CASE STUDY: Using Twitter to report the recent Taser case in Columbia

On March 18, around 5:30 p.m., a man was shot with a Taser on Ninth Street in Columbia. Here’s the lede from the Columbia Missourian report:

Police shocked a man with a Taser after he reportedly assaulted a Columbia police officer during an incident at Lakota Coffee Co. on Ninth Street on Thursday afternoon.

Unfortunately, the Missourian didn’t get this story posted until 6:39 p.m. March 19 — a full 24 hours after the news happened. The Columbia Tribune didn’t do that much better in its report — the first story the Trib published came at 12:51 p.m. March 19. It was later updated at 1:41 p.m.

So why does it take the Trib 18 hours to turn a significant crime story? And why does it take the Missourian even longer? Easy: Both pieces are one-source stories from the spokeswoman at the Columbia Police Department.

Full disclosure: I am the opinion editor at the Missourian, but I’m currently home on paternity leave with my second child. I’m pretty disconnected from the newsroom right now, though I’m still getting my usual load of news releases and inter-office memos via e-mail (i.e. I’m still on the listserv). I did not get in touch with the Missourian about this story or for this blog post.

I first learned of the story through Twitter when I saw this tweet:

He wasn’t the only witness either:

She saw it, too:

Clearly, there were witnesses, but none appeared in either story. That’s a shame, because Tasers are a controversial issue within the Columbia community and has been for a while. One group of activists is completely opposed to Tasers, saying they’re too dangerous and can cause accidental deaths. The other side sees it as a useful, justified and necessary law-enforcement tool. To both sides, this is news: It’s either another example of an unneccessary use of force, or it’s a good example of the dangers police officers face and a textbook argument for why we should be equipping them with the best tools for the job.

Whichever way you lean, it’s news. So why wait to report it? Why not report what you know as you know it, like she did:

And as for this one-source thing — why? Witnesses are clearly willing to talk about it:

Plus, news spreads quickly over social media (check out all the retweets):

Here’s how I would have done it if I wasn’t up to my elbows in diapers:

1. Report what you know as you know it: Confirm someone was shot with a Taser. Publish that. Then, start contacting witnesses. Get to the scene ASAP and start asking questions. Start making contacts on Twitter and Facebook — ask them to call the office or to let you DM them your cell number.

2. Continue publishing facts as you can confirm. If a witness saw a police officer get punched, put it in with attribution. You don’t have to wait for the official spokeswoman comment if you have an eye witness. But do be careful with the language — don’t make anyone guilty or a victim, just report the facts. Let the reader decide.

3. When the official spokeswoman is ready to tell the official side, add it to the story. And while you have her ear, ask her to corroborate your witness statements. If the stories differ, be transparent about it.

And most importantly — don’t just put the story on your site and hope people will come find it. Use those same social networks to get the word out that you have the story.

My social media presentation for the spring reporting class

I’m giving a lecture on social media to the reporting class on Thursday. Here is a copy of the PowerPoint I put together for it:

View this document on Scribd

Take a break with The Copy Editor’s Lament (The Layoff Song)

If you’re a copy editor or have ever worked in a newspaper newsroom, you’ll identify with this. Enjoy!

@FakeAPStylebook offers good lessons for journalists

I’m going to go out on a limb here and hypothesize that just about every copy editor in the world has now heard about @FakeAPStylebook on Twitter.

If you haven’t, you really should take a moment to check it out. Like any copy editor worth hers or his salt, @FakeAPStylebook is snarky, funny and doesn’t take itself too seriously.

But wrapped up within the 140-character-or-less zingers are good lessons for journalists, especially young reporters. Things like:

“Expat” is jargon and should not be used unless specifically referring to people no longer named Pat.

If spelling out an acronym such as WTF or FUBAR, be sensitive to readers who dislike cursing by writing “fuck” in a whisper.

