CNN accidentally broadcast 30 minutes of hardcore porn last night (opens in new tab)

(thenextweb.com)

88 pointsnebula9y ago36 comments

36 comments

Although this is hilarious, it seems to be sourced to a single Twitter user. I wonder if it's actually true or just another example of fake news making it onto real news sites?

AndrewKemendo9y ago

I think it's probably right that this is bullshit.

30 minutes of hardcore porn on CNN at 11PM on Thanksgiving on a popular cable network in Boston is an eternity. The idea that only one person saw it and reported it is absurd.

Edit, To wit: http://www.mediaite.com/online/did-the-media-fall-for-a-fake...

ghurtado9y ago

Absolutely:

> ...pixelates the naughty parts while leaving the TiVo lower third graphic untouched.

That was the sentence that locked in the "bullshit alert signal" for me.

scottshea9y ago

Given how badly CNN has fallen in its standards this did not seem as far fetched as it once might have been

woliveirajr9y ago

> (...) after a grave error by RCN, a local cable TV provider based in New Jersey that provides CNN's broadcasting all down the east coast.

> Apparently, only viewers in Boston experienced the mistake on Thursday night as one viewer voiced her concerns on Twitter.

According to these lines from [1], it was a localized problem, and wasn't from the CNN stream, but from the RCN replaying a wrong feed to subscribers.

[1] http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/news/cnn-...

djsumdog9y ago

I wonder if someone found and exploit on their network and did this for kicks, or maybe a disgruntled employee with enough access left in a time bomb before he or she was let go.

ranman9y ago

I think it is more likely that "parts unknown" was part of a porn title.

2 more replies

swang9y ago

the person whose tweet is in the news article had to protect her* tweet because people were sending her hate mail.

what the hell.

anigbrowl9y ago

Left to themselves,a significant number of people are awful. You know, between natural language processing, sentiment analysis, clustering and so on, IDing things like hateful tweets or persistently hateful tweeters seems well within the capability of today's AI. Nor do I think it would be too hard to find funding or a revenue stream for a reliable Asshole Detector. I mean, companies don't want to hire assholes, and browsing the news would be so much more pleasant if comments from assholes were pre-emptively labeled as such.

djsumdog9y ago

Twitter does censor stuff, and that's not a good thing. I mean no, you shouldn't be a bully/asshole/send death treats and that's a horrible thing to do; but the censoring and removing posts of people you don't like starts to create an echo chamber. People with non-hateful grievances can have their posts swept up in the same net.

When people are anonymous, they tend to be more candid about what's really deep down inside. The solution isn't to create A.I.s to censor everything. The tweets are a symptom of frustration in society. The real problem is much more difficult to fix.

6 more replies

tenpies9y ago

Twitter's law: no matter how wonderful your tweet, you'll still get hate-tweets.

mixedCase9y ago

Life's law: No matter how well you do, you'll get haters.

sunnyP9y ago

I can see how Parts Unknown can be confused for a porn title.

ScottBurson9y ago

Surprised no one has mentioned that this could have been a TiVo problem -- either an error in their programming data, or, more likely considering that only one user seems to have reported it, a malfunction in an individual TiVo unit. I've had a TiVo for years, and they do screw up or crash occasionally.

zoul9y ago

As far as decency goes, I think that’s a reasonable improvement over the recent presidential election coverage.

clishem9y ago

What was broadcasted exactly?

ChoGGi9y ago

"replaced with explicit material starring transsexual pornstar Riley Quinn"

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/news/cnn-...

1 more reply

Dowwie9y ago

Hacker news needs to enable downvoting for articles. Fake news is here to stay.

grzm9y ago

HN has submission flagging. How would submission down votes serve a useful purpose?

joesmo9y ago

That's what the "flag" link is for. Please use it when you see garbage like this.

james_pm9y ago

Add TNW to the fake news list. They got it all wrong in their rush to publish.

ry4n4139y ago

"It remains to be seen if in response to its collapsing ratings, CNN will refocus from waging war on "fake media", and make airing of hard core porn during primetime TV a part of scheduled programming. Come, pardon the pun, to think of it, "Deep Quote with Wolf Blitzer and Anderson Cooper" is a "news" show we could certainly sink our teeth into." ZH

bitwize9y ago

This sounds like something from Idiocracy, in which Starbucks had pivoted into the brothel-chain business.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

36 comments

makomk9y ago

Although this is hilarious, it seems to be sourced to a single Twitter user. I wonder if it's actually true or just another example of fake news making it onto real news sites?

AndrewKemendo9y ago

I think it's probably right that this is bullshit.

30 minutes of hardcore porn on CNN at 11PM on Thanksgiving on a popular cable network in Boston is an eternity. The idea that only one person saw it and reported it is absurd.

Edit, To wit: http://www.mediaite.com/online/did-the-media-fall-for-a-fake...

ghurtado9y ago

Absolutely:

> ...pixelates the naughty parts while leaving the TiVo lower third graphic untouched.

That was the sentence that locked in the "bullshit alert signal" for me.

scottshea9y ago

Given how badly CNN has fallen in its standards this did not seem as far fetched as it once might have been

woliveirajr9y ago

> (...) after a grave error by RCN, a local cable TV provider based in New Jersey that provides CNN's broadcasting all down the east coast.

> Apparently, only viewers in Boston experienced the mistake on Thursday night as one viewer voiced her concerns on Twitter.

According to these lines from [1], it was a localized problem, and wasn't from the CNN stream, but from the RCN replaying a wrong feed to subscribers.

[1] http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/news/cnn-...

djsumdog9y ago

I wonder if someone found and exploit on their network and did this for kicks, or maybe a disgruntled employee with enough access left in a time bomb before he or she was let go.

ranman9y ago

I think it is more likely that "parts unknown" was part of a porn title.

2 more replies

swang9y ago

the person whose tweet is in the news article had to protect her* tweet because people were sending her hate mail.

what the hell.

anigbrowl9y ago

djsumdog9y ago

6 more replies

tenpies9y ago

Twitter's law: no matter how wonderful your tweet, you'll still get hate-tweets.

mixedCase9y ago

Life's law: No matter how well you do, you'll get haters.

sunnyP9y ago

I can see how Parts Unknown can be confused for a porn title.

ScottBurson9y ago

zoul9y ago

As far as decency goes, I think that’s a reasonable improvement over the recent presidential election coverage.

clishem9y ago

What was broadcasted exactly?

ChoGGi9y ago

"replaced with explicit material starring transsexual pornstar Riley Quinn"

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/news/cnn-...

1 more reply

Dowwie9y ago

Hacker news needs to enable downvoting for articles. Fake news is here to stay.

grzm9y ago

HN has submission flagging. How would submission down votes serve a useful purpose?

joesmo9y ago

That's what the "flag" link is for. Please use it when you see garbage like this.

james_pm9y ago

Add TNW to the fake news list. They got it all wrong in their rush to publish.

ry4n4139y ago

bitwize9y ago

This sounds like something from Idiocracy, in which Starbucks had pivoted into the brothel-chain business.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse