For the Record
Dean Wright on Ethics, Innovation and Values
Honoring free expression online
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
A few weeks ago, I wrote about the Breaking Borders event in Berlin that marked the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. The event, at which I spoke, took the anniversary as an opportunity to explore how the Internet is playing a role in advancing participatory democracy and free expression around the world.
The media of 1989–television and satellite technology–played a role in bringing down the wall by connecting people and empowering them with information. Now, 20 years later, vastly more powerful information and communication technology is connecting people online, making it more possible to get around efforts at censorship and the suppression of information.
As a result of discussions at the Breaking Borders conference, Google and Global Voices, the international network of bloggers, have established the Breaking Borders Award to honor those who are fighting for free expression.
Audience and media: Can this marriage be saved?
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
Reuters recently hosted a panel at our New York headquarters called “Audience and the Media: A Shaky Marriage.” I was on the panel with a distinguished group: Lisa Shepard, ombudsman of National Public Radio; Andrew Alexander, ombudsman of The Washington Post; and Michael Oreskes, senior managing editor of The Associated Press. Jack Shafer, editor-at-large of Slate, was the moderator.
The key question we explored was: “How can mainstream news organizations retain (or regain) their audiences’ trust in a skeptical world where almost anyone with an Internet connection can be a publisher?” It will come as no surprise that we did not answer the question definitively in the 75 minutes we were on stage. However, a number of questions–some quite troubling–were raised. Rather than attempt to summarize all the points raised and positions taken by the panelists and the audience, I’ll explore some of the questions raised in my mind.
–Why do people mistrust the media and whose fault is it?
The fall of the Wall–and the media’s role
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
It was 20 years ago that the Berlin Wall, the most iconic symbol of the Cold War, fell, on Nov. 9, 1989.
In recent days, there have been a number of commemorations of the event and news organizations around the world have taken note of what was one of the most important stories of the latter half of the 20th century.
I had the privilege of attending and speaking at one Berlin event organized by Google and Reporters Without Borders. The event, Breaking Borders, took the anniversary as an opportunity to explore how the Internet is playing a role in advancing participatory democracy around the globe. Twenty years earlier, television and satellite technology helped play a role in the fall of the Wall, by connecting people and empowering them with information.
The fall of the Berlin wall was symbolic for some other invisible walls to cave in: The wall between the rich and the poor; the walls among races; the walls among religions; the wall between genders. We have to go a long way to demolish these walls. The concrete or iron walls could collapse easily. But the mental walls are so strong that no bulldozer can demolish. A world without such invisible walls is my dream. If God is there, please fulfill my dream. Come on dears, let us go for that.
Are we too fast for our own good?
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
One thing I’ve tried to be consistent about in this column is the notion of transparency.
As I’ve written, at a time when trust is such an endangered commodity in the financial and media worlds, it’s important that news consumers see the guidelines our journalists follow. That’s why we made our Handbook of Journalism available free online.
But it’s also important to remember that handbooks don’t do journalism. Journalists do. And journalists are continually facing new challenges in a brutal economic climate with tough competition and a news cycle that is measured in seconds — or less.
Dim view of media? Try more transparency
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
This week brought more distressing news for journalists, as a new survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press found the U.S. public more critical than ever of the accuracy and independence of the media.
Only 29 percent of Americans believe that news organisations generally get the facts straight, the survey found, the lowest level in the survey’s near quarter-century history.
It gets worse:
I glanced over the values and find “commission” but where is “omission”? Failure to report on the Tax Day Tea Parties (which I did not attend) was lamentable. Thousands of Americans in all 50 states participating in any activity is newsworthy. This, naturally, leads one of wonder what else you are omitting? And why? And who decided that we didn’t need to be informed? And with what agenda?
Handbook response: G is for global
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
Last month we made our Handbook of Journalism freely available online, and the response has been gratifying.
Since then, several thousand of you–hundreds each day– have visited the Handbook and a quick analysis of the traffic shows how global the audience is.
Visitors have come from 106 countries. Not surprisingly, about 32 percent of visits have come from the United States and 16 percent from the United Kingdom. But Germany accounted for 7 percent of visits. Rounding out the top 10 are Canada, Singapore, India, Russia, South Africa, Australia and Brazil.
Dear,Mr.Dean Wright,
Today,i have read your brief notes on full disclosure -hand book-response,feed back,and improvements of future articles etc in a very detailed manners
Till today, i have not received any book let from here
Please a send this free book let me to my email address or in this website
i will take a copy of it
good works done by you and your time
Happily writing,getting appreciation from some editors,authors.
thanks.
