The marketability of sensation is the primary incentive to the evil and the deranged to take the lives of the uninvolved. While such acts must be reported, they don't need be milked for viewership over days or weeks.
Withholding the names of victims until next of kin are informed has not compromised the First Amendment.
Choosing not to create endless color and background stories—or to air lurid, repetitive speculations about self-justification scenarios—might depress Nielsen ratings but no amount of ad revenue is worth one victim's life.
Of all the power structures in modern society, only the media is accorded an unquestioned right to censor (to edit-out) public criticism of its actions and its motives. But we still have this much access to "sunlight" —the President's Bully Pulpit.



