“Of blogs, accuracy and editors.” Or: About Twitter, TechCrunch, and owning a mistake
Filed Under (Culture, Internet, Twitter) by David Chartier on 15-04-2008
Tagged Under : Culture, Internet, journalism, TechCrunch, Twitter
Mathew Ingram on TechCrunch’s baseless—and, as it turns out, completely false—claim that Twitter was testing ads:
having editors is a great thing (mostly). But journalism is about speed as well. It’s a classic battle between going with the story because you’re out of time, and checking one more source or fact.
This is why I feel constantly conflicted with the world of blogging. Don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful it exists and there are a lot of great bloggers and sites out there. Hell, I got to Ars Technica—a 10+ year web publication with staffed editors—because Weblogs, Inc. gave me a shot. But there are certainly levels of professionalism and rationality missing from segments of a blogging world that allows anyone to have a voice.
The race to be first with any story all-too-often becomes a rabid obsession with many bloggers. The techniques of checking facts, verifying with sources, and considering ramifications before hitting “publish” are sometimes hurled out the living room window in favor of nailing a few extra AdSense views or, if you’re lucky, fifteen seconds (or less) of fame on digg.
Again I ask you not to get me wrong—TechCrunch is a fine site, and Arrington and company work their butts off (also: TechCrunch, as far as I understand, is generally known for checking; the staff is decently connected to begin with). But Wingram has a point regarding blogging in general: there isn’t enough homework or even good ol’ fashioned fact-checking going on.
Fortunately, this time it doesn’t seem to have done any damage (remember when Engadget knocked $4 billion off Apple’s market cap by printing a bogus e-mail and not waiting for verified confirmation?). But blogging is quickly gaining the power and recognition it wants—now it’s time to handle the responsibility that comes along with it.
It’s also worth noting that, while Twitter’s Evan Williams refuted even testing ads on the service (in conversation with TechCrunch’s Arrington, nontheless), and numerous commenters on TechCrunch’s post have asked for an update, it looks like Duncan Riley flat-out rewrote the post with almost entirely new and different content. The original screenshot used as “evidence” has been replaced with the Twitter logo, and the post reads more like a bland postulation about Twitter’s supposed need for some kind of advertising.
Not the best way to handle this mistake. Everyone makes them. It would’ve been better to leave the original and post an update. Now it’s just an attempt to sweep the mistake under the rug.
In fact, isn’t updating an original post with clarification one of the (un)written rules of blogging?
