4 ms·

This is a silly piece. The author just doesn't seem to be aware that the two things he complains about are just simply industry standards in journalism. He want

This is a silly piece. The author just doesn't seem to be aware that the two things he complains about are just simply industry standards in journalism. He wants journalism something to be that it isn't and has never been, and then critiques it for not being that thing. What he calls "copypasta", is called print syndication[1] and has always been standard practice in the news. Newspapers purchase the rights to some essay, piece of information or what have you and disseminate it to readers. There's no secrecy or lie by omission here, that's just how it works without anyone hiding it. It's been a thing since the 1800s. It's no different from a TV news channel purchasing the rights to some footage or program and rebroadcasting it. Ever heard of the AP or Reuters? That's what they do. As to citations, journalistic articles are not scientific pieces. The target audience of the NYT pays them to provide authoritative information, they're not an aggregator for links or a repository of a sort. If that's what you're going for a popular scientific journal is probably what you want, not The Guardian the NYT or some other paper of record whose very purpose is to talk to a general lay audience. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Print_syndication https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Print_syndication

Doctor_Fegg 4y ago
It's not even print syndication. It's a press release. In the Moncrieff case, he says "pawn off the quote as if they just did a bunch of investigative journalistic legwork and tracked it down but really all they did was poach it from another organization". Nope. A press release is where an organisation puts out a statement _specifically_ for the purposes of reuse. There is no sleight-of-hand or "poaching" involved. If I voluntarily give you £1, you haven't "poached" it from me. In this case, the press release - as Erik Hoel could have found out, as I did, with 10 seconds' googling - is at https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2022/jul/no-evidence-depression-caused-low-serotonin-levels-finds-comprehensive-review https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2022/jul/no-evidence-depression-c... . It has the full Moncrieff quote, verbatim. UCL will have sent it to the Guardian with the expectation that the quote is used.
- jrochkind1 4y ago
  I think the practice of writing an article-by-press release is worth commenting on. It essentially helps launder marketing into consensus "journalistic" truth. It is, of course, done because it is far cheaper and easier for a journalist to repackage a press release than to actually do reporting. You are right that it is widespread (which op certainly recognizes, that's their point), and it's not new (not sure if OP recognizes) -- Chomsky and Herman's Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (1988) originally brought this practice (and others) to my attention, along with in general thinking about what mainstream journalism actually does and how and why. (Because it is in large part, as a standard practice, driven by economics, it's possible it has accelrated as newsrooms and reporting budgets have been, literally, decimated. But that's just a guess). It is still definitely worth commenting on. That what standard journalism actually does, for the most part, even well-respected outlets, is not quite the model most people have of it, is quite a bit lazier and less reliable than the outlets would like you understand them as.
- Nomentatus 4y ago
  Note the copyright implications, too - these outlets claim copyright on every word, including the copypasta, and never distinguish what they actually do own copyright too; and don't.
schnitzelstoat 4y ago
Syndication is fine, but I'd appreciate citations/links. I understand that this would have been very difficult in the days of print newspapers but for online news, I really don't see why they don't do it. It would really help the fight against fake news.
- orwin 4y ago
  In my country, it is mandatory to add 'by Reuters' in small print near the title. I thought it was a EU convention (i dislike ordo liberalism as much as anyone, but i recognize that the emphasis on transparency is great.)
chiefalchemist 4y ago
This is my goto filter for "Is it journalism?" https://kottke.org/20/01/jim-lehrers-rules-of-journalism-1 https://kottke.org/20/01/jim-lehrers-rules-of-journalism-1 The unfortunate nature of modern journalism is its "rebranded" itself (in an Orwellian) sort of way. What used to be rare and shunned is now standard best practices. If that profession wants to be sloppy, lazy, etc. that's fine. But that's not journalism and the people doing it aren't journalists. It's obvious at this point they're not going to police themselves. It's up to the rest of us to call out what we see, when we see it.
- oezi 4y ago
  The unfortunate truth of modern journalism is that people don't want to pay for it. So being a journalist today means getting paid by the number of words or paid by the number of stories produced per day. I know for instance in a typical reputable German online news site a journalist on the news desk has to produce 4 to 8 news items per day. Per day! If you are on the investigation teams that is obviously lower but nobody can spend a week on researching a topic anymore.
  - chiefalchemist 4y ago