I recently put together my own batch of @FakeAPStylebook to use in the classroom, and I thought I’d share them here as well. Enjoy:

View this document on Scribd

UPDATE: Breaking down Washington Post’s social media guidelines

The much-debated social media guidelines from the Washington Post have now been published online at paidcontent.org.

Now that we have the full document, let’s dissect it to see what’s good, what’s bad and what needs revision.

Here’s the opening graf:

Social networks are communications media, and a part of our everyday lives. They can be valuable tools in gathering and disseminating news and information. They also create some potential hazards we need to recognize. When using social networking tools for reporting or for our personal lives, we must remember that Washington Post journalists are always Washington Post journalists.  The following guidelines apply to all Post journalists, without limitation to the subject matter of their assignments.

The emphasis in that graf comes from the Post, but I agree wholeheartedly with it. My last blog post, which one friend constructively criticized as being long on passion, may have given the impression that journalists should be able to say anything they want to say on social networks. I don’t believe that at all. Journalists should still behave as professionals at all time, not get into petty arguments a la Perez Hilton.

Using Social Networking Tools for Reporting

When using social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, My Space or Twitter for reporting, we must protect our professional integrity.  Washington Post journalists should identify themselves as such. We must be accurate in our reporting and transparent about our intentions when participating.  We must be concise yet clear when describing who we are and what information we seek.

When using these networks, nothing we do must call into question the impartiality of our news judgment.  We never abandon the guidelines that govern the separation of news from opinion, the importance of fact and objectivity, the appropriate use of language and tone, and other hallmarks of our brand of journalism.

Our online data trails reflect on our professional reputations and those of The Washington Post.  Be sure that your pattern of use does not suggest, for example, that you are interested only in people with one particular view of a topic or issue.

Nothing here really stands out as a problem. Social media outlets are a wonderful resource for story ideas, sources, crowdsourcing, etc. etc. As for the line about “impartiality of our news judgments,” that could be taken a number of ways, but I take it as this: Be fair to all sides, and let all viable voices be heard. That doesn’t equal objectivity, it equals fair and balanced (which, despite my disdain for Fox News, is a slogan the entire media should adopt).

Before we move on with this analysis, let’s take a moment to discuss objectivity. For one, it’s an ideal, not a hittable target. In traditional newspaper journalism, we teach our reporters starting out to write in an inverted pyramid style: Most important stuff first, then trail off with what’s less important. But isn’t the process of determining what is most important and what isn’t subjective?

Rather than pay lip service to this impossible ideal, which the journalism community has done for decades, social media has given us, the journalists, an opportunity to be real people again. We have the ability to interact with our readers and share insights. That’s not something you can do with a two-dimensional hunk of newsprint. Making those personal connections will go a long way toward keeping professional journalists in business. After all, would you rather have a news discussion, or would you rather have someone on high telling you that’s the way it is? The industry’s circulation numbers are the best answer to that question.

Back to the analysis …

Using Social Networking Tools for Personal Reasons

All Washington Post journalists relinquish some of the personal privileges of private citizens.  Post journalists must recognize that any content associated with them in an online social network is, for practical purposes, the equivalent of what appears beneath their bylines in the newspaper or on our website.

What appears on Twitter and what appears in the pages of the Washington Post are totally different animals. One is endorsed by a journalistic institute — the other lends insight into how the journalist framed a story. The public is absolutely smart enough to get that. The partisan critics out there will argue the opposite, and that’s fine. The partisan critics are going to argue anyway. Let ’em.

Here’s the thing about journalists: They all have opinions. It’s called being human. If a journalist spends hours and hours researching a particular subject, talks to all the players, sits through meetings, and otherwise takes in tons of information, OF COURSE he or she is going to form an opinion. Remember the idea that opinions are kind of like belly buttons? So why are we pretending that these opinions can be shoved aside long enough for the news to be framed?

