The new question: How did the false rape allegations happen against WikiLeaker? Any governments responsible?
Update, 11:41 a.m. and after: Well, that was fast. The Swedes have withdrawn the warrant for Julian Assange, saying the rape allegations are false. MSNBC says a Swedish prosecutor “did not address the status of the molestation case, a less serious charge that would not lead to an arrest warrant.” Also see CNN story with a few details about the alleged incidents. One way or another, the real story ought to be, “How did the rape accusations come about in the first place? And were any governments responsible?” Below is the original post where I wondered if media would cut Assange less slack than they did Al Gore.
Al Gore was the victim of a smear job. I’ll be curious to see how the sex-crime allegations against WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Julian Assange turn out—it’s too early to say, other than to wonder about the timing of the accusations and some other oddities.
In The Solomon Scandals novel, the so-called respectables smear a Washington, D.C., gossip columnist to create a diversionary scandal to help turn attention away from massive corruption and a related building collapse. The Gore case wasn’t quite the same: the ex-VP was and is infinitely more respectable than his accuser.
But what of Assange? Among U.S. establishmentarians he would be regarded as a disreputable troublemaker, and in fact all kinds of issues arise about the leak of the names of intelligence sources for the American military and its allies in Afghanistan. But is this worthy of a smear, assuming there is one?
“What are the bets,” asks Rob Beschizza in the BoingBoing blog, “that someone under constant surveillance, publisher of powerful people’s secrets, would find time (while on a ubiquitously-covered trip to Sweden to legitimize the journalistic status of his organization and attend a public conference) to fit in some rape and molestation?”
If nothing else, I wonder how much slack the press will cut Assange compared to the handling of the Gore case. Actually I felt that journalists were a bit too charitable toward Gore’s accuser, but will this be far more of a problem in the Assange coverage, given that his respectable quotient is far less than Gore’s? How many news organizations will ask the same clueful question, about the Swedish accusations’ validity, that BoingBoing is?
Update: Assange is editor in chief of WikiLeaks but says he is not founder. I’ve changed the copy.
Related: Assange teaming up with Iceland on global press haven (via AFP). Also see Memeorandum roundup and BBC story.
Update: And for fun, check out ‘Journalistic warning labels.’
NYT Times story, spotted at 3:22 p.m.: Here. The Times says AP has reported that the Swedes are still looking into the molestation accusations. It also says: “Two Swedish newspapers said the allegations were made by two women who worked with WikiLeaks in Sweden.” Staff? Or freelancers? And any connections with any governments? I have no idea, one way or another. But the issue certainly is worth raising.
You might also enjoy:- Oil-enriched pols vs. a green Al Gore: New York Times story unfair to ex-VP?
- Al Gore’s ‘scandal’: Sex attack claims from Oregon masseuse are dodgy so far
- Gore sex probe dropped in Oregon: A NONscandal, without sufficient follow-up in the Washington Post and Politico
- ‘Journalism warning labels’: Helpful in Assange case?
- The Sally Quinn post
‘6 great novels that were hated in their time’: Hope for overlooked novelists and brave readers
What do The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (one book shown), Moby-Dick, The Catcher in the Rye, Lord of the Flies, The Grapes of Wrath and Brave New World have in common?
Literary critics hated them.
So, at least, says Jacopo della Querci’s Cracked piece—must reading for brave readers and overlooked novelists alike. Here’s the lowdown on the reception befalling The Lord of the Rings Trilogy:
“The reasons for Tolkien’s negative feedback were numerous, not the least of them being that he was a career linguist, not a professional writer. The New York Times described Tolkien’s writing as ‘high-minded’ and ‘death to literature itself.’
“The New Republic described the book and its characters as ‘anemic, and lacking in fiber’ which was apparently a real burn back then in the pre-Cheerios days. Even heavyweights like Isaac Asimov weren’t sold by the book’s whole industry versus the environment message, retorting that modernity ‘or perhaps the modern world… wasn’t all bad.’
“Hell, not even Tolkien’s friends were all that big on it. Tolkien had to stop reading samples of the book to them on account of negative feedback/hurt feelings. One member of Tolkien’s circle, Hugo Dyson (H.V.D. Dyson in geek) once famously moaned from a sofa during one reading: ‘Oh, fuck! Not another elf!’
