April 19, 2007
Tell ‘Em What You DON’T Know
Butch Ward gave up many words of wisdom in his presentation. One phrase in particular makes a great motto for online journalists. To paraphrase:
Tell the reader what you know. And tell the reader what you don’t know.
This sentiment was echoed at Politico.com editor Bill Nichols’ 20 minute briefer on the site, its brief history, and its ambitious mission. Politico.com was merely two months out of the box on March 22, when Ben Smith blogged that John Edwards would announce his withdrawal from the ‘08 campaign 90 minutes before a scheduled press conference at which Edwards would address the reappearance of his wife Elizabeth’s breast cancer but would indeed continue his campaign for the Democratic nomination.
Smith relied on a single source—a friend of the Edwardses—on information relayed the day before, according to Nichols. Relying on a single source was not necessarily the crucial error, the former USA Today White House reporter explained, but had Smith told the audienced what he did NOT know, in addition to what he had heard, the blog posting would not have caused such a stir. In other words, as Ward said earlier, by exposing both what you know, and definitive information that you do NOT know for sure, your reporting is validated in the eye of the audience. It’s impossible to trump the reader in the Internet age. Mistakes are not soon forgotten. As Dan Gillmor, author of We the Media wrote, “the audience knows more than I do.”
The irony is that Ben Smith’s blog post became an even bigger issue after being reported second-hand by other media outlets that concurrently failed to do further due diligence on the Politico.com’s lead. Ben Smith more than redeemed himself by immediately posting an apology/correction and a lengthier column later in the day, which is something you don’t often see from other outlets (an unnamed correction in the next day’s paper wouldn’t cut it here, not to mention, some news orgs posted the official news as an “update” not a “correction.”
With 6 million pageviews a month, Politico.com is well-established as a major media player. It will be interesting to watch how it’s editors’ and contributors’ old-school print media standards translate—and hopefully advance—the integrity of online journalism.
By Andy Sternberg, 04/19/07 at 7:19 pm
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