16 ms·

Is It Journalism, or Just a Repackaged Press Release? Here's a Tool to Help

183 points by hythloday 13y ago

elorant 13y ago
And then publishers wonder why we've stopped buying newspapers years ago.
obviouslygreen 13y ago
It may seem like a minor nitpick, but the main Churnalism site[1] touts the byline "Discover the journalism you can trust and what you should question." The purpose of this tool is definitely a step in the right direction, but just because a given piece probably isn't a recycled press release doesn't mean you should stop looking at it with a healthy dose of skepticism. [1] http://churnalism.sunlightfoundation.com/ http://churnalism.sunlightfoundation.com/
- DanBC 13y ago
  Sometimes the press release is more accurate. There have been examples in the UK when something released by the Office for National Statistics[1] is looked at and interpreted by a journalist. Unfortunately statisticians get the numbers right and journalists don't, and so reporters make very dramatic statements that just aren't supported by the numbers. [1] (http://www.statistics.gov.uk/hub/index.html http://www.statistics.gov.uk/hub/index.html)
  - jkldotio 13y ago
    Which is why I include statistics.gov.uk in my UK section of http://jkl.io/ http://jkl.io/ I think we can get around more than just churnalism if people have direct access to academic, state, NGO and partisan materials without journalistic intermediaries. It's niche, in that not everyone is going to read such a site, but important I think.
  - pp19dd 13y ago
    Though in our defense, there are also plenty of times when the numbers are wrong and journalists are right. After performing a basic checksum, we contacted the UN to get a clarification on their firearm-homicides report discrepancy (their A + B should have been equal to C, but wasn't in some cases.) Their response was to basically manually correct column C without ever explaining why it was off. That shook our confidence in their collection and analysis methodology. State department nonimmigrant visa statistics for the past decade has plenty of numbers for T-2, T-3, T-4, T-5 visas (about 1,500) but only zeroes for T-1. Problem? Description of "T-2" through 5 is "Spouse of T-1", "Child of T-1", "Parent of T-1" and "Unmarried siblings of T-1". So if these are dependents of the visa holders, what happened to T-1's? After pursuing this, we received no comment and hit a dead-end. Somewhat understandably, as T-1 description is a sensitive topic: "T-1: Severe human trafficking informants."
- erdogan 13y ago
  Agreed. Also, this tool seems to be more about raising questions about context rather than a litmus test for plagiarism. As the author wrote, "Although such quotations are not examples of churnalism per se, Devine says that that information will be helpful to readers too, showing them the context a quote appeared in, and giving them the chance to think about why a reporter selected a particular passage from all of the others."
mseebach 13y ago
Aren't good PR people supposed to "sell" their story directly to a "journalist", without an intermediate publicly available press release? Will this tool find those? Also, there's a certain irony in that this story itself almost certainly is "planted" PR.
- illuminate 13y ago
  "Aren't good PR people supposed to "sell" their story directly to a "journalist", without an intermediate publicly available press release?" That would require that the "journalist" pay attention and not just directly look through their pile of releases for a "story". News departments are lazy and don't want to pay for real news, they want it spoon-fed.
  - mseebach 13y ago
    It's spoon-feeding I'm describing. It's just targeted, one-to-one spoon feeding instead of spray-and-pray press releases. It is way easier for a journalist to go to lunch, accept flattery for his sharp style and leadership in his field, and then walk home and copy-paste the text handed to him, than sift through the same pile of press releases that every other journalist in the industry is also sifting through.
    - mpclark 13y ago
      My, aren't we all cynical today? There is nothing wrong with the concept of a press release, particularly when used as intended, as a starting point for a piece of journalism. In the media we write many different kinds of stories. Some are the vast investigative pieces that put the world to rights and might one day win a Pulitzer prize, but others are simply humdrum announcements of new products or services. I'd have thought that a community of founders would appreciate the value engendered by outlets that gather eyeballs for particular sectors and spread the sort of bread and butter news that is press released day in day out by stakeholders in those sectors -- usually after having first removed the hype, dubious claims ("World's first!") misrepresentation ("A and B have partnered to..." when it means A has bought/licensed something from B) and fluff ("We are excited to...", "This development reaffirms our commitment to...") that the authors of the press releases have inevitably included. The simple truth is that press releases were not designed for direct consumption by the public, and sites that reproduce them verbatim do nobody any favours. However, in many circumstances several outlets could legitimately run very similar stories based on the same press release, and deliver great value in doing so because they all reach different audiences. Using a press release as a source is not in every case a dirty little secret that needs to be exposed by clever software. Addressing the point made in the parent post, it seems to me there is a bit of a disconnect in assuming that one can take a journalist to lunch, tell him how very clever he is, and then hand him copy-paste text. Wouldn't work on anyone I know...
