What’s worse than a press release from hell? Sloppy reporting of it by mainstream media and bloggers, says Rich Gordon at E-Media Tidbits.
A couple of weeks ago, Nielsen//NetRatings put out a vague and poorly written press release (PDF) with a misleading headline that spread throughout the blogosphere (at least 17 citations on Technorati) and through Web and traditional news sources (40+ links on Google News). (Examples here and here and here)
While the majority of reports conclude that 21 percent of newspaper readers switched from print to online, Gordon points out, that’s not what the data really mean. “In fact, the data might mean that nobody has switched from print to online — that online newspapers are attracting a new audience that never read the print editions previously.
Most sites just excerpted the release. Even media outlets that assigned the story to a staff writer did little more than rewrite the release, with the same canned quotes, which Gordon calls “incomplete or sloppy reporting on the topic is a disservice to the industry — and to the society.”
Press Release From Hell and Lousy Reporting It Generated
BL Ochman | June 30, 2005 | Permanent Link | Comments (2) | TrackBack (
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Categories: Blogging and Moblogging, Dead Tree Journalism, Digital Journalism, Internet, Press Release From Hell, Worst Practices
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BL: That item was actually written by Rich Gordon (E-Media Tidbits is a group blog).
If I read that study right, 21% of Web users prefer the online edition. Of course they do, they use the Internet. To me the interesting part of the study was that 72% still prefer the hard copy. That means seven out of 10 Web users still prefer to read the printed material. That indicates the print edition is still the main choice of Web users. I would guess that the vast majority of non Web users also prefer the print edition. While online usage is gaining, it still has a long ways to go before the print edition becomes obsolete.