To paraphrase the late, great George Carlin, I want my bullshit front and center where I can get a good whiff of it. In other words, I want to know right away what bias is sneaking into my news. Example: I can watch and trust Fox News if it’s covering something non-political, like a bank robbery or a wildfire. But once that discussion turns to the political party that make it possible for that bank to be robbed or that wildfire to spread, I know I’ll need to hear from a few other sources to make up my own mind.

What you do on social networks should be presumed to be publicly available to anyone, even if you have created a private account.  It is possible to use privacy controls online to limit access to sensitive information. But such controls are only a deterrent, not an absolute insulator. Reality is simple: If you don’t want something to be found online, don’t put it there.

This is just good advice for everyone. Privacy controls fail. So keep your most personal stuff offline.

Post journalists must refrain from writing, tweeting or posting anything—including photographs or video—that could be perceived as reflecting political, racial, sexist, religious or other bias or favoritism that could be used to tarnish our journalistic credibility. This same caution should be used when joining, following or friending any person or organization online.  Post journalists should not be involved in any social networks related to advocacy or a special interest regarding topics they cover, unless specifically permitted by a supervising editor for reporting and so long as other standards of transparency are maintained while doing any such reporting.

What exactly is meant by “involved”? If I’m following a special interest group on Twitter, does it mean I support those views, or am I keeping an eye on it in case I can find a story idea? Again, the key here is transparency. I’m fine with a certain amount of bias in a report on two conditions: 1) It’s transparent; 2) The alternative arguments are given fair representation. As I argued in my last blog, objectivity as a business model is something newsrooms have preached for years. And how’s that working for us now?

Post journalists should not accept or place tokens, badges or virtual gifts from political or partisan causes on pages or sites, and should monitor information posted on your own personal profile sites by those with whom you are associated online for appropriateness.

No argument here.

Personal pages online are no place for the discussion of internal newsroom issues such as sourcing, reporting of stories, decisions to publish or not to publish, personnel matters and untoward personal or professional matters involving our colleagues. The same is true for opinions or information regarding any business activities of The Washington Post Company. Such pages and sites also should not be used to criticize competitors or those who take issue with our journalism or our journalists.

Now, I think personal pages are a wonderful place to discuss sourcing, reporting decisions and the like. It is not the place to air office politics and other dirty newsroom laundry (Full disclosure: I went down this road once myself, complaining about a manager I had a following out with. And although everything I said in that blog I had already said to his face, I should have kept it between him and I. It didn’t effect any stories or coverage decisions, and thus I should have found a less public way to vent).

Newspapers, by and large, are so good about explaining the decisions that go into a news report. Heck, the Post has been a major leader in that over the years (the Angler series on Dick Cheney comes to mind). We do this through ombud columns, live chats, Q&A’s, etc. etc. So why does this need to be confined to the Post’s site? Why can’t this discussion happen elsewhere, too?

Conclusion

The Post and other newsrooms that will no doubt embrace these guidelines are embracing and applying traditional values to nontraditional media. And until those journalists realize that the technology of Twitter, Facebook, WordPress, et al is changing the way we can and should cover the news, they will continue to see readership shrink and their institutional place among journalism’s elite erode.

And this is coming from a guy who used to pitch huge, emotional fits in the newsroom about the importance of adhereing to objectivity. Somewhere along the way, I realized that I often learned the most about a subject through several filters as opposed to a single, sterilized filter. Objectivity takes the voice out of the news, and that voice is what makes news matter to people. It’s what helps us understand and relate. It’s what shows us that there are people who think similarly and that others can have a different take.

The best thing we can do as an industry is give up this ideal of objectivity, continue covering the news with the same enthusiasm for a fair and balanced report as we have for objectivity, and let readers get their two cents in.

Washington Post tries to force divorce with Twitter, social media

Those of us who believe in the social media revolution have been crying foul all day long about this Washington Post ombud blog that basically forbids its member journalists from posting any type of opinion. I suppose under this policy, a tweet that reads “I am having a sandwhich” may actually be OK. That is, until the salad makers of America read it and get upset that a WashPo reporter would dare pick a sandwhich over a salad.

