That’s what I got as a result of watching Cho Seung-Hui’s “multimedia manifesto” that NBC decided to air widely and repeatedly yesterday, and which other news outlets also broadcast. But the icky feeling I got surely cannot compare to the horror and agony the families of the victims must have felt upon seeing this material, not to mention the folks who came face to face with Cho and lived to tell about it.

Could you imagine being in the hospital recovery room as your multiple bullet wounds heal and then you see Cho pop up on the screen with two guns menacingly pointed at the camera? Shudder.

Airing this evil killer’s self-aggrandizing rants did not aid public understanding of the Virginia Tech tragedy; it only aided NBC’s ratings. And it was not as though this was necessarily a binary choice between disclosure and nondisclosure, which NBC executives seem to have realized by dictating that the Cho material would not be aired for more than six minutes per hour on MSNBC.

NBC tried to be cautious — or attempted to portray itself as being concerned about their complicity in glorifying a mass murderer — in how they handled this vile, disgusting stuff but they still fell short. The story could have been just as well advanced by describing the package of materials and quoting from it judiciously. Viewers could then have been directed to a dedicated link on MSNBC to find more.

Instead, readers saw this photo adorning the MSNBC home page.

So why does it matter? If those closest to the tragedy really are sensitive about news coverage, presumably they have their TV sets off, right? Perhaps, except there is a lot of other worthwhile news related to the mass murder still trickling out that one might want to be aware of without having Cho’s pompous multimedia “Song of Myself” suddenly thrust into your consciousness.

Also, there is the prety well documented copycat effect of over-the-top media coverage of suicides and mass shootings. Again, presumably the wannabe Chos out there could find the material online even if NBC and other outlets had been more judicious in how they chose to publicize it. But considering that the killer’s manifesto added close to zero news value, why push it up front? The story could still be told while minimizing the potential copycat effect.

The victims’ families, surprisingly, have now pushed back on this and it’s apparent that both due to declining news value (though it’s a small drop from “almost none” to begin with) of the video and public and media criticism that news outlets are dialing back the exposure even further.

NBC displayed really poor judgment. It’s not the end of the world, and of course I agree with Brian that they’ve the right to do whatever they want. But I second the “scum” label.

(Originally posted to Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Blog.)