If you haven't caught it, there was a great article yesterday in USA Todayabout the negative impact unfavorable media reports can have on theindustry. Over here at Counter Culture, we've been pretty convincedof otherwise.Our main feeling has always been: Do consumers reallycare that much? If anything, we've always thought that reports of achain doing poorly will actually attract shoppers becausethey're going to expect bargains.Well, this article didn'tnecessarily convince us otherwise (we're not going to ignore aretailer's announced store closings any time soo), but it did bringup a few points that we hadn't considered.Falserumors about gift cards not getting redeemed. We haven'treported on anything like this, but it does make sense that thiscould have some negative impact. Charming Shoppes executivesactually attribute this to weakened gift card sales over theholiday season.False reports about an unhealthy retailer candamage relationships with suppliers. Is this really true? Wewould hope that it isn't and that suppliers have a financialrelationship with stores that goes beyond just checking up on themin the media. (Plus, how many suppliers are doing all that greatnowadays?)One point we were glad we saw: Journalists rely onspeaking to "independent experts" because MANY MAJOR RETAILERSDON'T TALK TO THE MEDIA. The story particularly concentrated on thedoom and gloom forecasts of Howard Davidowitz, an analyst who we'veloved quoting in the past because he has such colorful things tosay. We've always left it up to the reader to determine whether ornot they agree with him.Also, make sure and look at the sidebar inthe article that shows the health of some major retail chains basedon S&P data. Interesting.