Jusletter IT

Everything looks deceptively real – as if the camera would be right in the middle of real life. The so-called «scripted reality» enjoys not only on commercial TV increasing popularity. «Farmer Wants a Wife», «The school investigators» or similar reports provide mere pseudo-documentaries. Their dialogs are predetermined, spoken by real actors. The documentary style is merely simulated and explained by a short, very small written note at the beginning: «All persons involved are fictitious.» A spectator who switches on in between does not take any notice of the deception. This new television format poses next to the question whether this is simple viewer delution, also some copyright, media, unfair competition, and personal rights issues.