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Local News - Is this an issue in your market?

MarcB

MarcB

Here in Hartford we have 4 stations with local News - CBS affiliate WFSB Channel 3 owned by Merideth, NBC affiliate WVIT Channel 30 which is an O&O, ABC affiliate WTNH Channel 8 owned by LIN Television, and FOX affiliate WTIC-TV Channel 61 owned by CT-1 Media. (Tribune)

The issue here and I see it all the time is they can never agree on how old someone is. This weekend one of the stories being covered is about a fatal hit and run accident in New Haven. Channel 3 said the pedestrian who was killed was 16. Channel 30 said he was 17. While they din't agree on the victim's age both agreed that the guy who was later arrested and charged was 51 and heavily intoxicated.


The only thing I've seen the 4 stations all agree upon was about Irene last weekend. All 4 said that rainfall amounts statewide would vary between 5 and 12 inches depending on where one lives in the state.
 
Not exactly a pressing issue, nor one I'd wager most people would bother to study in any serious detail.
 
In this market, we had a story just yesterday about a baby who died in a hot car.

Initially, the little girl's age was reported as being 18 months old. Then, she was 13 months old.

Very simple explanation: The local police department was the source of the age initially, then the county medical examiner's office reported her to be 13 months old.
 
The news outlets aren't going to agree, because they get their info from different sources, and from even more different sources during the course of an investigation (as much as there is one in most cases).

It's not like they work together to make sure the stories are 'right' 'accurate' or whatever, so they're not really going to 'agree' on all the minute details like this. It's only important to the ones it's important to.
 
quadraphonic said:
It's not like they work together to make sure the stories are 'right' 'accurate' or whatever, so they're not really going to 'agree' on all the minute details like this. It's only important to the ones it's important to.
Click to expand...

My old journalism teacher just rolled over in his grave. ::)

There are no unimportant details to a story. Every mistake that's made, no matter how small, tells the reader/listener/viewer that the reporter didn't do his/her job and brings suspicion on the rest of the story.

If the reporter cannot confirm, by reasonable standards, the age of someone suffice to give a more broad description e.g., "infant", "teen", "elderly" etc.
 
Over my lifetime, I've been involved in a number of news stories as a participant - nothing really tragic, harmful, or against the law, thankfully. But in each case, since I was very familiar with what occurred, I've been disillusioned with how inaccurate the media (both TV and newspapers) have been with the details. In a couple of cases, these details could be called 'trivial,' but in others, the details were very important.

This was true of the first event almost 40 years ago, so it's not that the journalists of today are more sloppy or less careful that their predecessors, necessarily. Maybe its the rush to get the story on air (or in print).

I can only speculate, but regardless - it's no excuse, and it's made me very careful to make sure that I get multiple and diverse sources for stories that are important.
 
landtuna said:
quadraphonic said:
It's not like they work together to make sure the stories are 'right' 'accurate' or whatever, so they're not really going to 'agree' on all the minute details like this. It's only important to the ones it's important to.
Click to expand...

My old journalism teacher just rolled over in his grave. ::)

There are no unimportant details to a story. Every mistake that's made, no matter how small, tells the reader/listener/viewer that the reporter didn't do his/her job and brings suspicion on the rest of the story.

If the reporter cannot confirm, by reasonable standards, the age of someone suffice to give a more broad description e.g., "infant", "teen", "elderly" etc.
Click to expand...
I didn't say it was right. I was just explaining how come they sometimes report different information. ;)
 
quadraphonic said:
It's only important to the ones it's important to.
Click to expand...

It's your quote above with which I am disagreeing.

It (accuracy) is important to every reader and to the history of the event. Not only the people directly involved.
 
landtuna said:
quadraphonic said:
It's only important to the ones it's important to.
Click to expand...

It's your quote above with which I am disagreeing.

It (accuracy) is important to every reader and to the history of the event. Not only the people directly involved.
Click to expand...

Not everyone considers journalism a sacred trust anymore.

This is like when people argue the minutiae of historic formats and call letter changes. Nobody in the general public cares outside This Small Circle. Maybe sometimes they will care if they notice the media making consistent mistakes over time, and that gives them something to critique, or suddenly they are involved in a story and notice some inconsistencies, but overall, people are doing their own thing. Media studies isn't one of those things for most people.

Theoretically, journalists shouldn't practice journalism that way, but in practice, it is. Theoretically, readers should expect more, but realistically why would they? They're trying to make it through the day.
 
How about earthquakes the magnitude like 8.9 to 9.1 in Chile or Japan seems to be in dispute because the media are citing sources like Caltech and USGS for information.
 
Different stations get different information from different places about the same thing.

Same goes for the ages mentioned in the original post. None of these stations is trying to be misleading, they're all relying on the latest information they got from wherever it is they got it.
 
Unlike us, most people don't flip back and forth between all 5 stations in the market to see how they are reporting a particular story. If you watched the news on one station, you wouldn't notice the discrepancies.
 
WKYT and WTVQ in Lexington Ky use to have staggered weather forcast so one could watch them both. I can remember several times when one would give an entirely different forcast from the other one. What made it so comical is the fact that both are less than a mile apart and one can stand outside one station and see the other station.
 
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