As some of you might know, I currently intern at the Innocence Project, a law clinic that works to overturn wrongful convictions of their clients based on DNA evidence. Unfortunately, one of the foundations that contributes heavily to Innocence Project, the JEHT foundation, was a victim of the Madoff scandal, leaving their foundation with nothing to donate. While this does not cause a direct loss of funds, the future ramifications might be quite damaging. The director of the organization, Maddy deLone explained:
Obviously, the loss of a foundation that supported us so generously will hurt us, but it's not catastrophic. The JEHT Foundation's great legacy is that it helped the Innocence Project and other organizations become more self-sufficient; over the last four years, the foundation focused on helping us diversify our base of donors so that we draw support from more individuals and other foundations. Now, in the midst of the critical holiday fundraising season, we are optimistic that even more individual donors will step up and help us move forward.What is so significant about this (in relation to our course) is where this letter was first posted. It was not submitted to the AP, the New York Times, Reuters or any other news source, but rather it was first posted on the Huffington Post blog (as well as the Innocence Project's own blog, more about that later) . Here is in my opinion, breaking news, (as the Innocence Project plays a significant role in media and every exoneration that takes place finds its way to CNN.com) yet the first place it showed up was on a blog. To contrast, the recent release of President Joel's letter to our university didn't get posted to a blog prior to news media publishing the letter. Any news source quoting the information from the director of the Innocence Project links to or quotes the Huffington Post or Innocence Project blogs.
In researching this specific issue I discovered as well the way that the Innocence Project "breaks news". While the media will often do their own research on recent exonorees, the most up to date information as well as breaking news can be found at the Innocence Projects own blog. This is not a place for press releases or internal information but a public forum for the Innocence Project to get out their latest breaking news. However, what if the Innocence Project chose not to have this blog, how would they get their news out?
This, I think, is how blogs play a role in breaking news. What is breaking news to one person can be meaningless to another. Having a "news blog" allows for those designated individuals to post the breaking news from their own perspective. If the Innocence Project just notified the MSM as of some "breaking news" chances are that information would never get to the public. A news blog, like the Huffington Post, allows for breaking news to be released to the public quickly and efficiently. This is how blogs can play an important role in "breaking news" that the MSM might otherwise miss.
5 comments:
Excellent point Steven. But there are still is the credibility issue. A reporter can verify that it is actually the news organization that is putting out the news release, and -as mentioned in Gilmore- can make sure the information is in context. There is simply to much manipulation possible when the "check" that is a reporter is taken out of the equation.
Is that reporter a check or a barrier? The individual reporter is only beneficial if intellectually honest.
Stevent, you state that "The individual reporter is only beneficial if intellectually honest." is this true?
In "A Face in the Crowd" we see the depiction of an intellectually dishonest broadcaster who benefits tremendously (in popularity and finances) from his personality. Although this is a fictional story, I don't see why this is any different from the media of today, whatever form it may take (blog, TV, etc.)
I meant beneficial to the public.
Is even that claim fair to make? You assume the definition of beneficial to mean something along the lines of "providing the most accurate information so that the public is most accurately knowledgeable," but maybe for some, and I believe this is true, the benefit is in the entertainment aspect.
Additionally, how do you define "the public" in this case?
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