from the it's-what-happens-in-the-heat-of-the-moment dept
There was a silly debate soon after the awful tragedy of the terrorist attacks in Mumbai last month, where people started questioning whether or not Twitter was a legitimate news source. There were many reports from people on the scene via Twitter, and it was a fascinating (if somewhat depressing) "real-time" way of keeping up on some of what was happening. But some criticized the reliance on Twitter-as-journalism by complaining that it wasn't journalism because Twitter reports got facts wrong. That sounds good, but if that's the actual standard, then, well, pretty much nothing is journalism. As Slate is reporting, early reports from the mainstream press seemed to get much of the story wrong as well.
In the heat of an ongoing crisis, it's no surprise that details and facts are somewhat cloudy, and sources aren't (and often can't be) checked, but in the rush to get the news out, information, whether or not it's accurate, is going to get reported anyway. That's not necessarily a bad thing -- so long as it's clear that the information hasn't yet been confirmed. It's better to get the information out there. However, as the Slate report notes, what newspapers could do, is do a much better job cleaning up after the fact -- as we suggested in our story last week about a newspaper's incorrect report that quickly spread around the internet. Rather than put up a correction, the newspaper simply deleted the wrong article and pretended it never happened.
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