zapdrive 13y ago
Reminds me of the fake web browser and IQ study (which claimed IE users are dumb). Basically every media house just copy pasted the press release. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Quotient_(IQ)_and_Browser_Usage http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Quotient_(IQ)_and_...
- Samuel_Michon 13y ago
  Since then, has there been a real study into the relation between intelligence and browser choice? I suspect the hoax report largely was picked up by IT sites and mainstream press because the conclusion sounded plausible to them (IE users = not smrt).
  - ubersync 13y ago
    Yea it was an exploit of a cognitive bias (confirmation bias, to be exact [1].) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias
Articulate 13y ago
As a former PR person I can tell you that this ap is AWESOME. the general public has no idea how much of their "news" is actually just corporate created "infomercials" I don't even mean to sound like a conspiracy theorist- but it is truly shocking when as an intern I would write press releases and then later that night hear my exact words said on the evening news. This is especially true of newspapers who are trying to create reams of content but with far fewer journalists. If this app works as well as they claim- this is a game changer.
- thisishugo 13y ago
  I never quite published a press release verbatim in all the news stories I have written[1], but sometimes the information density of a press release is so low as to make a rewrite look like a copy anyway. [1]https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=site:trustedreviews.com+hugo+jobling+news https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=site:trustedreviews.com+hu...
  - abraxasz 13y ago
    I don't think there is a problem with press releases, as long as journalists acknowledge them for what they are: press releases. It's fine imho for a newspaper to reproduce a press releases verbatim, if it makes it clear to the reader that no post-processing has been done. What is not ok is to trick the reader into believing that a piece of information has received adequate treatment, when it really hasn't. There's an implicit contract of trust between the newspaper and the reader, and if that app does what it advertises, it will make the contract harder to breach.
    - guelo 13y ago
      The only way it should be acceptable is if the journalist writes "the company said X but they stand to make money off of it and I have not verified it."
      - Pwnguinz 13y ago
        I used to think that, until I read this: http://www.zerohedge.com/content/zero-hedge-conflictsfull-disclosure-policy http://www.zerohedge.com/content/zero-hedge-conflictsfull-di... In particular: | The reality is, critical readers should read analytic | posts and the rest of Zero Hedge* with the blanket | assumption that the author is totally "conflicted." | (Phrased more logically, that the author stands to | benefit from being right--imagine that). * Replace "Zero Hedge" with "News Site", "Blog", etc.
sehugg 13y ago
This would be pretty awesome with a browser plugin.
- hythloday 13y ago
  Here you go: http://churnalism.sunlightfoundation.com/downloads/ http://churnalism.sunlightfoundation.com/downloads/
  - notimetorelax 13y ago
    Does it analyse every page I visit? I would prefer if it was activated by a button press only when I need it.
    - jcarbaugh 13y ago
      It runs automatically, but only on a whitelist of sites. You can edit the list in the extension settings.
      - notimetorelax 13y ago
        Thanks, good to know.
TeMPOraL 13y ago
For reference, the term "PR Submarine" refers to pg's essay, "The Submarine" - http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html.
RyanMcGreal 13y ago
Obligatory reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh_Kx7UKndI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh_Kx7UKndI
JonnieCache 13y ago
For an in depth investigation into this phenomenon, see Nick Davies' Flat Earth News: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flat-Earth-News-Award-winning-Distortion/dp/0099512688 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flat-Earth-News-Award-winning-Distor...
runjake 13y ago
Great application. And as always, a healthy dose of skepticism is good. The two questions I always ask myself when reading something or listening to someone is "Why are they telling me this? What is their motive by telling me this?". I ask these questions whenever I listen to anyone, from the salesperson, to a journalist, to a politician, to my wife and kids.
ignostic 13y ago
This is really awesome. It's definitely a step in the right direction, anyway. If the tool really catches on, though, there's an easy loophole that spammers have been using to trick Google for the last ten years. You simply load the content into a "spinner" and have it generate synonyms. Articles for human consumption used to require manual editing, but the programs are getting better. Spammers have been known to use a similar trick to re-use company "news" by sending journalists re-written releases as "exclusives." This is why real journalists call, verify, and investigate. Publications like the NYT or WSJ are never fooled by the tricks above, though they may use some AP or PR copy to save time.
- guelo 13y ago