    My point is, "getting paid by the number of words or paid by the number of stories produced per day" is no longer journalism. Call it reporting. Call it wordsmith-for-hire. Call it whatever you want. But that is no longer journalism. I certainly understand the nature of that business has changed. However, that doesn't mean they get to be lazy and sloppy and still earn / deserve the title of journalism and journalists, any more than flipping burgers at McDonald's makes me a chef. The fact that they've knowingly and shamelessly changed the meaning of the word (i.e., they use it well aware of the fact that they don't meet the definition) doesn't make it okay. Repeating a lie doesn't magically turn it into truth.
- LeifCarrotson 4y ago
  In particular: > Cover, write, and present every story with the care I would want if the story were about me. When your subject is described by a press release to which you add little more than your byline, you haven't taken that level of care.
deadpannini 4y ago
For those that haven't read the OP, this comment is misleading. The original author, Erik Hoel, is not complaining about the _use_ of press releases, but taking exception to the general lack of attribution and the dishonest way that news outlets incorporate press releases into articles to imply quotations were obtained by reporters.
- xnorswap 4y ago
  That's entirely the intention of press releases. For a better critique of modern journalism and uncritical regurgitation of press releases and where it leads then Flat Earth News by Nick Davies is great reading.
- roenxi 4y ago
  The article is being naive in its views of what the institutions of journalism are trying to accomplish. It is obvious that they are not interested in disseminating facts. Wikipedia crushed the entire industry of for-profit journalists in getting reasonably sourced information out to the world. With lower costs and generally better accuracy and less bias. Mostly by accident and because their deep-citation approach is just better than the alternatives. Top 10 global website, and all that. The level of failure there by the media not copying them goes beyond incompetence, it is clear that there is no interest. None. Not worth a penny. Nothing of interest to the media. If the article writer wants to play along with the pretend game then sure, the journalists working for the places he lists are just having a little moment of weakness on a path to bettering their practices. No doubt their bosses are staring glumly into their coffee mugs wondering how to get better information out to the patient masses! However the world is going to be a strange place where nothing seems to quite happen the way he expects, if he wants to believe that. Journalists are creators of new, interesting and original content. That is often somewhat related to things that are factual. But they are not fact distributors.
coldtea 4y ago
>This is a silly piece. The author just doesn't seem to be aware that the two things he complains about are just simply industry standards in journalism. He wants journalism something to be that it isn't and has never been, and then critiques it for not being that thing. This is a silly comment. The author just doesn't seem to be aware that "standards" can still be bad and people can legitimately complain about them. Especially since the "standards" are not some professional legal code or technical protocols that have to be followed, but just common practices. Doubly so, since, besides some standards being inherently bad, even good standards can go stale over time. For example, newspapers not providing references might have been OK back in the days of print, but it's not in the web era, when a reference via a link to the source is trivial and gives immediate access to it to the reader. Triply so, since there do exist news outlets that do far better than the "standard": giving actual links, properly attributing, not pulling quotes out of their ass or unrelated interviews, and so on. So it's not "standards" being followed here, it's more like "minimum-effort common practices" being followed. [Heck, all kinds of "dark patterns" are now standard behavior in news outlets too. Doesn't make them ok]. Quadruply so, since "syndication" is not an excuse either. News outlets can (and some do) edit, restructure, and add links or other annotations to syndicated content from news agencies and other sources. In other words? A typical HN "piss on TFA" comment, promoting bad practices (sorry, standards), and being upvoted for no discernible reason.
Kye 4y ago
There's a reason various late night comedy show segments on it went viral. Running different anchors from different outlets reading the same script without any indication it's not their own one after the other is hilarious because it's surprising. Every single one saying the same thing, word for word. Segments discussing products with no indication it's paid. Fake products intentionally put through this system by comedians to point out how absurd it is. I think if you polled a random sample of people you would find most don't actually know this. Or didn't, and don't think it's okay now that they do. This very forum was started by someone who published an article on it in 2005. http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html
- rozab 4y ago
  I've never seen any segments like that, can you link?
  - Kye 4y ago
    These are the only examples I could find on a search: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIi_QS1tdFM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIi_QS1tdFM
alexalx666 4y ago
1. Its ok to have hi standards 2. copypasta is a cool startup name

