"With Valentine's Day around the corner, love is on the minds of many," said KOKH-25 [1] anchor Kris Roberts [2], as he introduced the next story. What viewers didn't know is that every word in his teleprompter was provided by publicists, and the report that followed was nothing more than a pre-packaged stealth ad for an online dating service.

To herald its new Chemistry.com [3] spinoff site, Match.com [4] hired D S Simon Productions [5] to create a video news release [6] (VNR) about "the chemistry of love." The 102-second video package included soundbites from Tim Demik and Diane Millaway, two habitual online daters; Kristin Kelly, a spokeswoman for Chemistry.com; and Dr. Helen Fisher, an author and anthropologist who has studied the science of love and attraction for 25 years. The second half of the VNR provided a visual demonstration of Chemistry.com's "patented 1-2-3-Meet system," which is described as relying more on chemical instinct than traditional dating criteria.

Once again, KOKH-25 actively deceived their audience by taking the complete and uncut VNR and working it into their newscast without a single trace of disclosure. Editors inserted network-branded graphic overlays onto the video and Roberts introduced narrating publicist Jim Lawrence as if he were a station reporter.

In the course of its ten-month study, the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) documented KOKH-25 airing six VNRs—a staggeringly high number, given that CMD documented TV newsrooms' use of 36 VNRs (thousands are produced each year). In addition to Chemistry.com, KOKH-25 aired complete pre-packaged VNRs from Trend Micro Software [7], Panasonic [8], Intel [9], Cadillac [10], and Towers Perrin [11].

To view the original VNR, as well as the KOKH-25 feature, click on the Quicktime links below.