3 ms·

If they interviewed one of the scientists whose name was on the paper, wouldn't that count? Also, it's hard to publish links on the radio. Finally, I think yo

If they interviewed one of the scientists whose name was on the paper, wouldn't that count? Also, it's hard to publish links on the radio. Finally, I think you missed his point- not all news organizations are going the tabloid route.

tokenadult 16y ago
If they interviewed one of the scientists whose name was on the paper, wouldn't that count? My answer, as a former journalist, is that whether or not that would count would depend on how well the reporter prepared for the interview. Good preparation for an interview of a scientist who just published a news-making paper would be reading the paper before the interview. It's just as easy to cite papers on the radio as in print to make the paper findable, by saying something along the lines of "a paper by A. Smith and B. Jones published in the 1 April 2001 issue of Science." That's not a complete citation format, but Goldacre's complaint in the blog post submitted here is about mentions of papers where perhaps an author was mentioned, and perhaps a journal title was mentioned, but the date of the paper was not mentioned, and a link to the paper found in a press release was not reproduced in the online version of a print publication that often carries links to other online content. After edit: I agree with you that you are responding to an exaggeration in a comment to the submitted article, with an example of a news organization that does better at fact-checking than the news organizations mentioned in the submitted link, and I too think there are happy exceptions to the tendency in some places for journalism not to cite published research. Here's wishing for more journalism to emulate the best current examples of careful research and meticulous citation of sources.
anamax 16y ago
> If they interviewed one of the scientists whose name was on the paper, wouldn't that count? No. If you're reporting on science, for example, the interview is unlikely to provide sufficient information. The interview is information for telling a story. Why? Because journalists aren't subject-matter-experts - they're story-tellers. > Finally, I think you missed his point- not all news organizations are going the tabloid route. You miss the point. The fact that some news organizations don't trade coverage for access does not imply that those organizations are producing good news. It just means that they're not committing a specific (albeit common) sin. In other news "both sides don't like my coverage" does not imply "my coverage is good/fair/balanced/etc". However, it would be nice if you provided a link to all of the interview, not just the results of your edit.

tokenadult 16y ago

If they interviewed one of the scientists whose name was on the paper, wouldn't that count? My answer, as a former journalist, is that whether or not that would count would depend on how well the reporter prepared for the interview. Good preparation for an interview of a scientist who just published a news-making paper would be reading the paper before the interview. It's just as easy to cite papers on the radio as in print to make the paper findable, by saying something along the lines of "a paper by A. Smith and B. Jones published in the 1 April 2001 issue of Science." That's not a complete citation format, but Goldacre's complaint in the blog post submitted here is about mentions of papers where perhaps an author was mentioned, and perhaps a journal title was mentioned, but the date of the paper was not mentioned, and a link to the paper found in a press release was not reproduced in the online version of a print publication that often carries links to other online content. After edit: I agree with you that you are responding to an exaggeration in a comment to the submitted article, with an example of a news organization that does better at fact-checking than the news organizations mentioned in the submitted link, and I too think there are happy exceptions to the tendency in some places for journalism not to cite published research. Here's wishing for more journalism to emulate the best current examples of careful research and meticulous citation of sources.

anamax 16y ago

> If they interviewed one of the scientists whose name was on the paper, wouldn't that count? No. If you're reporting on science, for example, the interview is unlikely to provide sufficient information. The interview is information for telling a story. Why? Because journalists aren't subject-matter-experts - they're story-tellers. > Finally, I think you missed his point- not all news organizations are going the tabloid route. You miss the point. The fact that some news organizations don't trade coverage for access does not imply that those organizations are producing good news. It just means that they're not committing a specific (albeit common) sin. In other news "both sides don't like my coverage" does not imply "my coverage is good/fair/balanced/etc". However, it would be nice if you provided a link to all of the interview, not just the results of your edit.