Chicago Tribune Stops the Journatic Presses 62
theodp writes "In April, the Chicago Tribune touted its investment in and use of news outsourcer Journatic. 'We're excited to partner with Journatic, both as an investor and as a customer,' said Dan Kazan, the Trib's Sr. VP of Investments. 'Journatic will expand Tribune's ability to deliver relevant hyperlocal content to our readers, and we believe that many other publishers and advertisers will benefit from its services as well.' That was then. In a Friday-the-13th letter to readers, the Tribune announced a plagiarized and fabricated story has prompted the paper to suspend its relationship with Journatic. The move comes two weeks after Journatic's standards and practices were called into question by This American Life, which noted several Journatic-produced stories had appeared this year on TribLocal online with false bylines. Explaining why he went public about his experience at Journatic, reporter Ryan Smith said he felt 'people should know how their local newspapers are being hollowed out.'"
News Has Been Outsourced for Years. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Hyperlocal (Score:5, Interesting)
Seems either pointless, boring, or hyper-gossipy.
Hows that different from non-Hyperlocal newspapers?
Hyperlocal spam might be more interesting than non-hyperlocal spam. There's a Cabella's around 50 miles away, and I get spam for it, that spam is useless to me. Hyperlocal spam would be my neighborhood Gander Mountain, there's at least theoretically a chance I'd find that useful.
I'm not sure what the point is of a newspaper in 2012. My young son asked me about newspapers, and I explained it as "A tiny little part of the internet, printed out yesterday, and delivered to your house". He's completely uninterested. Everyone in my generation knows we're supposed to feel newspapers are important, maybe a sense of guilt at not subscribing. Rather like the donation campaigns for the Ballet at work, no one wants to go but we've all been socialized to believe its important. However, newspapers are so far off the modern cultural radar, that my kids don't even get the point. They're simply doomed. You know you're in big trouble when the conversation switches from "you're no longer relevant" to "what are you?"
Re:The Ole' Chicago Sucker-Roll (Score:2, Interesting)
Journatic: Go with us and you can fire all those expensive reporters on the ground and we'll replace them with cheap freelancers for next-to-nothing! And you won't take any hit in quality, honest. Hey...would we lie to you, pal?
Chicago Tribune: Yay, sounds great! We like money. And words are hard, 'specially the long ones.
Journatic: While we're at it, just between us, we also have some prime Florida real estate we can let you have for a steal...
Chicago Tribune: Yay, more money!!!
What "hit in quality"?
When the standards are Jayson Blair, Janet Cooke, and Dan Rather, the only thing bad about plagiarism and fabrication is getting caught.
Re:News Has Been Outsourced for Years. (Score:4, Interesting)
Well if you have worked in a newspaper, you'll realize that except for big name reporters, a byline is simply the credit given to the person who supplied data for a news report. This might consist simply of the basic who, why, what, how, where. The person who'd combine all this into something that isn't a mere tabulation of data would be the copy editor, who frequently goes uncredited (although I've seen news reports with a tagline like "With reporting by So-an-So).
The most "honest" bylines probably belong to a columnist or a lifestyle (useless news) section writer. Lifestyle writers have all the time to write their critical analyses of the latest Shakespeare play or why Facebook is a great way for moms to keep in touch. But for the front page, where time is of the essence, what the reporter submits is at best a rough draft.