Doctor_Fegg 4y ago

It's not even print syndication. It's a press release. In the Moncrieff case, he says "pawn off the quote as if they just did a bunch of investigative journalistic legwork and tracked it down but really all they did was poach it from another organization". Nope. A press release is where an organisation puts out a statement _specifically_ for the purposes of reuse. There is no sleight-of-hand or "poaching" involved. If I voluntarily give you £1, you haven't "poached" it from me. In this case, the press release - as Erik Hoel could have found out, as I did, with 10 seconds' googling - is at https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2022/jul/no-evidence-depression-caused-low-serotonin-levels-finds-comprehensive-review https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2022/jul/no-evidence-depression-c... . It has the full Moncrieff quote, verbatim. UCL will have sent it to the Guardian with the expectation that the quote is used.

jrochkind1 4y ago
I think the practice of writing an article-by-press release is worth commenting on. It essentially helps launder marketing into consensus "journalistic" truth. It is, of course, done because it is far cheaper and easier for a journalist to repackage a press release than to actually do reporting. You are right that it is widespread (which op certainly recognizes, that's their point), and it's not new (not sure if OP recognizes) -- Chomsky and Herman's Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (1988) originally brought this practice (and others) to my attention, along with in general thinking about what mainstream journalism actually does and how and why. (Because it is in large part, as a standard practice, driven by economics, it's possible it has accelrated as newsrooms and reporting budgets have been, literally, decimated. But that's just a guess). It is still definitely worth commenting on. That what standard journalism actually does, for the most part, even well-respected outlets, is not quite the model most people have of it, is quite a bit lazier and less reliable than the outlets would like you understand them as.
Nomentatus 4y ago
Note the copyright implications, too - these outlets claim copyright on every word, including the copypasta, and never distinguish what they actually do own copyright too; and don't.

schnitzelstoat 4y ago

Syndication is fine, but I'd appreciate citations/links. I understand that this would have been very difficult in the days of print newspapers but for online news, I really don't see why they don't do it. It would really help the fight against fake news.

orwin 4y ago
In my country, it is mandatory to add 'by Reuters' in small print near the title. I thought it was a EU convention (i dislike ordo liberalism as much as anyone, but i recognize that the emphasis on transparency is great.)

chiefalchemist 4y ago

This is my goto filter for "Is it journalism?" https://kottke.org/20/01/jim-lehrers-rules-of-journalism-1 https://kottke.org/20/01/jim-lehrers-rules-of-journalism-1 The unfortunate nature of modern journalism is its "rebranded" itself (in an Orwellian) sort of way. What used to be rare and shunned is now standard best practices. If that profession wants to be sloppy, lazy, etc. that's fine. But that's not journalism and the people doing it aren't journalists. It's obvious at this point they're not going to police themselves. It's up to the rest of us to call out what we see, when we see it.

oezi 4y ago
The unfortunate truth of modern journalism is that people don't want to pay for it. So being a journalist today means getting paid by the number of words or paid by the number of stories produced per day. I know for instance in a typical reputable German online news site a journalist on the news desk has to produce 4 to 8 news items per day. Per day! If you are on the investigation teams that is obviously lower but nobody can spend a week on researching a topic anymore.
- chiefalchemist 4y ago
  My point is, "getting paid by the number of words or paid by the number of stories produced per day" is no longer journalism. Call it reporting. Call it wordsmith-for-hire. Call it whatever you want. But that is no longer journalism. I certainly understand the nature of that business has changed. However, that doesn't mean they get to be lazy and sloppy and still earn / deserve the title of journalism and journalists, any more than flipping burgers at McDonald's makes me a chef. The fact that they've knowingly and shamelessly changed the meaning of the word (i.e., they use it well aware of the fact that they don't meet the definition) doesn't make it okay. Repeating a lie doesn't magically turn it into truth.
LeifCarrotson 4y ago
In particular: > Cover, write, and present every story with the care I would want if the story were about me. When your subject is described by a press release to which you add little more than your byline, you haven't taken that level of care.