  Before a journalist takes the time to load a press release into a "spinner" maybe they'll just go ahead and rewrite in their own words.
Create 13y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent:_Noam_Chomsky_and_the_Media https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent:_Noam_Ch...
mjn 13y ago
In addition to stuff lifted from press releases, it seems to also notice when articles borrow large chunks of verbatim text from Wikipedia.
stretchwithme 13y ago
kudos on the name.
danso 13y ago
A cool app, but a sad statement about the state of journalism that PR fluff is as easy to spot as seeing quotes come verbatim from previously published PR pieces. The more insidious PR can come from spoon-fed "exclusive" interviews and not be as easily detected by this process. Even better would be something that produced a dossier of organizations and spokespeople...so that you can easily see the potential connections behind any quoted source (of course, there will be false positives) In news stories, someone's role as a shill can be papered over by calling them a: "industry expert" or "author" or "researcher/analyst"
- fyi80 13y ago
  Of course, the simple solution to that is that "Exclusive" is never in the reader's interest.
regis 13y ago
Isn't this a part of some sort of PR strategy for the Sunlight Foundation? It's sort of hard to take this article seriously when the article literally contains fragments from the application's about page. Isn't this what they're trying to 'protect us' from?
- fyi80 13y ago
  The Sunlight Foundation may be happy for you to know this is their PR. Not really their fault that the Rebecca Rosen is too lazy to write a proper article. It ironically drives home the very point of their app, which perhaps was intentional by Rosen!
  - rthomas6 13y ago
    Unfortunately, when I run the article through the tool it returns no hits.
doctorpangloss 13y ago
The Churnalism concept has been circulating in media/nonprofit think tanks for a couple years now. Before a team worked on something similar at the Berkman Center in Cambridge, MA, we all discovered tools like iThenticate, which do the same job and more better. More importantly, very little PR news was mislabeled as not PR. It was hypothesized that politicians read from PR directly into the Congressional record, but the instances were so exceedingly few and the audience so exceedingly small that there were no discoveries to announce. Hence color me a little unsurprised that despite a great tool, Sunlight Foundation didn't actually find anything too controversial to announce with their tool.
- fyi80 13y ago
  If the PR was circulated privately to a high value, unique target (like Congress), would you expect an eternal analysis to find it?
eli 13y ago
Depending on the release and the article, I'm not convinced that rewriting or lifting words from a press release is always a bad thing. Is it possible to write a story about the latest Consumer Price Index without it being substantially based on this press release http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/cpi.pdf http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/cpi.pdf ? Is it possible to write about a newly announced iPhone without lifting data from Apple PR events or releases? I would rather have an article that lifts a technical phrase from a press release over one that attempts to reframe or extrapolate from it in a way that is no longer factually correct.
- fjh 13y ago
  > Is it possible to write about a newly announced iPhone without lifting data from Apple PR events or releases? No, but writing about the newly announced iPhone shouldn't really be called journalism.
  - eli 13y ago
    Why not? So is a press release never news?
    - lostlogin 13y ago
      I agree with both of you. A journalist (in my opinion) shouldn't be someone who rewrites press releases. Having just finished Robert Fisks column before I came here, I'm certain of that. Not everyone can be where he is however, and the small local stories need to be written. Re-writing press releases is a mile from these situations however - at least read around the subject and compare/contrast (?pad it out) with what others are doing.
- fyi80 13y ago
  This is a solved problem for journalists, and it is called "citing your sources". Either your source is anonymous and you give a good reason, or your source is cited. When sources are not cited, we have PR or lies masquerading as journalism.
pp19dd 13y ago
Pardon my skepticism, but an automated tool that replaces vetting, critical thinking and analysis may not be as helpful as it leads to believe. I've punched in three stories that I specifically know came from a PR, and the tool wasn't able to spot anything amiss with it.
kenko 13y ago
Is it published on a technology or startup-focused site that isn't Ars Technica? It's a press release.
xadxad 13y ago
The Sunlight Foundation has been full of awesome ideas and tools. Its worth digging into their other projects
kderbe 13y ago
The Atlantic piece is light on details, but the Sunlight Foundation has a blog post describing the technology used for text pattern matching, titled "Churnalism US: the Nuts and Bolts" (http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2013/04/23/churnalism-technical-background/ http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2013/04/23/churnalism-tec...). They've released the core matching code, called SuperFastMatch, as free software (https://github.com/mediastandardstrust/superfastmatch https://github.com/mediastandardstrust/superfastmatch).
Wonderdonkey 13y ago
