Ethics in Blogging
Group Leader: Melissa Cornick
After news producer Melissa Cornick confronted an internet blogger who was a presenter at this event over how he sullied her reputation after her major news story aired, and later sold rights to his site for over a million dollars, she decided to hold a discussion and get feedback on one of her favorite topics: Ethics.
Cornick put forth an impromptu hypothetical case to discuss how bloggers would or could best handle it.
Participants include: Kate Myers, Cory Heidelberger, Peggy Holman, Tish Grier, Ekse Kainer, Cody Howard, Ruby Synriche, Sara Bauer.
Here is the hypothetical:
A national news story questions whether the local media got the story wrong. But havoc is caused locally by the aired report because it involves child molestation at a day care center:
Several years previously, two children at a Bakersfield, California day care center, while speaking with a psychologist, had made some disturbing drawings. At the end of extensive interviewing, the children asserted that not just the parents, but the uncles, the aunts and the grandparents had committed child molestation.
The local prosecutor arrested, tried, convicted imprisoned the entire family for life. It was a high profile story.
Years later, out of the blue — a national news producer receives a tip and speaks extensively with the imprisoned family members. She learned that the prosecutor has covered numerous similar cases in and that other families in the area have also been accused and convicted. Some aunts and uncles in the first case who were on the lam claim the molestations never occurred and present evidence.
Now the community in an uproar. People are pulling their kids out of the day care center for fear that with the prosecutor under scrutiny, their children will not be protected. The day care center has angry communications with the local press which revives evidence against the family and other details provided by the family’s former neighbors. They all claim big media got the story wrong.
Several conference participants committed to this fast, free flowing discussion. Here are some of the quotes:
“Big journalists don’t always get it right. For example, there was an incident with the New York Times. They published story with false information on a guy, basis of the story was wrong. If we research him, the bad New York Times story will come up in the search, but the retraction won’t.”
“This is like the attacks by Fox News which says there is a great left wing smear machine. The story becomes the response that Fox is making. The more Fox is lying about this issue the more it gets incendiary and the more Bill O’Reilly mocks the original story.”
What’s the best way to proceed on evidence for bloggers?
“Go back and look at local paper archives. Maybe local media did convict beforehand. Some of the best blogging equals people being willing to look at multiple versions of the truth. What was the initial report? Chat with people, see what was going on when it first started. Then look at how did we got here.”
“You want to be thorough, so you talk to everyone in the neighborhoods to check reputation of the family, reputation of the national reporter. It’s difficult because you can’t not offend someone.”
“Maybe local media failed. The dance for any journalist covering a sensational story is convict before there is a trial. Check media coverage of the case from beginning to where we are. See whether or where the outcome was affected. Hopefully job of blogger is to make it right.”
“As a blogger, you may not be able to get people to talk to you. People are less willing. It’s a tough thing, Can you put your piece on hold as you to wait for people to come to you? Probably not, but there might also be legal issues when you try to investigate. You don’t want to add to the problem by posting hearsay.”
Do bloggers have the same ethical standards as journalists?
“Village Soup actually shares best practices. Our collective endeavors were characterized by huge number of mistakes. We tried to learn fast and cheap so that we could adapt fast. I would compliment the sponsors of this conference, Bill, Steve and Peggy and encourage them to keep up discussions that more likely that we will empower Pamphleteers to sustain quality journalism in the 21st century.”
“Consult a lawyer. Bloggers don’t have the first amendment rights of the press. Laws vary from state to state, check it out and see how you are going to be supported.”
“Star Tribune once took something we originally reported and they gave us credit for it, and they got own source. But that is not always the case.”
Are you competing with news organizations?
“Traffic on the story doesn’t benefit me even if I get a mentioned in big media. Half the time people don’t look to find you. If there is no link, you won’t get the traffic. Sometimes, they don’t even mention the site by name. Equally worse, they don’t contribute to the site.”
“Regarding credits, copyright, creative comments license. Nothing stops the mainstream from taking your stuff.”
“Everybody has been talking about community aspect and wanting to continue this community. Journalists and big media should be part of that continuum.”
Are there blogger biases against corporate journalism?
“Minnesota News Council handles complaints and open lines of communication with journalists and the public . We focus on media literacy so that people know that the big “bad” media aren’t necessarily out to get them. More traditional journalist and media consumers have more concern with bloggers than community journalists, There is a trust issue. I want to make sure I can trust at a certain level and believe in what the product that is being produced. The idea of ethics is primarily thought of as a journalist responsibility to report truth and to be honest. I believe that I have a renewed hope in ethics involving emerging new journalists.“
“Whatever you find out about the case, present it and let it go. Self correcting amounts to building your own reputation and the opportunity to build relationships.”
“Don’t get emotional because you can wind up insulting people. Mark Potts (a reporter?) came to me and said, this is how I feel about what you wrote. I ended up giving Mark the respect. You find out the the journalists are hard working people, just like us.”
“We’re human and everyone makes mistakes. We have got to look at the best way to do this. If we are continuously updating the story, we must go back to our original post and update. Something here may be wrong and so we must link to new post. Allow the debate and don’t go back and delete our original post in order to correct your own mistakes. All of this becomes part of the story.”
“One blog is not supposed to make a difference. The impact should come out of a collective process. And there ways to formalize the process so that it doesn’t veer off into mob rule direction. Ditto for journalists.”