deadpannini 4y ago

For those that haven't read the OP, this comment is misleading. The original author, Erik Hoel, is not complaining about the _use_ of press releases, but taking exception to the general lack of attribution and the dishonest way that news outlets incorporate press releases into articles to imply quotations were obtained by reporters.

xnorswap 4y ago
That's entirely the intention of press releases. For a better critique of modern journalism and uncritical regurgitation of press releases and where it leads then Flat Earth News by Nick Davies is great reading.
roenxi 4y ago
The article is being naive in its views of what the institutions of journalism are trying to accomplish. It is obvious that they are not interested in disseminating facts. Wikipedia crushed the entire industry of for-profit journalists in getting reasonably sourced information out to the world. With lower costs and generally better accuracy and less bias. Mostly by accident and because their deep-citation approach is just better than the alternatives. Top 10 global website, and all that. The level of failure there by the media not copying them goes beyond incompetence, it is clear that there is no interest. None. Not worth a penny. Nothing of interest to the media. If the article writer wants to play along with the pretend game then sure, the journalists working for the places he lists are just having a little moment of weakness on a path to bettering their practices. No doubt their bosses are staring glumly into their coffee mugs wondering how to get better information out to the patient masses! However the world is going to be a strange place where nothing seems to quite happen the way he expects, if he wants to believe that. Journalists are creators of new, interesting and original content. That is often somewhat related to things that are factual. But they are not fact distributors.

coldtea 4y ago

>This is a silly piece. The author just doesn't seem to be aware that the two things he complains about are just simply industry standards in journalism. He wants journalism something to be that it isn't and has never been, and then critiques it for not being that thing. This is a silly comment. The author just doesn't seem to be aware that "standards" can still be bad and people can legitimately complain about them. Especially since the "standards" are not some professional legal code or technical protocols that have to be followed, but just common practices. Doubly so, since, besides some standards being inherently bad, even good standards can go stale over time. For example, newspapers not providing references might have been OK back in the days of print, but it's not in the web era, when a reference via a link to the source is trivial and gives immediate access to it to the reader. Triply so, since there do exist news outlets that do far better than the "standard": giving actual links, properly attributing, not pulling quotes out of their ass or unrelated interviews, and so on. So it's not "standards" being followed here, it's more like "minimum-effort common practices" being followed. [Heck, all kinds of "dark patterns" are now standard behavior in news outlets too. Doesn't make them ok]. Quadruply so, since "syndication" is not an excuse either. News outlets can (and some do) edit, restructure, and add links or other annotations to syndicated content from news agencies and other sources. In other words? A typical HN "piss on TFA" comment, promoting bad practices (sorry, standards), and being upvoted for no discernible reason.

Kye 4y ago

There's a reason various late night comedy show segments on it went viral. Running different anchors from different outlets reading the same script without any indication it's not their own one after the other is hilarious because it's surprising. Every single one saying the same thing, word for word. Segments discussing products with no indication it's paid. Fake products intentionally put through this system by comedians to point out how absurd it is. I think if you polled a random sample of people you would find most don't actually know this. Or didn't, and don't think it's okay now that they do. This very forum was started by someone who published an article on it in 2005. http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html

rozab 4y ago
I've never seen any segments like that, can you link?
- Kye 4y ago
  These are the only examples I could find on a search: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIi_QS1tdFM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIi_QS1tdFM

alexalx666 4y ago

1. Its ok to have hi standards 2. copypasta is a cool startup name