• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

Pergament takes WBEN to task over not attributing the News in Kane case

R

Rob Piotrowski

http://talkintv.buffalonews.com/201...r-coverage-of-a-story-about-hockey-superstar/

Cliff notes version: The News posted Saturday that Blackhawks player and Buffalo native Patrick Kane would not face charges on rape allegations.

Pergament asserts hours later WBEN did their own story without attribution. That started a Twitter war between Pergament and Tim Wenger.

Interesting in that Pergament used an argument people post on this board that without the News there'd be no local news in Buffalo.
 
He's applying journalistic standards to social media. They're not the same thing. Social media is the same thing as you & I speaking casually. So it becomes a source for other people's news. If that's a problem, don't post scoops on social media.
 
I don't know what happened on social media, but it was not reported on the radio by WBEN until Sunday morning, and by a full time news reporter...or possibly Saturday night at 11:30 by a full time overnight reporter.

Just looking at WBEN's Twitter for the first time, shows them giving credit to the rag on October 30th for a Key Bank/First Niagara deal. So one would assume that had they used the rag as a source on October 31st, they would have done the same.
 
Last edited:
Right now-Newsroom staffed with anchor giving updates at the top and bottom of every hour. At least three reporters in the field. Two others hosting the election night talk show. Some will wait until tomorrow to get the results from the rag, if it's even up to date, and then even if the driver wasn't too high to deliver it. Now the question is, will WBEN be cited? At the very least for what the Lancaster Supervisor said while calling in to Bauerle's show today? Doubt it. At least the dead trees are good for a place where the dog can go to the bathroom. A bit over priced though.
 
dand5780 said:
What I don't expect is for the rag to be accurate.
Click to expand...

You don't realize how silly you look touting WBEN over the Buffalo News where news-coverage is concerned.

As is usually the case in market after market, Buffalo being no exception, the local newspaper offers far more comprehensive and in-depth coverage than ANY radio station can, especially one whose newsroom is a shell of it's former self. The Buffalo News website IS a destination for info, while WBEN's is just like most radio station sites: token coverage, mostly re-feeds of wire service stories with very little in-depth local info.

Anyone who relies on WBEN for news is only superficially informed.
 
flybynight said:
You don't realize how silly you look touting WBEN over the Buffalo News where news-coverage is concerned.
Click to expand...

I'm not even talking about news coverage. It isn't even news. It's a lie. A non-fact. It was proved listening for 2 hours last night. And it was reported as an attempt to pretend that there is no news at the radio station.

Because they think that the radio station doesn't have any other sources that could say that the guy wasn't facing charges. I don't know what the rag said. The station said the hockey player was expected to not face any charges. I could have told anyone that when 3 other guy's DNA was found and none of it was his, and then the mother finding an evidence bag in her door that she put there.

"WBEN’s tweet didn’t credit The News for first reporting the story."
As I said, when is WBEN credited for the stories they report first? And there were some major stories first reported by WBEN lately. I don't know or think they should be credited. But you can't have it both ways, and this guy is worried about a "tweet."

And this guy even suggests it may be possible they DID get it from someone else, and not the rag. But it was several hours later. Great. Why is he worried then?

Wenger hasn't been a reporter in years? I don't know about that. I know he's been an anchor this year. I know he's been a talk show host this year. I know he's been a traffic reporter this year. He does anything that needs to be done.
 
Great. You get your "news" from two right-wing, understaffed media outlets. I guess that explains your limited frame of reference toward the rest of the world.
 
Because opening up a rag and reading a "news" article about the "reporter" that is sad his rag wasn't cited is news, right?

No, that's a left-wing, overstaffed, dead tree. He is bashing a radio station because he is, literally, in a dead industry.
 
dand5780 said:
Because opening up a rag and reading a "news" article about the "reporter" that is sad his rag wasn't cited is news, right?

No, that's a left-wing, overstaffed, dead tree. He is bashing a radio station because he is, literally, in a dead industry.
Click to expand...

Seems many newspapers are doing a much better job of transitioning to digital content than the crappy radio station sites that are merely token gestures to seem relevant.

As I said, the Buffalo News website is a destination for local info. WBEN is NOT.
 
flybynight said:
Seems many newspapers are doing a much better job of transitioning to digital content
Click to expand...

I agree that they're doing a great job in terms of content creation. They're doing a terrible job in making money from that content. And tweeting out news scoops only makes money for Twitter, so it's a bad idea. It's giving away the store.
 
The Twitter war of words between Pergament and Wenger is separate from the issue at hand, that being WBEN uses The News' online version as its source.

Here are the facts: The News has more dedicated reporters on any one given story than WBEN could hope to have. The News broke the Kane story, broke the DA's refusal to send the case to the grand jury and most important, followed the story with detailed analysis. WBEN played catch-up. As to election night, The News' on-line edition was the primary source of updated information on every local race in Western New York, often beating the TV stations. The News app is easy to use and functional, which is why so many reporters check it as often as they do.