Journalism isn't supposed to be fiction. The information comes from some place other than the journalist's mind, and often that information originates in a press release, though that absolutely should not be the end of a journalist's research. Still I don't understand why journalists (including some of the ones I have hired as freelancers) are willing to regurgitate a press release and leave it at that. Some even plagiarize releases and put their bylines on the story, which is beyond shady. But beginning and ending with a press release is lazy. Sometimes more information just isn't available. Sometimes. I cover technology. There is no technology that isn't announced in a press release. It's just the way the industry is. It's either a press release or leaked information that will appear in a press release later anyway. But press releases, as someone here mentioned, are often lacking in details. They're also often just plain inaccurate. It is a very rare PR person who has any grasp of technology beyond Twitter and Microsoft Office. Why do people write stories based exclusively on a press release instead of getting hold of the software or hardware, reading spec sheets, reading manuals or at least visiting the product information page online? You write a story about a new projector. What ports does it have? Those aren't in the press release, but they're easily accessible. Throw ratio? Weight and dimensions? Lens options? Throw distance? All of those pieces of information are important to your readers and can easily be learned by looking outside the press release. So why skimp when your audience is counting on you? Now, all of that said, I think the premise of this tool is a joke. Google works fine when I want to find out if my writers are plagiarizing verbatim, which I have caught some doing. But other than that, every single piece of journalism is based on information obtained from somewhere, whether it's a press release in your mailbox or a press conference in the White House, whether it's a whistle blower meeting you in secret or a piece of damning evidence you found in a dumpster. It all comes from somewhere.
zimpenfish 13y ago
Today I will mostly be: sketching out how to hook my URL catching bot to the Readability API for extracting article text and then to the Churnalism API for finding what press releases the BBC* have put lipstick on this time. * other news-gathering organisations are available.
Intermernet 13y ago
I reckon all discovered examples should be posted by the browser plugin automatically to a central db where they can be analyzed. It won't take too long to build up a picture of which news outlets do this the most, then that data can be posted in a simple, updated list (with links to examples) for everyone to consume much as they would an email blacklist. This could all be automated.
losethos 13y ago
God says... Saul's brethren of Benjamin. 12:3 The chief was Ahiezer, then Joash, the sons of Shemaah the Gibeathite; and Jeziel, and Pelet, the sons of Azmaveth; and Berachah, and Jehu the Antothite. 12:4 And Ismaiah the Gibeonite, a mighty man among the thirty, and over the thirty; and Jeremiah, and Jahaziel, and Johanan, and Josabad the Gederathite, 12:5 Eluzai, and Jerimoth, and Bealiah, and Shemariah, and Shephatiah the Haruphite, 12:6 Elkanah, and Jesiah, and Azareel, and Joezer, and Jashobeam, the Korhites, 12:7 And Joelah, and Zebadiah, the sons of Jeroham of Gedor. 12:8 And of the Gadites there separated themselves unto David into the hold to the wilderness men of might, and men of war fit for the battle, that could handle shield and buckler, whose faces were like the faces of lions, and were as swift as the roes upon the mountains; 12:9 Ezer the first, Obadiah the second, Eliab the third, 12:10 Mishmannah the fourth, Jeremiah the fifth, 12:11 Attai the sixth, Eliel the seventh, 12:12 Johanan the eighth, Elzabad the ninth, 12:13 Jeremiah the tenth, Machbanai the eleventh. ---- G.E.D. Peter Gadwa http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/11/mf_ticketmaster/all/1 http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/11/mf_ticketmaster/all/1 Mach 11 God says...Montana excessive City debtor comfort glam figures soul occasion remembrances immoderate seeking rashly Arians instances weight weeping racked cares calmly statue absurdly hesitating know unchangeably deliberation banished progress dir uncertainty throngs And crooked renowned indicate child habitation pay poise deeply nations it_was_nothing narrowly application price persons distract
losethos 13y ago
How big is God's database? God says... offering for ever. 3:15 And Samuel lay until the morning, and opened the doors of the house of the LORD. And Samuel feared to shew Eli the vision. 3:16 Then Eli called Samuel, and said, Samuel, my son. And he answered, Here am I. 3:17 And he said, What is the thing that the LORD hath said unto thee? I pray thee hide it not from me: God do so to thee, and more also, if thou hide any thing from me of all the things that he said unto thee. 3:18 And Samuel told him every whit, and hid nothing from him. And he said, It is the LORD: let him do what seemeth him good. 3:19 And Samuel grew, and the LORD was with him, and did let none of his words fall to the ground. 3:20 And all Israel from Dan even to Beersheba knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the LORD. ---- Long hauling? God says... C:\TAD\Text\BIBLE.TXT flax given to cover her nakedness. 2:10 And now will I discover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of mine hand. 2:11 I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts. 2:12 And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. 2:13 And I will visi

