Cat. & Reference: EBSCO and libraries
I like to listen to the radio in the mornings when I'm getting ready to go to work. By "the radio," I mean "NPR." (I hear tell they've got some newfangled stations that play songs just like a jukebox, but I like the news, thanks.)
However, my local NPR station is currently playing an underwriter announcement (NOT a commercial) that is driving me nuts. The announcement says something like "[Program X] is underwritten by EBSCO. EBSCO partners with libraries to make full-text databases available to patrons nationwide."
EBSCO is a library vendor. Libraries pay them for a subscription to their databases. I have no problem with this arrangement, but saying that EBSCO partners with libraries makes it sound like EBSCO is some sort of charitable nonprofit organization, instead of a business involved in a capitalistic enterprise. I might as well say that the local grocery story partners with me to make dinner or that the gas station partners with me to make my car run.
Don't get me wrong, I have no particular beef with EBSCO. Without them, I wouldn't be able to read online issues of The Journal of the American Society of Information Science and Technology. (A tragedy, indeed!) I'd just rather their NPR spots weren't misleading.
3 Comments:
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You could tell them. NPR is necessarily better at listening.
Not necessarily. Or perhaps they just don't like listening to me.
I think it's only appropriate that EBSCO mislead about its "partnership" with libraries in an "underwriter announcement" on NPR.
Heh. I think the language is misleading, but not necessarily untrue (in both cases), so I doubt I've got much of a case. I just don't like PR-speak.
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