Hope to get more from you and fromteam,staff.
With best wishes.,
A is for abattoir; Z is for ZULU: All in the Handbook of Journalism
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
The first entry is abattoir (not abbatoir); the last is ZULU (a term used by Western military forces to mean GMT).
In between are 2,211 additional entries in the A-to-Z general style guide, part of the Reuters Handbook of Journalism, which we are now making available online. Also included in the handbook are sections on standards and values; a guide to operations; a sports style guide and a section of specialised guidance on such issues as personal investments by journalists, dealing with threats and complaints and reporting information found on the internet.
The handbook is the guidance Reuters journalists live by — and we’re proud of it. Until now, it hasn’t been freely available to the public. In the early 1990s, a printed handbook was published and in 2006 the Reuters Foundation published a relatively short PDF online that gave some basic guidance to reporters. But it’s only now that we’re putting the full handbook online.
Some good stuff to read… enjoyed your post, thanks..
Citizen journalism, mainstream media and Iran
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
The recent election in Iran was one of the more dramatic stories this year, with powerful images of protests and street-fighting dominating television and online coverage.
Because traditional news organizations were essentially shut down by the authorities, it fell to citizen journalists — many of whom were among the protesters — to provide the images that the world would see, using such social media as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
This has raised a number of ethics, standards and legal questions for mainstream journalists. My colleague John Clarke, Reuters Global Television Editor, found himself in the middle of the issue as images became available and clients demanded coverage of the election’s aftermath. John discusses the issues raised, the lessons learned and the opportunities for the future below. As always, his opinions are his own.
Ethics tips — and more — for budding journalists
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
YouTube has launched a worthy project called the Reporters’ Center, a collection of videos from journalists around the industry providing advice for aspiring citizen journalists.
I’ve contributed a piece on ethics and gaining and keeping the trust of your audience, and my Reuters colleague Adam Pasick, the U.S. editor of Reuters.com, has done a piece on shooting different kinds of video interviews.
You’ll also find contributions from folks who are a lot more famous, such as Katie Couric, Bob Woodward and Arianna Huffington, among others.
Just watched your video and totally agree: Most news consumers don’t know whom to trust these days. The explosion of online media makes it extremely difficult. You’re right that the basic principles of honesty, fairness, transparency, non-bias, and truth are more important than ever — especially in the new world of citizen journalism. As Scott Gant’s savvy book put it: “We’re All Journalists Now.” If all those who practice any form of journalism, however defined, would be more transparent, accountable and open about who they are and where they’re coming from, credibility and trust might be regained. They should also welcome challenges, correct mistakes promptly and — perhaps most important — have a little humility. The Washington News Council (www.wanewscouncil.org) has been promoting these ideas for almost a dozen years now. Journalism is vital to democracy, but it must earn public trust or it will be rendered irrelevant.
Counting quality — not characters — in social media
Dean Wright is Global Editor, Ethics, Innovation and News Standards. Any opinions are his own.
Are we too connected?
In recent days and weeks I’ve been wondering if our mobile phones, Blackberries, text messaging and constant access to email and social media have brought us too close together for our own good.
Or maybe the quality of our connected life is only as good as the information we share.
Hello Dean,
Good thoughts, thank you for sharing. It’s good to know you are developing guidelines for journalists using social media.
However, I have to take issue with your characterization of Twitter, in particular its ” ““me, me, me” quality” and “focus on short answers to such generic questions as, “What are you doing?””
This misses the mark on Twitter’s value and importance. For some of us that have been active users for two or more years (yes, we do exist) Twitter is primarily an INFORMATION MANAGEMENT tool. That’s not to say all who use it find value that way, but it is a way of finding and sharing information that is more efficient than email, yet as the same time a bit quixotic and serendipitous. It is like Digg and StumbleUpon with people who share your interests. Thus, I have characterized Twitter as part of a personal information management system. Not the only part, but an important one.
On a broader level, the manifestation of so many thoughts can be seen as a peek into the collective conscious, or panconsciousness. I’ve articulated this concept on my blog.
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Dear Editor,
Whatever happens to newspapers,magazines and weekly circulations to this world,as long as freedom of expression,fair reporting of present events and some valid criticism on vital subjects are permanent thinking to us.
I think that, both dailies,weekly,monthly journals and news on line will continue for ever.
We will wait and see,what happens in next technical,media revolutions.
So many months,many years to stay,watch and to explore on many media changes.,