183 points by hythloday 13y ago

And then publishers wonder why we've stopped buying newspapers years ago.

It may seem like a minor nitpick, but the main Churnalism site[1] touts the byline "Discover the journalism you can trust and what you should question." The purpose of this tool is definitely a step in the right direction, but just because a given piece probably isn't a recycled press release doesn't mean you should stop looking at it with a healthy dose of skepticism. [1] http://churnalism.sunlightfoundation.com/ http://churnalism.sunlightfoundation.com/

DanBC 13y ago
Sometimes the press release is more accurate. There have been examples in the UK when something released by the Office for National Statistics[1] is looked at and interpreted by a journalist. Unfortunately statisticians get the numbers right and journalists don't, and so reporters make very dramatic statements that just aren't supported by the numbers. [1] (http://www.statistics.gov.uk/hub/index.html http://www.statistics.gov.uk/hub/index.html)
- jkldotio 13y ago
  Which is why I include statistics.gov.uk in my UK section of http://jkl.io/ http://jkl.io/ I think we can get around more than just churnalism if people have direct access to academic, state, NGO and partisan materials without journalistic intermediaries. It's niche, in that not everyone is going to read such a site, but important I think.
- pp19dd 13y ago
  Though in our defense, there are also plenty of times when the numbers are wrong and journalists are right. After performing a basic checksum, we contacted the UN to get a clarification on their firearm-homicides report discrepancy (their A + B should have been equal to C, but wasn't in some cases.) Their response was to basically manually correct column C without ever explaining why it was off. That shook our confidence in their collection and analysis methodology. State department nonimmigrant visa statistics for the past decade has plenty of numbers for T-2, T-3, T-4, T-5 visas (about 1,500) but only zeroes for T-1. Problem? Description of "T-2" through 5 is "Spouse of T-1", "Child of T-1", "Parent of T-1" and "Unmarried siblings of T-1". So if these are dependents of the visa holders, what happened to T-1's? After pursuing this, we received no comment and hit a dead-end. Somewhat understandably, as T-1 description is a sensitive topic: "T-1: Severe human trafficking informants."
erdogan 13y ago
Agreed. Also, this tool seems to be more about raising questions about context rather than a litmus test for plagiarism. As the author wrote, "Although such quotations are not examples of churnalism per se, Devine says that that information will be helpful to readers too, showing them the context a quote appeared in, and giving them the chance to think about why a reporter selected a particular passage from all of the others."

mseebach 13y ago

Aren't good PR people supposed to "sell" their story directly to a "journalist", without an intermediate publicly available press release? Will this tool find those? Also, there's a certain irony in that this story itself almost certainly is "planted" PR.

illuminate 13y ago
"Aren't good PR people supposed to "sell" their story directly to a "journalist", without an intermediate publicly available press release?" That would require that the "journalist" pay attention and not just directly look through their pile of releases for a "story". News departments are lazy and don't want to pay for real news, they want it spoon-fed.
- mseebach 13y ago
  It's spoon-feeding I'm describing. It's just targeted, one-to-one spoon feeding instead of spray-and-pray press releases. It is way easier for a journalist to go to lunch, accept flattery for his sharp style and leadership in his field, and then walk home and copy-paste the text handed to him, than sift through the same pile of press releases that every other journalist in the industry is also sifting through.
  - mpclark 13y ago
    My, aren't we all cynical today? There is nothing wrong with the concept of a press release, particularly when used as intended, as a starting point for a piece of journalism. In the media we write many different kinds of stories. Some are the vast investigative pieces that put the world to rights and might one day win a Pulitzer prize, but others are simply humdrum announcements of new products or services. I'd have thought that a community of founders would appreciate the value engendered by outlets that gather eyeballs for particular sectors and spread the sort of bread and butter news that is press released day in day out by stakeholders in those sectors -- usually after having first removed the hype, dubious claims ("World's first!") misrepresentation ("A and B have partnered to..." when it means A has bought/licensed something from B) and fluff ("We are excited to...", "This development reaffirms our commitment to...") that the authors of the press releases have inevitably included. The simple truth is that press releases were not designed for direct consumption by the public, and sites that reproduce them verbatim do nobody any favours. However, in many circumstances several outlets could legitimately run very similar stories based on the same press release, and deliver great value in doing so because they all reach different audiences. Using a press release as a source is not in every case a dirty little secret that needs to be exposed by clever software. Addressing the point made in the parent post, it seems to me there is a bit of a disconnect in assuming that one can take a journalist to lunch, tell him how very clever he is, and then hand him copy-paste text. Wouldn't work on anyone I know...

zapdrive 13y ago

Reminds me of the fake web browser and IQ study (which claimed IE users are dumb). Basically every media house just copy pasted the press release. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Quotient_(IQ)_and_Browser_Usage http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Quotient_(IQ)_and_...