How about Brave New World? “Even fellow futurists like H.G. Wells were shocked by the book’s dystopian landscape. Despite being the same man who wrote War of the Worlds, Wells describe Brave New World’s bleak future as ‘a betrayal.’ As for the book’s more forgettable critics, i.e. everyone else, responses ranged from dismissal to childish name-calling.”
Now here’s a question. If even critics can’t get these things right, just what are the implications of the above in an era when Amazon and many other book-related Web sites rely so heavily on the opinions of civilians? Perhaps it doesn’t matter, since the readers are rating books for each other, not posterity. Or does it? Meanwhile I think it’s tragic that Kilgore Trout is only imaginary and Kurt Vonnegut is dead. I’d love their opinions on these matters.
Detail: “Jacopo della Querci” is apparently a pseudonym? Note the similar name of an Italian Renaissance sculptor.
You might also enjoy:- What Epublishers Weekly says about ‘Scandals’
- Corrections: Any to add to our list for the next edition?
- A few words on tech, ‘screening’ and e-text—and Danny Bloom (1949–2032?)
- Solomon Scandals readable on new global Kindle—or you can buy the paperback, even if you’re outside the U.S.
- Solomon Scandals on Books On Board home page
TBD D.C.-area news site not a steady riser in early Alexa stats. But let’s wait for the full story
I’ve been rooting for TBD, the D.C.-area hyperlocal news site that some journalists regard as a savvy canary in the coal mine. Will frequent updates and a link-heavy neighborhood–by-neighborhood approach, tied in with local bloggers, be the future of metropolitan news? I really hope this experiment works, just as I wish success to other hyperlocals in the D.C. area and elsewhere.
So how is TBD doing, according to Alexa.com, which among other things measures sites by the “Percentage of global Internet users who visit”?
Well, following a debut on the morning of August 9, TBD would appear not to be enjoying a steady rise in traffic from world of mouth, if Alexa is on the mark. Alexa might be all wet. Alexa is not nearly as accurate as internal measurements based on counters embedded in Web pages. We’re a long way from the full story. And remember, too, the day-of-the-week factor to consider when analyzing traffic for a news-sports-weather-and-traffic site. For comparison’s sake, the above Alexa chart also picks up stats for the Web side of the Washington City Paper, which needs a lot fewer visitors to turn a profit.
I’ll alert my TBD contacts and see if people there can share more meaningful data and comment on the Alexa stats. Do they have any sign that immediate word of mouth is kicking in despite the above chart? How do the stats compare with expectations? Can TBD provide traffic stats of its own, the more significant internal ones? Keep in mind that even most major sites get off to slow starts—and, again, the serious limitations of Alexa, which is far from scientific.
Whatever the numbers, my theory is that TBD can grow traffic by being less DC-centric and offering more coverage of, say, the Washington suburbs, where, not so coincidentally, I live (Alexandria). I still wonder if TBD and allied operations have enough staffers to do the job right, even with a link-heavy approach.
Update: 9:39 p.m.: Speaking of geography, I don’t see a single Virginia story at the top of the TBD home page unless you count the weather update—even though I’ve been told that all TBD readers see the same main stories at the top. Doesn’t Virginia exist, too? Within Virginia, the most populated county is Fairfax and within the county, schools are topic #1 or close to it. But a quick and hardly infallible search of Google Blogs doesn’t exactly turn up an abundance of school-focused bloggers in Fairfax County. Maybe instead of building TBD’s blog network around the existing supply and distribution of bloggers in the D.C. area, TBD should train new bloggers from the ‘burbs who are knowledgeable about key topics like schools.I’ve heard of a former ABC producer in Reston who’s a PTA mom fixated on local test scores. Talk about a potential blogger for TBD or other sites wanting to do justice to the Fairfax County public schools! This is how to boost TBD’s numbers.
Update, 10:08: The TBD iPhone app is in the App Store.
You might also enjoy:- Solomon Scandals hyperlocal series so far: A list for latecomers
- Confederate History Month returns to Virginia: Should Northern VA secede?
- TBD’s Washington area news startup: Niche blogs wooed—but no signs YET of a hyperlocal nirvana
- Washington Post vs. Allbritton’s TBD Web startup plans: BOTH sides could do better
- How TBD could use hyperlocal journalism to kick the Washington Post’s butt
Media pieties debunked: Even NYT and WaPo pick up SOME rumors—and I’m glad they do
Here’s a question that the debut of TBD.com, the new hyperlocal site written up in Howard Kurtz’s media column today, makes all the more timely.
