Interesting entry in the blog:
Anders Jacobsen's blog: Journalist = bad blogger?
In essence, the blogger submitted some information to a journalist, but was uncredited in the article that was published. He asks the question:
Do "real" journalists have less netiquette than webloggers, or is this just business as usual?The answers in the comments are depressingly predictable and clueless.
The answer is, of course, it depends on the journalist, the editor he's writing for and the publication's style. Anders bemoans the lack of a link back to him: it could be that providing external links is against the publication's policy. He mentions the lack of credit: often, while researching a story, journalists are bombarded with the same information again and again. In the end, only those who were directly quoted in the story are generally credited. Otherwise, the whole feature would be nothing but a long name-check.
Anders at least asks the question. His commenters show the typically depressing blogger mindset of treating us journalists like a monolithic social block that all behave the same way. Yet if any journalist should dare to describe bloggers in the same way, all hell breaks loose...
Adam,
appreciate your view on this, and of course I might be wrong and not having been the lead for the story, BUT a "thank you" email in response to received emails whether the exact content is being used for the story or not would appear to be good netiquette?
I happen to know a couple of journalists and of course I know you're not all one big "blob", and I'm sorry if the article came across as putting you all in the same category...
Anders
I think expecting journalists to know "netiquette" is a little optimitic, as it is for most net users these days. It's just another one of those conventions that has been drowned in the flood of mass adoption.
That said, it did make me think about my own attitude to sources. It's all too easy to treat them with too much contempt, simply because we get bombarded with material from PRs and thus tend to think of our role as one of picking and choosing the best. Also, many journalists tend to give more weight to things they're discovered for themselves, rather than things that are given to them - but that's fodder for another post.