Samuel_Michon 13y ago
Since then, has there been a real study into the relation between intelligence and browser choice? I suspect the hoax report largely was picked up by IT sites and mainstream press because the conclusion sounded plausible to them (IE users = not smrt).
- ubersync 13y ago
  Yea it was an exploit of a cognitive bias (confirmation bias, to be exact [1].) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

Articulate 13y ago

As a former PR person I can tell you that this ap is AWESOME. the general public has no idea how much of their "news" is actually just corporate created "infomercials" I don't even mean to sound like a conspiracy theorist- but it is truly shocking when as an intern I would write press releases and then later that night hear my exact words said on the evening news. This is especially true of newspapers who are trying to create reams of content but with far fewer journalists. If this app works as well as they claim- this is a game changer.

thisishugo 13y ago
I never quite published a press release verbatim in all the news stories I have written[1], but sometimes the information density of a press release is so low as to make a rewrite look like a copy anyway. [1]https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=site:trustedreviews.com+hugo+jobling+news https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=site:trustedreviews.com+hu...
- abraxasz 13y ago
  I don't think there is a problem with press releases, as long as journalists acknowledge them for what they are: press releases. It's fine imho for a newspaper to reproduce a press releases verbatim, if it makes it clear to the reader that no post-processing has been done. What is not ok is to trick the reader into believing that a piece of information has received adequate treatment, when it really hasn't. There's an implicit contract of trust between the newspaper and the reader, and if that app does what it advertises, it will make the contract harder to breach.
  - guelo 13y ago
    The only way it should be acceptable is if the journalist writes "the company said X but they stand to make money off of it and I have not verified it."
    - Pwnguinz 13y ago
      I used to think that, until I read this: http://www.zerohedge.com/content/zero-hedge-conflictsfull-disclosure-policy http://www.zerohedge.com/content/zero-hedge-conflictsfull-di... In particular: | The reality is, critical readers should read analytic | posts and the rest of Zero Hedge* with the blanket | assumption that the author is totally "conflicted." | (Phrased more logically, that the author stands to | benefit from being right--imagine that). * Replace "Zero Hedge" with "News Site", "Blog", etc.

sehugg 13y ago

This would be pretty awesome with a browser plugin.

hythloday 13y ago
Here you go: http://churnalism.sunlightfoundation.com/downloads/ http://churnalism.sunlightfoundation.com/downloads/
- notimetorelax 13y ago
  Does it analyse every page I visit? I would prefer if it was activated by a button press only when I need it.
  - jcarbaugh 13y ago
    It runs automatically, but only on a whitelist of sites. You can edit the list in the extension settings.
    - notimetorelax 13y ago
      Thanks, good to know.

TeMPOraL 13y ago

For reference, the term "PR Submarine" refers to pg's essay, "The Submarine" - http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html.

RyanMcGreal 13y ago

Obligatory reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh_Kx7UKndI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh_Kx7UKndI

JonnieCache 13y ago

For an in depth investigation into this phenomenon, see Nick Davies' Flat Earth News: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flat-Earth-News-Award-winning-Distortion/dp/0099512688 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flat-Earth-News-Award-winning-Distor...

runjake 13y ago

Great application. And as always, a healthy dose of skepticism is good. The two questions I always ask myself when reading something or listening to someone is "Why are they telling me this? What is their motive by telling me this?". I ask these questions whenever I listen to anyone, from the salesperson, to a journalist, to a politician, to my wife and kids.

ignostic 13y ago

This is really awesome. It's definitely a step in the right direction, anyway. If the tool really catches on, though, there's an easy loophole that spammers have been using to trick Google for the last ten years. You simply load the content into a "spinner" and have it generate synonyms. Articles for human consumption used to require manual editing, but the programs are getting better. Spammers have been known to use a similar trick to re-use company "news" by sending journalists re-written releases as "exclusives." This is why real journalists call, verify, and investigate. Publications like the NYT or WSJ are never fooled by the tricks above, though they may use some AP or PR copy to save time.

guelo 13y ago
Before a journalist takes the time to load a press release into a "spinner" maybe they'll just go ahead and rewrite in their own words.

