The following is a memorandum from the business manager of a television station.
"Over the past year, our late-night news program has devoted increased time to national news and less time to weather and local news. During this period, most of the complaints received from viewers were concerned with our station's coverage of weather and local news. In addition, local businesses that used to advertise during our late-night news program have canceled their advertising contracts with us. Therefore, in order to attract more viewers to our news programs and to avoid losing any further advertising revenues, we should expand our coverage of weather and local news on all our news programs."
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
The memorandum presented to us rife with assumptions that are unfounded and not backed by any evidence. It puts the recommendation given by the business manager at greater risk of backfiring. In the following essay, I'll analyse the memorandum and point out its flaws that undermine the argument that expanding coverage of local news and weather will increase audience viewership and advertising revenues.
The first ambiguity present in the memorandum is failure of describing the concerns regarding the coverage of local news and weather. We are not sure if the viewers want more local news/weather coverage or less. We can't even determine if the viewer concern is regarding the content quality or the variety of news. There could be a myriad of reasons which can result in viewers concern and not even one of them is hinted at in the memorandum.
The second flaw in the argument is again lack of information regarding the cancellation of advertising contracts. Could it be that disagreements over finer points in the agreement between the television station and local business festered discontent which resulted in such business pulling out of advertising contracts? Or could the local economy be in a bad way and local businesses could not afford advertising over the past year? It might also be that local business realised that advertising during late-night shows are not bringing enough revenues as compared to advertising during day time. To assume that cancellation of advertising contracts is a direct consequence of less advertising coverage during late-night news program is erroneous.
The third assumption in the argument is prescribing that increasing coverage of local news and weather throughout all news programs - not just limited to late-night shows - will increasing advertising revenues and viewership. Based on the other two points I mentioned above, this assumption does not hold any ground on its own. When the reason for this problem is never presented properly, how can this recommendation be the solution.
Thus the recommendation provided by the business manager is very aleatory. No proof to back this argument is provided. Rather it makes a huge blunder of correlating two ambiguous situations to be the cause of declining viewership and advertising revenues. It would serve well to investigate further the reasons for it and come to a solid conclusion rather than trusting the judgement of its business manager.
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Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 19 15
No. of Words: 391 350
No. of Characters: 2027 1500
No. of Different Words: 192 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.447 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.184 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.948 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 148 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 128 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 99 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 64 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 20.579 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 6.548 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.421 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.31 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.555 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.138 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 217, Rule ID: ILL_I_LL[1]
Message: Did you mean 'I'll'?
Suggestion: I'll
... of backfiring. In the following essay, Ill analyse the memorandum and point out it...
^^^
Line 1, column 221, Rule ID: HE_VERB_AGR[8]
Message: The proper name in singular (Ill) must be used with a third-person verb: 'analyses'.
Suggestion: analyses
...backfiring. In the following essay, Ill analyse the memorandum and point out its flaws ...
^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 216, Rule ID: CANT[1]
Message: Did you mean 'can't' or 'cannot'?
Suggestion: can't; cannot
...local news/weather coverage or less. We cant even determine if the viewer concern is...
^^^^
Line 5, column 351, Rule ID: IN_A_X_MANNER[1]
Message: Consider replacing "in a bad way" with adverb for "bad"; eg, "in a hasty manner" with "hastily".
...ontracts? Or could the local economy be in a bad way and local businesses could not afford a...
^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 402, Rule ID: AFFORD_VBG[1]
Message: This verb is used with infinitive: 'to advertise'.
Suggestion: to advertise
...y and local businesses could not afford advertising over the past year? It might also be th...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 179, Rule ID: DID_BASEFORM[1]
Message: The verb 'will' requires the base form of the verb: 'increase'
Suggestion: increase
...just limited to late-night shows - will increasing advertising revenues and viewership. Ba...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 1, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Thus,
...this recommendation be the solution. Thus the recommendation provided by the busi...
^^^^
Line 9, column 120, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Rather,
...roof to back this argument is provided. Rather it makes a huge blunder of correlating ...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, first, if, regarding, second, so, third, thus, well
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 19.0 19.6327345309 97% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 10.0 12.9520958084 77% => OK
Conjunction : 15.0 11.1786427146 134% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 26.0 28.8173652695 90% => OK
Preposition: 54.0 55.5748502994 97% => OK
Nominalization: 19.0 16.3942115768 116% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2064.0 2260.96107784 91% => OK
No of words: 389.0 441.139720559 88% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.3059125964 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.44106776838 4.56307096286 97% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.02034016622 2.78398813304 108% => OK
Unique words: 198.0 204.123752495 97% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.508997429306 0.468620217663 109% => OK
syllable_count: 645.3 705.55239521 91% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 4.96107784431 121% => OK
Article: 4.0 8.76447105788 46% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 2.70958083832 37% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 19.0 19.7664670659 96% => OK
Sentence length: 20.0 22.8473053892 88% => OK
Sentence length SD: 47.1461451528 57.8364921388 82% => OK
Chars per sentence: 108.631578947 119.503703932 91% => OK
Words per sentence: 20.4736842105 23.324526521 88% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.0 5.70786347227 53% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 8.0 5.25449101796 152% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 4.0 8.20758483034 49% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 10.0 6.88822355289 145% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 5.0 4.67664670659 107% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.317471632256 0.218282227539 145% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0918661227122 0.0743258471296 124% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0752641423799 0.0701772020484 107% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.162575511827 0.128457276422 127% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0613037623758 0.0628817314937 97% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.8 14.3799401198 96% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 42.72 48.3550499002 88% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.3 12.197005988 101% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.52 12.5979740519 107% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.44 8.32208582834 101% => OK
difficult_words: 94.0 98.500998004 95% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.0 11.1389221557 90% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 Out of 6
---------------------
Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.