Wenger is defending his and his wife's paychecks. Gotta pay that mortgage in Orchard Park and send those kids to a good Ivy League school. It's understandable that he'd be defensive, but in this case, Pergament is right. The on-line version of The News repeatedly whips WBEN's ass til it's red as a monkey's butt, with breaking news, in-depth reporting and updated news. Give WBFO some credit on election night, too. Still, the go-to was The News on-line.
 
Element9 said:
The on-line version of The News repeatedly whips WBEN's ass til it's red as a monkey's butt, with breaking news, in-depth reporting and updated news.
Click to expand...

Nobody cares. Radio has always been the "Cliff's Notes" version of history. That competition goes back to the 1930s. The print press resented broadcasters getting preferential treatment, because their story got out quicker. The old print guy's line was "Do you want it fast or do you want it right?" You see how the public is voting.

If The News puts its stories on social media, they're giving it away. They're putting a bag of money on a public street, tempting passers buy to pick it up. If they really want to defend their paychecks, don't put the news on the web. Keep it locked up behind paywalls. But whether WBEN credits the paper or not doesn't make a difference in the reporter's paycheck. It's really about ego, and no one cares.
 
If the guy from The News is worried about his paycheck, the guy from radio is worried about two paychecks. The fact is, the guy from The News has his paycheck locked in. He's retired. The News brought him back because, surprise of surprises, as much a toolbag as he sometimes can be, he's a recognizable brand and known commodity. He doesn't give a spit about who he might offend, least of all Entercom, WBEN, it's PD or GM... and he seems to know that working it on Facebook and Twitter reaches a new and younger demo. If the radio guy was smart, he'd ignore the newspaper guy. By responding, the radio guy legitimizes the newspaper guy's position. Haw haw! Kinda like what we do here.

Your turn to argue a point that maybe 23 people care about.
 
Last edited:
There are two things that need addressing here:

First, radio used to have the resources and flexibility to get the story first. Newspapers got it in more detail, but the whole "dead trees" thing was correct. They had to wait to publish. The Internet has changed all that. Radio still could do live shots and have an immediacy that the newspaper site couldn't match, but they simply don't have the staff, or the desire to fund it. As far as the "fast vs. right" thing is concerned, newspapers wrote history. Radio WAS history in the making, and anyone who's ever found themselves in the middle of a new story knows, the context can change over time.

Secondly, the Buffalo News DOES use a paywall. Yes, you can read up to 10 articles a month, and there's plenty of free content available (and ad-supported). If you're more than a casual reader, you need a subscription to access the really in-depth content.

As far as The News putting the story on social media and "giving it away", it just ain't so. It's no more "giving it away" than the old newsboy shouting "Extra, Extra, Read all about it - Kane not going to court." 240 characters ain't exactly "the whole story". It does drive people to the site, however - including local radio "reporters" (actually, more like aggregators, or outright plagiarists).

The News is staying afloat in the age of digital media by using ad-supported content as well as a pay wall. Striking the balance between "free" (ad-supported) and paid (subscriber) content is the voodoo that most outlets who actually created content are struggling with in the digital age.

WBEN's news department is a shadow of its former self, and not particularly well-funded. Ask Steve Cichon why he left after 20-ish years, journeying from intern to News Director. The money ain't there, and neither is the commitment from management. At best, radio news is an internship for TV news for people who don't scare the camera. In fact, more of today's young TV reporters would benefit from the voice development that radio offers. I swear that some of them should be locked in a room and forced to listen to themselves. Maybe they'd improve their vocal skills.
 
Last edited:
SirRoxalot said:
First, radio used to have the resources and flexibility to get the story first.
Click to expand...

And they still do. Just not this particular story. There are threads here comparing coverage from WBEN vs WBFO, and WBEN still sends people out to do the old live shot from the site of the story. As for staffing, WBEN isn't a single radio station, operating alone, it's part of a cluster. The station also has access to WGR, which happens to be a SPORTS station, and has the rights to the Buffalo Sabres. Would someone at WGR have some inside information about a local court case involving a hockey player? Perhaps. So it's not beyond the realm of possibility that WBEN has access to some of the same contacts that The News has. Of course we're also ignoring the fact that the story broke on a Saturday, which isn't a normal day for full time staff, regardless of how big the news room is.

SirRoxalot said:
Secondly, the Buffalo News DOES use a paywall.
Click to expand...

Great...so if WBEN didn't use its own resources to get the story, they have paid a subscription to The News. So they're not "stealing" stories, they're paying for them. So what? Every radio news room I worked at had subscriptions to local papers, used AP and other outside services to augment staff coverage. Big deal. The public doesn't care. As the article in the OP says, it's all inside baseball. The public doesn't care who got the story first. The public doesn't care if WBEN had a full time reporter at the court house. The public really doesn't give a hoot about any of this.
 
Last edited:
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom