How to get these guys to understand

Well, exactly. Tell Tim Wharnsby of the Globe and Mail that he shouldn't be allowed to cover the NHL because he was once the NHLPA's media director.

 

Richard Griffin went from Expos PR to writing baseball. Larry Brooks was a VP with the Jersey Devils and went back to covering hockey.

 

If you did PR, you shouldn't make up quotes either.

 

Exactly. It was every bit as unethical then as it would be for you to make them up now, Carlton.

 

That's disturbing.

 

Second that. I'm sure it happens, but to cop so blithely to doing it is odd for someone now a reporter.

 

Yeah, that is just wrong.

Admitting to it is even worse.

 

It really is.

 

It's common in PR though, and apparently some reporters do it as well. I know an SID who once told me, "I was the writer coaches liked to talk to because I always made them sound good. They always said I wrote what they meant to say." Basically he cleaned up quotes for them, and, even weirder, seemed proud of the fact that he could do that.

Part of my insides rails against that, but then I think of guys like....well, WC Heinz is one of the first who comes to mind. He'd recall entire conversations in his stories, and there's no way the people he talked to said everything exactly as he recalls, right? There is some other reporter who never took notes--I forget his name, but it was someone big according to my journalism professor--then went home right after the interview and wrote out the conversation/interview as he remembered it.

Maybe changing the subject a little, so my bad, but is the latter okay? Making up quotes is obviously just wrong, but what about the folks who don't quote someone verbatim yet are accurate with the quote's context?

I'm sure there have been times where I've not quoted someone perfectly, and I doubt everyone on here has been perfect every single time. Maybe I'm looking too hard at this, but just had some thoughts so there they are....

 

I don't think we're talking hats, here.

More similar to whore dresses.

 

Truman Capote? He used to test himself. But I think he had something like 90% recall...

 

Personally, I don't like it. It's why I keep a recorder on while I'm also writing down notes as verbatim as I can because I want to be absolutely sure I get the words completely accurately.

You can paraphrase, and that's fine, so long as you make clear you're paraphrasing. But if you're putting quote marks, they'd better be exact quotes.