San Antonio Night Editor slams a pop-knot on TV guys

[fishwrapper]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

I won't defend the TV station in question, but I always howl at the reaction whenever TV reporters do something wrong.

It's as if print people are the last virgins in journalism.

Well, isn't that an oversimplification of grand proportions.

I don't understand the problem. If someone else does the work, attribute it. It's not a difficult concept. If one of my writers steals information. I have no choice but to fire him/her. That much is understood.

Does that happen in television?

 

[HeinekenMan]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

I see this every day, and I am tired of the print industry being railroaded by TV and radio folks.

I hate to keep harping about this...

But what do you expect when you're giving away your news in the middle of the day? It's another example of what a knucklehead idea it is to give away the news on Web sites.

 

[Mighty_Wingman]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

I don't understand the problem. If someone else does the work, attribute it. It's not a difficult concept. If one of my writers steals information. I have no choice but to fire him/her. That much is understood.

Does that happen in television?

We all know the answer to that. And as several people have said on this thread, there are good journalists who work in television. Elliotte, you're one of them.

Which makes it even stranger that you'd have any problem with anyone being outraged by the hordes of lazy worthless thieving hacks who work in small-market local television.

 

[PackOfGauchos]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

I think the difference, Elliotte, is that when print people steal stuff, someone gets fired. When local TV or radio broadcasters steal stuff, it's perceived as accepted business practice.

 

[Elliotte Friedman]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

Sorry fish et al,

I didn't want to give the impression I was ducking, but something else needed my attention.

Like I said, I won't defend this particular station, nor would I defend any other outlet that did anything similar. What makes me ill is that whenever something like this happens, people in print jump all over it with the usual "TV foofs steal our stuff all the time" crap. Meanwhile, two pages down, the Memphis guy comes here to complain about the Commercial-Appeal doing the exact same thing, and gets 9 replies.

(I should note that some print reporters here properly criticize the paper for doing it, but the level of indignation is much, much lower.)

It happens both ways.

 

[Bubbler]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

Congrats to San Antonio! I might link from my blog to their web site to get them some more hits.

As far as stamping this out, every single thing I publish in my paper is copywrited. Web site or otherwise. There's one station in particular in my market that is notoriously guilty of doing the exact same thing as the San Antonio station and it pisses me off to no end.

No newspapers will do it -- mine won't -- but if newspapers would put forth a coordinated effort to stop copywright infringment by the electronic media, it would probably help.

I used this against the webmaster of my beat's message board when his posters were copy-and-pasting our stories directly off our web site. He straightened out right quick and created a policy forbidding it.

I actually think copy-and-pasted stories should be verboten here on SJ too. For all I know, they are.

 

[fishwrapper]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

Fair enough.
But, if my writer plagiarizes or takes information from an unattributed source, it over. They're in Human Resources as soon as I have confirmation, collecting their last pay check.
And, If I don't do that, and the story grows legs, I'm in Human Resources collecting my last check and trying to figure out where my wife and three daughters are living next. My career over.
So, it doesn't happen both ways.

 

[Elliotte Friedman]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

fisher,

I think you are in the minority, which is too bad. In Toronto, I've seen it happen both ways. And, I haven't seen much punishment by either side.

 

[Bubbler]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

I just realized the irony in my post. The San Antonio article is cut-and-pasted on this very thread!

I'd have linked it so the publication gets the hits.

 

[shotglass]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

i guess i'm lucky that in my town, they always seem to give me credit

That's because you're a multi-medium f'in stud. ;)

 

[brettwatson]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

The sad thing is Greg Simmons (one of the SA sportscasters in question) used to be one of the good broadcasters. He hustled and broke occasional stories and had what passes for integrity in that end of the business.

At some point, maybe after all of those years of taking money from the team he covers (the S.A. Spurs), he lost his moral compass. And once that happens, it's easy to become a rip-and-read hack like most of the rest of the talking heads.

 

[dawgpounddiehard]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

Alma's right.

When explained, a reader or viewer would get the picture and most would agree it's not acceptable.

But a writer bitching because his pressbox seat is moved from behind home plate to the third or first base line? They don't give a **** about that. Their attitude on that? "Boo hoo hoo for the poor widdle writer who still gets in for free."

Wanna cringe? Read a column where the writer ******* he had trouble doing his job because of, yada, yada, yada. You get the point.

I was shocked he wrote that, but once I read it, I was more embarrassed to call myself a journalist.

 

[RedSmithClone]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

You think TV folks have a problem with this? Try the sports radio yakkers.

And I happen to think there are plenty of good TV journalists -- Hi, Luggy -- but the one bad apple ...

As far as radio hacks go, WEEI out here in Boston is pretty good about giving credit to the newspapers it gets info from. Maybe it's because most of those reporters do guest hosting stints, but they will quote and credit smaller papers if they get info from them.

 

[John]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

I just realized the irony in my post. The San Antonio article is cut-and-pasted on this very thread!

I'd have linked it so the publication gets the hits.

I read the story here, then clicked on the link just to make sure they got a hit out of it.

 

[greenie]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

The big sports radio station in my market ought to just give us a free sponsorship of their every-20-minute tickers, since all they do is summarize the top stories on our site.

One of the hosts hammered me once when I screwed up the salary of a free agent signing. I e-mailed the guy and informed him that the exact same dollar figure was reported on his show.

"That's because we got it from your story," he said.

"Oh, I guess you should have attributed it then," I replied.

 

[Hank_Scorpio]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

What is one way newspapers could get this to stop?

Would putting a false breaking news story on its web site and seeing if the tv/radio station took the bait, stop this?

If a TV/radio station got burned like that, they may think twice before stealing it again.


Of course, the down side to this scenario would be the newspaper putting a false story on its web site/print edition. Of course, after the TV/radio station take the bait, the newspaper would have to come clean, tell why they did it.

It's not really a solution I would recommend, but would/should a newspaper do it to stop very chronic and very obvious stealing?

Figured I throw this out there for discussion. I'm pretty sure where we are all going to stand on this, tho.

 

[slappy4428]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

It happens both ways.

Absolutely it does... but nine posts against three pages comes from the fact that it happens more often with Broadcast stealing from print.
Two TV stations here would give attribution in a heart beat; the other 1 1/2 (cant count the CBS station as much) probably wouldnt. The sports talk station would.

 

[JayFarrar]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

Back in the bad ol' good old days in a couple different markets that saw intense newspaper wars and before the rise of the interweb, competing papers used to slip in incorrect or made-up high school football scores and stories in their early editions, to see if the other paper would take the bait.
I wish I could remember the name of the school that was created by one of the Dallas papers. Hopefully someone will help me out.

An easy fix is to form partnerships with a broadcast outlet and then the marketing demons take hold and they have to credit the paper then.

 

[HoopsMcCann]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

i guess i'm lucky that in my town, they always seem to give me credit

That's because you're a multi-medium f'in stud. ;)

pretty much

won't get me on the radio again until saturday, i think

 

[slappy4428]

Re: San Antonio SE slams a pop-knot on TV guys

Of course, the down side to this scenario would be the newspaper putting a false story on its web site/print edition. Of course, after the TV/radio station take the bait, the newspaper would have to come clean, tell why they did it.

Of course, that works for print on print too... or it does, as long as you say it loudly and to enough people in the press room at the girls basketball finals and the writer from the smaller paper in the JOA bites on it...