Verification and Journalism

I think a very important factor of journalism is to be as transparent as possible. Reporters should tell their audience where they are getting their information and facts. It is fine to say that you got a quote from an anonymous source, but it’s important to specify something about that source so readers know that it is credible. When I read a quote in an article that has no source or does not sound legitimate, I don’t take the article, the author, or the newspaper (or form of news) seriously. As the handout says, journalists have the right to be biased, but they must consistently test their information by seeking out multiple witnesses or disclosing as much information as possible.     Journalism is set apart from other forms of communication, such as propaganda, fiction, and entertainment because journalists are loyal to verifying their information. The public holds them responsible to this, and I think biased journalists are even more responsible to their audience to check their facts before they make broad statements.

                The WikiLeaks are an interesting example of journalistic verification. Reporters should be as transparent as possible, but I don’t think the public needs to know the secret operations and actions of the government that were disclosed with the WikiLeaks. All we know as citizens is that an anonymous source who works for the government gave the media the information found in the WikiLeaks. Although I do not doubt the truth of the documents, I think we need to be careful in accepting them as they are. We do not know very much about the source, and because of the suspicious and secretive nature of the information, I do somewhat question the credibility of the journalism that was displayed by the organization that published the WikiLeaks.

How WikiLeaks Outsourced the Burden of Verification:

http://www.cjr.org/campaign_desk/how_wikileaks_outsourced_the_b.php

Verification in Journalism in the Age of Real-Time Tweets:

http://www.reportr.net/2010/04/30/verification-in-journalism-in-the-age-of-real-time-tweets/

Toward a New Journalism With Verification:

http://www.nieman.harvard.edu/reports/article/100292/Toward-a-New-Journalism-With-Verification.aspx

The Profession: Forms of Journalism

Journalism has evolved with the rise of social media over the past few years. People are now able to find the news in any form they want, whether it’s on television, a video clip online, the newspaper, online newspapers, pictures, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and other sites. In class, we were given a handout that had three forms of journalism: a Tweet, a blog excerpt, and an excerpt from a New York Times article. Each reported the news of what was going on with the Egyptian protests, but they each told it in a different way. The Tweet was only two fragmented sentences that were simple and to the point; it told exactly what was happening in the most concise way. However, the Tweet only reported one event – it didn’t report on the entire story of the protests. The blog reported the news in a bulleted way. It was a list of quotes (some from unreliable sources) and facts, and it was much more in depth than the Tweet was. It told of many different events that had occurred, instead of just one like the Tweet. The excerpt from The New York Times was written like a story. It was creative and written in a way that readers could see an image of the events in their head.

I think that these different ways of telling the same event is a perfect example of how a person could receive the news in any way that they want. If I only had a second to check the news, I might look at Twitter to get an update of what was going on. If I wanted to get the basic facts of an event, I would want to look at blogs. If I had plenty of time to read the news and a newspaper was available to me, I would read it out of The New York Times or another paper to get a deep and complete coverage of the news. These different forms of the news have allowed more people to find the news in the way they want to receive it. I think many more people know what is going on in the world because they have the choice of reading or getting the news in the way that works best for them.

Lessons Learned in Types and Forms of Journalism:

http://blog.spot.us/2009/04/06/lessons-learned-in-types-and-forms-of-journalism/

New Forms of Journalism Emerge in New Media Ecosystem:

http://www.j-lab.org/about/press_releases/new_forms_of_journalism_emerge_in_new_media_ecosystem/

How Editors View Emerging Forms of Journalism:

http://www.editorsweblog.org/analysis//2007/03/2_how_editors_view_emerging_forms_of_jou.php

Loyalty and Journalism

In class, we discussed the fine line journalists must walk between pleasing their shareholders and being loyal to citizens. We discussed how a journalist must be loyal to citizens, but must also uphold their credibility as a reporter. I think that journalists should do their research to find the truth and report it, but I don’t think they should dishonestly or immorally dig up information to find the whole truth. Journalists should be loyal to citizens by giving them the truth in the best way they know how, but they should also be loyal to citizens by respecting them and their privacy. I think, for example, criminals should be exposed for their crimes, but it would be best that many of the things that happened in the past for normal citizens were left forgotten as they are now. I think many times when a reporter goes digging for information, it is not worth finding the truth to disgrace someone or act without integrity.

                I also understand that journalism is a business, and journalists have to do their job of reporting what goes on in the world. However, a corporation or the owner of a company should be committed to citizens (their customers) first. I don’t think journalists should have to compromise between pleasing their boss and reporting the news. The owner of a company should believe in core journalistic values. The problems some journalists must have about where their loyalties lie arise when their bosses don’t believe in the values of journalism. We discussed how The New York Times regularly turns away advertisements when important events happen that require a larger space in the paper for the news. The Times still makes plenty of money from advertising, but they also find a balance of reporting the right amount of news and information for citizens to receive.

                Journalism is about being a good storyteller. Even if a reporter’s loyalties lie elsewhere, they still have the ability to write an objective story that they don’t believe in or don’t agree with. If the quality of a journalist’s writing or effort goes down because he or she doesn’t believe in something, than he or she is not practicing the core values of journalism – reporting the news as it happens, without a bias.

A Pledge of Loyalty to Journalism:

http://www.creators.com/opinion/norman-solomon/a-pledge-of-loyalty-to-journalism.html

Journalism’s First Loyalty is to Citizens:

http://blog.oregonlive.com/oregonianopinion/2008/01/sandra_duffy_journalisms_first.html

The Changing Problem of a Journalist’s Loyalty:

http://www.digitaljournalist.org/issue0612/the-changing-problem-of-a-journalist-s-loyalty.html