at some points to get the latest breaking story. But in the age of new media and Web 2.0, has the media lost some of its ability to fact-check the stories it reports. Is Ashton Kutcher’s “prank” show a harbinger of things to come, where the media is reporting stories crafted by the subject it is supposed to be covering. A number of controversies that have occurred over the past few years involve situations where a reporter was willing to use forego investigative journalism with news stations running stories based on videos produced by the U.S. government, reporters plagiarizing other publications and even some creating fabricated pieces. It will be interesting to see where “Pop Fiction” goes from here and the number of stories that might have been falsified by Kutcher and his celebrity friends.