Just when should a reputable Web site—or maybe even a paper newspaper—publish rumors?
TBD’s people have expressed a strong interest in guiding readers to the truth; and the operation is not a rumor site. But with an emphasis on fast-breaking local stories, the line between news and rumor at times may be thin, just as it is on even the best news radio stations. The answer is to be transparent and share with readers the gaps in news stories and invite corrections, exactly what TBD is doing.
Psst! Think TBD is impure? Even the New York Times mentions rumors or speculation on occasion despite all journalistic pieties to the contrary. So does Kurtz’s employer, the Washington Post. And I’m glad that the Times and Post do, as long as they abide by certain commonsensical rules and doesn’t make rumors the main show. Among the other rules—or factors to consider:
1. Identification of rumors as rumors—rather than solid facts.
2. The source. Sony may well be about to release some new e-book readers, according to Sony Insider, and having considered the source, the CNET tech network feels comfortable in reporting the story with a question in the headline. On the other hand, I suspect that CNET would properly have ignored the report if it came from a news source unknown to it.
3. Positives for society in general vs. the negatives for the people written about. Or maybe the opposite—the risk that the publication involved will play into the hands of hype artists like stock-market scammers and corporate fraudsters. Take the possibility of a bank failure. Does the Web site or other publication risk setting off a panic? Or, via the hype, enriching unscrupulous Wall Street speculators? Just how widely should the information, whatever its nature, be shared?
4. Whether you may hurt the subject of the rumor by not printing the truth. The supposed Al Gore sex scandal was circulating online in the wake of a National Enquirer story—and the media had to write about it. At the same time the MSM people could and did raise questions. I’m just sorry that certain publications such as the Washington Post and Politco—owned by Allbritton Communication, the people behind TBD—didn’t publish more detail in questioning the rumor.
5. The prominence of the person—how close he or she is to, say, the presidency of the United States? Leonard Downie, former executive editor of the Washington Post, revealed in a video interview with Carol Joynt that the Post has an excellent rule. Don’t run ugly exposes of the personal lives of city council candidates. People at the Gore level are a different story since they may end up with their fingers on The Button. So the threshold for reporting a rumor would be lower.
6. In a related vein, the relevance of the rumor to the person’s role in public life. In The Solomon Scandals novel, I write of a gossip columnist whose employer deliberately sets out to wreck her career with rumors about her personal life. Even if the rumors are fact—and I leave that question open—I myself would not print the information. Gotcha morality is one way crooked corporations and governments try to blackmail activists into submission. It is no coincidence that some of the most corrupt societies are also among the officially most puritanical.
7. The nature of the publication itself. An oft-updated site like TBD will probably have a lower threshold than the paper edition of the New York Times. Often the new media in effect use conversation mixed with narrative. That is why a reporter-blogger at the Rock Hill Herald went with a credible rumor about a CVS Pharmacy being built near a Burger King, with the reporter mentioning a call placed to Burger King for confirmation. In other words, the readers would more or less be learning how the facts unfolded—a form of narrative. And via comments, they could participate in a conversation.
Doug Fisher, a senior journalism instructor and online newsletter publisher at the University of South Carolina, questioned the reporter-blogger’s decision. Defenders of the reporter-blogger said no harm was done and the nature of the online medium provided for an easy correction—and yes, the reporter was right about the CVS. I think this is a pretty gray area. Like the Fisher faction, I’d love to have known more about how the Burger King people knew that a CVS was on the way. First-hand info? I will say that I would not have printed the possible news—pre-verification—in a paper newspaper.
Footnote: Just to be clear, the Kurtz column is a general discussion of TBD—including links to members of a blog network—and not a condemnation of its prowess at getting at the truth.
You might also enjoy:- Wash. Post killing off domestic news bureaus: D.C. ‘prism’ better than the full story?
- A regular visitor? What would you like to read about?
- The trash factor: A big reason why newspapers are in trouble? And how can they cope with it?
- Solomon Scandals hyperlocal series so far: A list for latecomers
- Hyperlocal journalism: Georgetown publisher robbed—and eager to tell neighbors about it. Lesson for the Washington Post?