Streams of discussion and journalistic ethics

I posted a link to Martin Langeveld’s piece on the content cascade the other day and have been thinking a lot about the notion of discussion streams of late as I’m preparing to teach Online Journalism to the online master’s students this summer.

An illustration came to mind today as I was lecturing in Principles on media ethics. The case study we were walking through sketched a conflict involving a newspaper that had an ad submitted for publication from a local tanning salon. The ad made misleading claims that led the reader to believe that tanning beds are safer than laying out in the sun, whereas an advocacy group of dermatologists were upset that the ad was running because research shows the beds to be dangerous.

The reason discussion streams came to mind is that one of the proposed solutions was that instead of choosing to run or not run the ad, the newspaper could write a story about tanning bed safety and run it against the ad. Putting aside the problems that come with writing a hit piece against an advertiser right next to their ad, one thing that came to mind was the problem of time. Read more

From my reading radar: April 21, 2009

Stuff I’m reading and thinking about …

Mark Briggs has a good post about applying the reputation economy to comments on news sites. In terms of discussion online, when I talk to folks running news sites the issue of civility is usually atop the list of concerns.

Vin Crosbie has some good thoughts about where we are in the media reorganization, calling us in the “middlegame.”

I spent some time with working professionals last summer when I taught Online Journalism here at MU through our online master’s program. I wish I’d had this piece by Martin Langeveld from the Nieman Journalism Lab when we talked about journalism and the stream of discussion.

Mashable has some good thoughts about passing the social recruitment test for prospective employers.

Lastly, congrats to my former LA Daily News colleague Matt Hufman, who was part of the team that produced a series that won the Pulitzer Prize for public service. Matt reported and wrote a series of editorials that went with the packages that were considered for the award. He’s a top-notch journalist and a great guy.