Welmoed Sijtsma and her TV buddy Sam Hagens are under fire because they ask people through spots to become a member of WNL and therefore transfer money. “It’s just purely misleading.”
WNL talents Welmoed Sijtsma and Sam Hagens have had the chance of their lives: this summer they can present the late talk show of NPO 1, good evening the Netherlands. An excellent moment to shine and definitively prove itself as talk show hosts. But what do they do? They both go on holiday for two weeks.
“With your help!”
Result: four weeks half a program, with one half of the duo at the table. You can ask yourself how ambitious you really are when you think at such an opportunity: first pack the suitcases. And now they ask in spots unabashedly for money so that they can continue all summer. Ehh?
Welmoed appears on camera with her most serious gaze: “This summer is not a WNL in the morning, but with your help that is possible.”
A few weeks of sunshine
The presenters who themselves wave goodbye for a few weeks of sunshine, ask the viewer to contribute to a program that they are not even making themselves at that time. Are they just crowdfunding their own leave? “That can change with your support. As if you are watching DierenLot,” says X-Influencer Miesbee cynical.
Columnist Jan Dijkgraaf then: “Moreover, it is downright misleading. With more members, they will really not work during the summer break.”
Tina Critical
Tina Nijkamp, the most important opinion woman of the media world, is also critical. “They do that misleading, from: yes, if you now become a member of WNL, then Good Morning The Netherlands might be seen in the summer. Of course that is not at all true what they say there, because it is not a one-on-one relationship,” she says in Tina’s TV UPDATE.
“It is not that I become a member of WNL and that good morning the Netherlands can be seen again in the summer. That has to do with many other things, for example with the NPO. It is about the programming and not the broadcaster itself. In addition, it is not at all clear how much money from those members really goes to the programming, isn’t it?”
Expensive office
A lot of member money just goes to their expensive office, Tina thinks. “Many other things are also paid, such as expensive board members and also expensive office design. For example, WNL is known to have a very expensive office with incredibly expensive equipment and a very expensive design.”
“So that money goes to Goedemorgen Nederland when I become a member of WNL? I really think a journalist should dive into those membership spots.”
Spot
The conscious commercial: