News-Record.com

That's a similar approach that I heard from television news directors. Paraphrasing - we can teach you to write, edit and report. We can't teach you about the various subjects you will cover. A degree in journalism or mass communications only means you know how to use the tools, not how to fill the content.

"Without that innate shit detector, you'll never go far." ... And if writing for an audience of all ages, realize there are often words like "BS detector" that can work just as effectively as the real s#@t. Heck, I once got in trouble with an executive editor for letting a reporter include an angry man's statement of being "tired of this crap" (prompting a "no crap allowed" sign by the reporter's cubicle). I thought it was ridiculous (and ridiculously funny) at the time, but it goes back to the message of remembering your audience (from the youngest readers to those offended by any profanity in their family newspaper).

After reading an article in today's online edition, which had the byline "from staff reports", I have to ask why you bother to give any direction at all to your reporters.

The article in question was about the new frog display at the zoo. As I read it, I found myself thinking "this sounds like a news release." And sure enough, when I checked out the link for journalists on the zoo's site, there it was, more detailed but otherwise word for word as it appeared in the "staff report."

I think an explanation is in order.

An explanation of what? Why we published a news release from the Zoo? Or why it said "staff reports?" We publish lots of news releases without independent reporting. Do you doubt the veracity of the story? And we attach a non-specific byline like that on releases where we do editing but no research.

Why does reading that story cause you to wonder why we "bother to give any direction at all to your reporters?"

Hmmm. The term "from staff reports" indicates to me that what follows is original reporting by members of the N&R staff. It doesn't sound non-specific at all, and it certainly doesn't indicate that the article is a near-verbatim copy of a news release.

The caption on the accompanying photo--"courtesy of the NC Zoo"--was both accurate and gave due credit to the source. I don't understand why the same standard would not apply to text.

If N&R reporters and editors are given the nod to cut & paste news releases and pass them off to readers as "staff reports," are we to trust that this policy cannot affect other reporting as well?

I understand your point. We've used that terminology for years and, technically, it's not untrue, although it may not be as precise as we'd like everytime.

We change virtually every news release we publish. (I say virtually rather than all just to be safe, but I believe it is all.) We cut most of them, rewrite some, add some information.

Again, are you suggesting that the zoo brief is inaccurate or you don't like who we said wrote it? That, to me, is the key test.

Mr. Robinson, regarding press releases, if you "cut most of them, rewrite some, add some information" then what we see is not accurate, but the N&R version of what you'd like your readers to believe rather than the truth? Sounds a bit underhanded to me. How do the providers of these press releases feel about the N&R massaging and distorting their truthful information? Isn't it possible an editor or writer can change an otherwise-truthful press release to further their own political or commercial agenda? Why do you feel the need to alter the truth? This is very disturbing to me.

My concern is not with the accuracy of the Zoo's news release. My concern is with the N&R essentailly claiming authorship of an article that was written elsewhere.

Maybe I'm naive, but I never thought "technical" truths were satisfactory in the world of journalism. Precision and accuracy--those concepts should be sacrosanct.