[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[Maximus]

Newspapers have a reputation to uphold?

[crazy canuck]

Yup. The largest newspaper in Canada is risking its worldwide reputation by making this up.

You are missing the point.  They are not making something up.  They are reporting a dubious story as news without fact checking anything.  ie they are no better than online media that dont care what they report.

[Barrister]

Yup. The largest newspaper in Canada is risking its worldwide reputation by making this up.

It's not about them making it up.  They are reporting the truth - two somali men are trying to sell a video that they claim shows Rob Ford smoking crack.  It's the dubiousness of the source, and the lack of any corroboration, that calls their judgment into question by printing the story at all.

[Josephus]

You don't think they "lawyered" it?

[crazy canuck]

You don't think they "lawyered" it?

That also misses the point.  It might not technically be defamation.  But is that really the standard to which journalism has dropped.

[HVC]

Different news agencies have seen the same 90 second cellphone video and have come to the same conclusion. I mean the clip could be doctored or fake ( I mean its not like Somali drug dealers have an honest reputation )


*edit* removed the news faking commit due to others clarification.

[Barrister]

You don't think they "lawyered" it?

The story is probably fine legally speaking (though I'm not an expert on defamation).  It's just stupid.

You could probably find some schizophrenic homeless guy who reports that Rob Ford anally rapes him every night.  You could print his story, but you'd look stupid doing it.  That's what has happened here.

[crazy canuck]

Different news agencies have seem the same 90 second cellphone video and have come to the same conclusion. I mean the clip could be doctored or fake ( I mean its not like Somali drug dealers have an honest reputation ) but blaming the news for faking stuff seems a bit drastic.

Wow, this is the best example of why media these days is not what it used to be.  Gawker says they think they see something.  The story gets picked up and repeated and you think that "different news agencies have come to the same conclusion".

This isn't about faking stuff.  This is about reporting stuff that isnt fact checked.

I suppose people spend so much time on social media these days that they cant even discern what is a reliable news story and what is trash anymore.

[Neil]

Besides, it's not like news sources are exactly rational when it comes to people who they viscerally hate.  The Star is to Ford as Fox News is to Obama.

[HVC]

The Toronto star says they've seen it too. Two people from the star actually. So that's three people we know of from two news sources, one of which had no bone to pick with the mayor. It's not that the star read the gawker article and ran with it, they checked on their own and came to the same conclusion.

[Maximus]

I doubt the Star has ever come to a sane conclusion.

[Barrister]

Gawker is tried to crowd source $200k to buy this video from the crack dealer.

[HVC]

I doubt the Star has ever come to a sane conclusion.

lol so close. Would have gotten away with too

[crazy canuck]

The Toronto star says they've seen it too. Two people from the star actually. So that's three people we know of from two news sources, one of which had no bone to pick with the mayor. It's not that the star read the gawker article and ran with it, they checked on their own and came to the same conclusion.

Some reporter says he saw a picture someone claimed was taken from a video of dubious origin that had someone who looked like Ford smoking something that looked like it might have been crack.

Now that is journalism at its best!

[HVC]

It wasn't pictures, they claim the saw the 90 second clip. Star said they saw it three times. Don't know if ford is a crack head or not, just saying this isn't an example of the fall of western journalism.