The best kind of PR is invisible and often the best kind of invisible PR is that which looks like news.

Mix this with the fact that news rooms are downsizing and you have the rationale for a growing reliance on an insidious form of PR known as the Video News Release.

The VNR – and its audio cousin, the ANR – are here to stay, judging by journalist Bob Burton’s new book, Inside Spin, which explores the rather pitiful relationship between public relations and journalism.

He argues that VNRs undermine an aspect of journalism that citizens may still have some expectation of – namely our job as “independent gatekeepers, filtering out puff and digging for the real story.”

Instead VNRs – which conveniently provide the footage necessary to make TV stories happen – replace the probing by journalists with the spin of PR professionals. And they work by exploiting the pressures on modern journalism as well as the laziness engendered by a culture in which reporters are spoon-fed by PR flacks.

Burton, the editor of the online “spin busting” database, SourceWatch, reckons VNRs represent “advertising and advocacy in the guise of news” and perfectly illustrate the “cohabitation of journalism and PR”.

They come in two forms -either a pre-packaged story fronted by a PR-supplied reporter or a “B-roll” tape for newsrooms to ease the production process.

A B-roll might include “overlay” (or related file footage) and unedited interviews with supposed experts. It’s all about making life easier for the reporter so he can knock up a story cheaply and quickly. And that’s all about ensuring the subject being flogged by the PR operator is embraced by the newsroom in the first place.

Burton’s best estimate of the number of VNRs distributed in Australia seems a bit low – between only 100 and 200 a year. But, considering these are the kind that cost up to $20,000 to produce, they nevertheless represent a sizeable investment in the manipulation of the news.

Burton kills the myth that news management is unaware about the use of VNRs. He demonstrates that the production companies often deal directly with chiefs of staff. And, it appears, no network in Australia is immune.

One Australian VNR production company boasted to its clients that one of its releases was played on 38 TV news bulletins and was seen by 7 million people.

PR companies are also using Audio News Releases, or ANRs to have their content distributed by radio news rooms. The material is loaded onto 1800 numbers or mp3 files and sent directly to reporters who appear to be lapping it up.

Although there is an urgent need for greater disclosure, Burton notes that this is unlikely. It seems that admitting PR has had a hand in the bulletin is of more concern to the networks than giving them that level of influence.