There are so many things wrong with this new policy, I need a bullet list to sort them all:

• As stated in the blog, the Post has been working on this new internal policy for a while. So far, the Post has yet to post (pun intended) this policy publically. If you have a link, please leave it in the comments. In fairness, it could just be that the ombud blog jumped the gun and the full policy will be posted soon. At least, I hope so.
• The Post is making a firm statement about objectivity: That it will continue to be business as usual in terms of news coverage. For a newspaper that seemed to be at the forefront of pioneering new ways of delivering news, falling back into the objectivity rut is nothing but disappointment. Honorary Geek Jeremy Littau puts it so well: “Many, including myself, have come to see the objectivity norm in journalism to be an impossible standard and unproductive frame by which to judge news.”
• Thirdly, doesn’t it feel a little bit like the WashPo is tucking tail rather than rising above partisan bickering? From the ombud column: “In today’s hyper-sensitive political environment, Narisetti’s tweets could be seen as one of The Post’s top editors taking sides on the question of whether a health-care reform plan must be budget neutral.” Translation: “We don’t want the partisans picking on us.”

Talk about gutless. Especially from a paper that, after decades of First Amendment battles inside and out of the Beltway, seems uncharacteristically caught up in not pissing anybody off.

Academics like Littau and Jay Rosen have already picked this bone clean in terms of what it means to transparency and taking advantage of new media. I’d like to hypothesize for a moment that this was a business decision, and a really bad one at that.

Before anyone could become a publisher with just an Internet connection and a few ideas, newspapers ruled the media in terms of its monopoly on the published word (note I didn’t say “printed.”) Because it was a mass medium serving an entire community, objectivity was adhered to so that the paper could serve all within the community. Ideally, that meant lots of money in ads and subscriptions.

Is that what the suits in the WashPo offices have going on here? Don’t make waves, ride on the Post’s longtime reputation and hope the world suddenly falls in love with newspapers again?

If that’s the case, the suits should try investing in asbestos, too.

C’mon, can the Post really believe that the old standard of objectivity is a good model for journalism in theory or in practice? We’ve seen circulation spiral, great newspapers go out of business and hundreds of thousands of us have lost our jobs. And we’re sticking to the same business model why?

Fox News makes no apologies for being the “conservatives’ network.” Fox News also stomps its competitors in the ratings. Now granted, they do that with a healthy dose of bullshit and paranoia (i.e. Glen Beck), but the basic premise of telling the news from a particular point of view has been a solid business model.

So what if we took the Fox News model, but did it better (and more ethically)? What if we engaged our audience with language they’re comfortable with instead of sticking to lifeless, bureacratic words that help us maintain this fraud of objectivity? What if we offered thoughtful viewpoints and analysis from all angles, so readers could actually feel like we reported and they decided?

Here’s my full disclosure on this social media topic: I’m a huge fan of social media and of finding new ways to engage readers and keep our livelihood going. Yes, I wish for the romanticized days of Woodward and Bernstein, when reading the newspaper was almost a civic duty. But those days are gone, and given the way young people don’t read newspapers these days, they ain’t coming back.

Some can look at that last graf and say I just ruined any hope of ever working for the Post. Or you can get an idea of what my values are as a person, then make a decision for yourself whether or not I’m capable of being fair on a particular topic.

So, you tell me: How did I do here? Am I fair in my criticism, or should I take a flying leap?

VIDEO PICK: Social media is bigger than you think.

Just picked up this article at Mashable and watched the accompanying video. Erik Qualman, author of Socialnomics, breaks down the impact we’re seeing from social media so well in this video. Take special heed to his assertion that social media is not some fly-by-night fad — it’s a “fundamental shift in communication.”

I couldn’t agree more. Enjoy: