Category: Ethics

News Media by Joe WilcoxMar 19, 201510:10 pm

What is Behind the Journal’s Big Google-FTC Scoop?

Technology industry news scoops rarely offer as much intrigue as Wall Street Journal story “Inside the U.S. Antitrust Probe of Google“. According to reporters Brent Kendall, Brody Mullins, and Rolfe Winkler, the newspaper obtained a years-old Federal Trade Commission staff document, “after the agency inadvertently disclosed it as part of a Freedom of Information Act request”.

Seriously? Is that accidentally, or accidentally on purpose? Applying the question every journalist should ask about anything—Who benefits?—raises reasonable suspicion the release was deliberate. I say that because FTC staff recommended filing antitrust charges against Google, while Commissioners cleared the search and information in a unanimous vote, according to the Journal. The answer to the “Who benefits?” question likely lies in circumstances obvious and not: Intrigue in and around the agency, including staff dissatisfied with the outcome; timing with respect to Google; and competitor lobbying, manipulation, or interference.

News Media by Joe WilcoxFeb 25, 201511:11 am

Stop Paying Bloggers and Journalists for Pageviews

Last week, headline “Samsung lied—its smart TV is indeed spying on you and it is doing nothing to stop that“, piqued my interest. In the preceding days, the InterWebs flooded with allegations that the South Korean manufacturer’s televisions listen to their owners. But I cringed reading the story, which appeared on BetaNews, where I also contribute. The reporting doesn’t support the headline, which if editor on duty I would never have permitted.

Editorially, BetaNews and I drift apart. My responsibility for day-to-day management ended in May 2013. I told one of the writer/editors yesterday, in context of discussing the Samsung headline: “No offense, but the story packaging is more like a blog everyday…Real stories have real reporting. Too many of the BN stories rely on someone else’s reporting. That’s primarily my saying feels more like a blog. The Samsung lied story is good example”.

BN editorial structure is more diversified now, with several writers acting as day or night editors. All contributors share in common something I detest: Pay by pageviews. The model is widespread among blogs and news sites, and I oppose it. There is inherent conflict of interest, when the reporter’s livelihood directly ties to clicks.

Responsibility by Joe WilcoxFeb 2, 20154:48 pm

Perpetual Prosperity Psychology and the Housing Bubble

Something about the housing bubble narrative bugs me: Conspiracy. Evil bankers conspired to bilk Americans by financing home loans to people who could never pay, to then repackage bad mortgages as good investment products. While I lauded Matt Taibbi news analyses in 2010 and 2013 for exposing financial institution malfeasance, the blame game always seemed to ignore one other party’s culpability: Borrowers.

New research paper “Changes in Buyer Composition and the Expansion of Credit During the Boom” is a fascinating post-bubble autopsy. Its conclusions, if they survive the test, rewrite the bubble narrative, which revision makes more sense to me.

Critters by Joe WilcoxJan 5, 201512:15 pm

Our Cat Cali gets Fixed

This morning, my wife and I took our daughter’s Tortoiseshell kitty Cali to San Diego Humane Society, where she will have her operation today. I don’t feel good about taking away the cat’s motherhood, or changing her personality in the process. But I feel obliged by circumstance.

Cali came to live with us in October 2014, after one of my daughter’s four housemates insist the cat go. She and we endured two heat cycles in the last month, while we waited for our appointment date. This morning in Cali’s absence, Neko is unsettled. As am I. She comes home late-day.

Yesterday I posted a poll asking: “Is your cat fixed?” The results and comments are worth calling out.

Living by Joe WilcoxDec 27, 201411:01 am

Who Should Get This Found Money?

Two days before Christmas, I sat in the local coffee shop waiting to meet someone who was late. Way late. Bored, I switched between cleaning crap mail out of my iPhone 6 inbox and watching patrons. Looking up from a text message, I spotted something green under a chair about 5 meters away. I walked over and picked up unexpected cash, and an amount someone surely would miss. What to do with it?

Found money is a blessing if you need it, but a curse to the loser. This particular WiFi-equipped barista bar, LeStat’s on Park, is popular with college students. I imagined some impoverished, scholarshiper losing the last of his or her Christmas cash, and I wanted to return it. But how? To whom? You can help answer the latter question, either here or on one of the social networks where I will link. This post is plea for advice.

News Media by Joe WilcoxDec 14, 201410:44 am

Defending Rolling Stone

Editor’s Note: Dateline April 5, 2015, Rolling Stone retracted story “A Rape on Campus” when publishing a forensic analysis prepared by Columbia School of Journalism. Please see my follow-up post.

I subscribe to five magazines: Entertainment Weekly and Vanity Fair (print and digital) and Economist, New Yorker, and Rolling Stone (digital only). EW is cheap (as little as $10 a year), while the business weekly offers news analysis I mostly trust. New Yorker is for culture and the occasionally exceptional long-form feature. The other two deliver some of the best investigative journalism available anywhere. Today, I defend one of them, but also criticize its archaic news reporting methods.

Over the past few weeks, Washington Post leads blasting criticism against RS for story “A Rape on Campus: A Brutal Assault and Struggle for Justice at UVA“, which appears in issue 1223, Dec. 4, 2014. Online the dateline is November 19. The furor over the investigative report’s credibility is, ironically given the headline, a rape on Rolling Stone‘s credibility—and makes me just want to puke for the outrageous, holier-than-thou repudiation that should be pointed elsewhere. Mountains of irresponsibly-reported online news stories overshadow the amount of trustworthy content, yet the Post and other media outlets choose to gang-bang a magazine with standards for accuracy and accountability but also advocacy. The misdirected, and sometimes self-serving, attacks are shameful for their shamelessness.

News Media by Joe WilcoxNov 22, 20147:36 pm

Uber Should Drive Journalists to Accountability

Good for Uber for being transparent about investigating journalists. Bad for Uber for buckling to public relations pressure and renouncing an executive’s statements about the practice. Every company tracks journalists, or bloggers, covering it—to which I can attest from experience. PR pros and I have, in the past, discussed dossiers about me, because some put our relationship first. They feel dirty for keeping records and need to confess.

The ride-sharing startup would do nothing unusual by collecting the data, and there is good reason to want to use it. My profession is in a state of crisis. Sloppy sourcing practices spread rumors across the vast Internet landscape like environmental protestors throwing feces on corporate executives. Shit is shit, whether or not literal, and it all stinks. If the Fourth and Fifth Estates can’t be accountable for themselves—and they most certainly are not—victims of irresponsible reporting should protect their interests.

News Media by Joe WilcoxNov 19, 201412:34 pm

When News Sourcing is Conflict of Interest

Some days you see yourself as a blithering idiot. Add Nov. 19, 2014 to my confessional. While doing my morning routine, before brain fully engages and random synapses fire fleeting inspirations, I stopped cold with chilling realization about the evils of blog or news site B sourcing A—and only A—or visa versa. What if there is unseen, or even hidden, financial benefit, such as sharing advertising networks? In a way, everyone using Google AdSense already meets that criteria. Consider me the dumb-ass (and you wouldn’t be alone) for not making the connection sooner.

I am a longstanding critic of news, or so-called news, sites sourcing someone else’s reporting. My March 2010 diatribe “The Difference Between Blogging and Journalism” is must-read for any news gatherer regarding responsible sourcing. The topic also gets big treatment in my book Responsible Reporting: Field Guide for Bloggers, Journalists, and Other Online News Gatherers. The four year-old post is free and still relevant, so start there.

Mutual financial benefit moves the sourcing problem from reporting ethics to blatant conflict of interest, whether real or perceived.

Society by Joe WilcoxNov 10, 201410:26 pm

The Best Content is Original

A dozen or so times a day, I figuratively puke all over my iPad Air, out of disgust when reading stories that are plagiarism aggregated, rumors that source nothing more original than some blog or would-be news site, or an echo chamber of repetition—news posts repeating the same, unsourced or poorly-sourced allegations. But occasionally, original content shines through, like Josh Lowensohn’s “I used Apple’s AirDrop to troll strangers with photos of space sloths (And it’s been going on for months)” for The Verge.

Josh doesn’t recap another blogger’s experience, by aggregating something original into a shallow repeat. He produces something enthralling, a story told with vigor, drawn from experience. It’s a confessional. About something sneaky. Invasive. Maybe even illegal. But fun, and activity the reader might wish he or she had been clever enough to have imagined or fearless enough to have done.

Living by Joe WilcoxNov 2, 20147:42 pm

O Canada, What Say You?

What do two forts share in common? Kaci Hickox, the 33 year-old healthcare worker from Fort Worth, Texas, taking refuge in Fort Kent, Maine. Surely you know of the so-called Ebola nurse and the legal scuffle about quarantining her. As an Aroostook County native born about 70 kilometers (okay, I rounded up) southeast of FK and having traveled widely across the Lone Star State, I know something about the character of both regions. Think independent-mindedness times two, which equals “Don’t tell me what to do”.

The simple story: She volunteered in Sierra Leone, where the disease rages. She returned to the wrong state, New Jersey, which put her in isolation. She fled to one of the most rural and remote areas of the Northeast. Maine’s governor demanded voluntary quarantine. She defied it. A federal judge ruled against the Gov. News reporters who couldn’t find Fort Kent with a Google Map ruined the autumn tourist trade by filling up the only hotel. We all wait to see if she stays symptom free through November 10. Pass the popcorn. The suspense is thicker than a horror flick.

Apple by Joe WilcoxOct 31, 20146:54 pm

Why is Tim Cook’s Personal Life News?

My colleague Mark Wilson takes on the task I failed to (but should have) in commentary: “Apple’s Tim Cook is gay—the fact it needs to be announced shows what’s wrong in tech“. The CEO’s admission, in a Bloomberg-Businessweek opinion piece, isn’t surprising. The news media’s overglowing reaction is the shocker, as Mark observes: “Websites have practically fallen over themselves to heap their praise on the announcement”.

What? Are bloggers or reporters afraid they might appear to be homophobic if neglecting to add their voice to the echo chamber? Many news writers called Tim Cook’s announcement courageous. This morning, in chat, I told Mark: “Your response to it is hugely courageous”. He chose not to join the echo chamber and even to risk recriminations for rightly questioning why so much news space was given to Apple’s CEO.

Apple by Joe WilcoxOct 29, 20145:43 pm

Should Journalists Accept Free Travel to Apple Events or Any Others?

This morning, I awoke to a perplexing question in the BetaNews Tips inbox. Reader Mark Bryant shares a story from Medium and asks: “Should Journalists be obliged to declare in their reviews that the company has paid for business class travel to the event and given them free devices?” It’s a goddamn good question given too little attention.

“The True Bendgate: How Apple Bends Reality and Why the Media is Playing Along”, by Richard Gutjahr with German-to-English translation by Elka Sloan, is excellent and informative reading. Medium is good forum for the tale. Richard tells about receiving an invite to last month’s iPhone 6 and 6 Plus launch event, for which he reports Apple paid for transportation.