Create 13y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent:_Noam_Chomsky_and_the_Media https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent:_Noam_Ch...

mjn 13y ago

In addition to stuff lifted from press releases, it seems to also notice when articles borrow large chunks of verbatim text from Wikipedia.

stretchwithme 13y ago

kudos on the name.

danso 13y ago

A cool app, but a sad statement about the state of journalism that PR fluff is as easy to spot as seeing quotes come verbatim from previously published PR pieces. The more insidious PR can come from spoon-fed "exclusive" interviews and not be as easily detected by this process. Even better would be something that produced a dossier of organizations and spokespeople...so that you can easily see the potential connections behind any quoted source (of course, there will be false positives) In news stories, someone's role as a shill can be papered over by calling them a: "industry expert" or "author" or "researcher/analyst"

fyi80 13y ago
Of course, the simple solution to that is that "Exclusive" is never in the reader's interest.

regis 13y ago

Isn't this a part of some sort of PR strategy for the Sunlight Foundation? It's sort of hard to take this article seriously when the article literally contains fragments from the application's about page. Isn't this what they're trying to 'protect us' from?

fyi80 13y ago
The Sunlight Foundation may be happy for you to know this is their PR. Not really their fault that the Rebecca Rosen is too lazy to write a proper article. It ironically drives home the very point of their app, which perhaps was intentional by Rosen!
- rthomas6 13y ago
  Unfortunately, when I run the article through the tool it returns no hits.

doctorpangloss 13y ago

The Churnalism concept has been circulating in media/nonprofit think tanks for a couple years now. Before a team worked on something similar at the Berkman Center in Cambridge, MA, we all discovered tools like iThenticate, which do the same job and more better. More importantly, very little PR news was mislabeled as not PR. It was hypothesized that politicians read from PR directly into the Congressional record, but the instances were so exceedingly few and the audience so exceedingly small that there were no discoveries to announce. Hence color me a little unsurprised that despite a great tool, Sunlight Foundation didn't actually find anything too controversial to announce with their tool.

fyi80 13y ago
If the PR was circulated privately to a high value, unique target (like Congress), would you expect an eternal analysis to find it?

eli 13y ago

Depending on the release and the article, I'm not convinced that rewriting or lifting words from a press release is always a bad thing. Is it possible to write a story about the latest Consumer Price Index without it being substantially based on this press release http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/cpi.pdf http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/cpi.pdf ? Is it possible to write about a newly announced iPhone without lifting data from Apple PR events or releases? I would rather have an article that lifts a technical phrase from a press release over one that attempts to reframe or extrapolate from it in a way that is no longer factually correct.

fjh 13y ago
> Is it possible to write about a newly announced iPhone without lifting data from Apple PR events or releases? No, but writing about the newly announced iPhone shouldn't really be called journalism.
- eli 13y ago
  Why not? So is a press release never news?
  - lostlogin 13y ago
    I agree with both of you. A journalist (in my opinion) shouldn't be someone who rewrites press releases. Having just finished Robert Fisks column before I came here, I'm certain of that. Not everyone can be where he is however, and the small local stories need to be written. Re-writing press releases is a mile from these situations however - at least read around the subject and compare/contrast (?pad it out) with what others are doing.
fyi80 13y ago
This is a solved problem for journalists, and it is called "citing your sources". Either your source is anonymous and you give a good reason, or your source is cited. When sources are not cited, we have PR or lies masquerading as journalism.

pp19dd 13y ago

Pardon my skepticism, but an automated tool that replaces vetting, critical thinking and analysis may not be as helpful as it leads to believe. I've punched in three stories that I specifically know came from a PR, and the tool wasn't able to spot anything amiss with it.

kenko 13y ago

Is it published on a technology or startup-focused site that isn't Ars Technica? It's a press release.

xadxad 13y ago

The Sunlight Foundation has been full of awesome ideas and tools. Its worth digging into their other projects

kderbe 13y ago

The Atlantic piece is light on details, but the Sunlight Foundation has a blog post describing the technology used for text pattern matching, titled "Churnalism US: the Nuts and Bolts" (http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2013/04/23/churnalism-technical-background/ http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2013/04/23/churnalism-tec...). They've released the core matching code, called SuperFastMatch, as free software (https://github.com/mediastandardstrust/superfastmatch https://github.com/mediastandardstrust/superfastmatch).

