This just in from WorldWideWords.org:
PREDATOR A Sic! item last week mentioned a job advertisement for Fox News that referred to a "predator", a Writer/Producer/Editor.
Anthony Massey, a BBC news producer, e-mailed to say, "'Predator' is as you suggest a jargon term of the television news business, but it seems to be both very recent and so far confined to the US.
It may indeed be most often used by Fox News, as media companies do develop their own internal jargon. However, the job it describes is familiar in broadcast news organisations worldwide. It combines the journalistic function of producer with the technical skills of a picture editor, who assembles the film into a complete story. Now that 'film' doesn't have to be film, or even videotape,but often exists only on a computer server, there's no reason why one person should not research the story, write the script and assemble the pictures. In BBC News, and I believe in British television as a whole, such a person is simply called a producer. We have not felt a need to invent a new name, especially such an unpleasant-sounding one, just because the job description has expanded to take in new technology."
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