Friday, June 01, 2007

Reporting On Rumors

Where there are big stories, there are rumors. Where there are rumors, there are content coordinators working to try to confirm or deny them.

Yesterday, we began to hear rumblings that the Durham District Attorney, Michael Nifong, was expected to resign.

I can recount so many stories that started with a tip or rumbling. Some ended up being correct. Some ended up being wrong. Some ended up being a mixture of both.  As content coordinators, our goal is to seek out and report on the facts and only the facts.

Today, we had a plan in place should Mr. Nifong have resigned. Earlier today, we were faced with deciding whether or not we should report on this rumor of a resignation.

In our morning news meeting, we had a discussion amongst the content coordinators, producers, managers and web staff.  Since there was no confirmation of Mr. Nifong resigning, we decided to send a reporter to durham and ask him about the rumors, directly. He denied them. At the end of the day, there was no resignation. So we decided that it seemed the rumors were false and opted to not air or publish a report on them. Why? because that’s all it was…speculation.

As journalists, you welcome us into your homes each night and trust us to provide you with the news…not the rumors. We’ll leave the rumors and speculation for the blogosphere.

In the end, we took the high road. Today ended….no announcement of a resignation.

(BTW: Have you heard…..)

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Have a safe and enjoyable weekend.