Wonderdonkey 13y ago

Journalism isn't supposed to be fiction. The information comes from some place other than the journalist's mind, and often that information originates in a press release, though that absolutely should not be the end of a journalist's research. Still I don't understand why journalists (including some of the ones I have hired as freelancers) are willing to regurgitate a press release and leave it at that. Some even plagiarize releases and put their bylines on the story, which is beyond shady. But beginning and ending with a press release is lazy. Sometimes more information just isn't available. Sometimes. I cover technology. There is no technology that isn't announced in a press release. It's just the way the industry is. It's either a press release or leaked information that will appear in a press release later anyway. But press releases, as someone here mentioned, are often lacking in details. They're also often just plain inaccurate. It is a very rare PR person who has any grasp of technology beyond Twitter and Microsoft Office. Why do people write stories based exclusively on a press release instead of getting hold of the software or hardware, reading spec sheets, reading manuals or at least visiting the product information page online? You write a story about a new projector. What ports does it have? Those aren't in the press release, but they're easily accessible. Throw ratio? Weight and dimensions? Lens options? Throw distance? All of those pieces of information are important to your readers and can easily be learned by looking outside the press release. So why skimp when your audience is counting on you? Now, all of that said, I think the premise of this tool is a joke. Google works fine when I want to find out if my writers are plagiarizing verbatim, which I have caught some doing. But other than that, every single piece of journalism is based on information obtained from somewhere, whether it's a press release in your mailbox or a press conference in the White House, whether it's a whistle blower meeting you in secret or a piece of damning evidence you found in a dumpster. It all comes from somewhere.

zimpenfish 13y ago

Today I will mostly be: sketching out how to hook my URL catching bot to the Readability API for extracting article text and then to the Churnalism API for finding what press releases the BBC* have put lipstick on this time. * other news-gathering organisations are available.

Intermernet 13y ago

I reckon all discovered examples should be posted by the browser plugin automatically to a central db where they can be analyzed. It won't take too long to build up a picture of which news outlets do this the most, then that data can be posted in a simple, updated list (with links to examples) for everyone to consume much as they would an email blacklist. This could all be automated.

losethos 13y ago

God says... Saul's brethren of Benjamin. 12:3 The chief was Ahiezer, then Joash, the sons of Shemaah the Gibeathite; and Jeziel, and Pelet, the sons of Azmaveth; and Berachah, and Jehu the Antothite. 12:4 And Ismaiah the Gibeonite, a mighty man among the thirty, and over the thirty; and Jeremiah, and Jahaziel, and Johanan, and Josabad the Gederathite, 12:5 Eluzai, and Jerimoth, and Bealiah, and Shemariah, and Shephatiah the Haruphite, 12:6 Elkanah, and Jesiah, and Azareel, and Joezer, and Jashobeam, the Korhites, 12:7 And Joelah, and Zebadiah, the sons of Jeroham of Gedor. 12:8 And of the Gadites there separated themselves unto David into the hold to the wilderness men of might, and men of war fit for the battle, that could handle shield and buckler, whose faces were like the faces of lions, and were as swift as the roes upon the mountains; 12:9 Ezer the first, Obadiah the second, Eliab the third, 12:10 Mishmannah the fourth, Jeremiah the fifth, 12:11 Attai the sixth, Eliel the seventh, 12:12 Johanan the eighth, Elzabad the ninth, 12:13 Jeremiah the tenth, Machbanai the eleventh. ---- G.E.D. Peter Gadwa http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/11/mf_ticketmaster/all/1 http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/11/mf_ticketmaster/all/1 Mach 11 God says...Montana excessive City debtor comfort glam figures soul occasion remembrances immoderate seeking rashly Arians instances weight weeping racked cares calmly statue absurdly hesitating know unchangeably deliberation banished progress dir uncertainty throngs And crooked renowned indicate child habitation pay poise deeply nations it_was_nothing narrowly application price persons distract

losethos 13y ago

How big is God's database? God says... offering for ever. 3:15 And Samuel lay until the morning, and opened the doors of the house of the LORD. And Samuel feared to shew Eli the vision. 3:16 Then Eli called Samuel, and said, Samuel, my son. And he answered, Here am I. 3:17 And he said, What is the thing that the LORD hath said unto thee? I pray thee hide it not from me: God do so to thee, and more also, if thou hide any thing from me of all the things that he said unto thee. 3:18 And Samuel told him every whit, and hid nothing from him. And he said, It is the LORD: let him do what seemeth him good. 3:19 And Samuel grew, and the LORD was with him, and did let none of his words fall to the ground. 3:20 And all Israel from Dan even to Beersheba knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the LORD. ---- Long hauling? God says... C:\TAD\Text\BIBLE.TXT flax given to cover her nakedness. 2:10 And now will I discover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of mine hand. 2:11 I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts. 2:12 And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. 2:13 And I will visi