Papers' Devils writer from team website

[murphyc]

I think this is awful, don't get me wrong. But how many sports sections of that size and smaller haven't run barely rewritten (or not) handouts, especially from colleges? I fail to see how this is worse, ethically. But I do think it looks bad and basically tells the readers we take whatever the team says as gospel and we're not going to give you anything more than you can get online from the league's website--in fact, we'll give you less than you can get at NHL.com and we'll charge you for it.

I agree. How is running this NHL stuff worse than running a press release from a team/school/local sports organization?
My concern in this case is the EE's promise that if a controversial subject comes up with the team, the paper won't use the team's writer. If you're not actually covering the team per se anymore, are you going to be aware of a controversy brewing? Or will you depend on competition and/or readers to tip you off?

 

[Fredrick]

"As long as it served our readers and we told them where that content was coming from, the readers were fine with it," said Hollis Towns, executive editor of The Asbury Park Press, the largest of the state's six Gannett papers. "I think journalists get hung up on certain lines of what's ethical more than the readers."

He said readers need not worry about seeing articles about school districts or hospitals written by their employees, because the arrangement is limited to sports, and probably will remain that way.

Yeah it'll "only be done in sports coverage."
The quote should have added. "We executive editors do not care about sports and wish sports would go away. Our reporters charge us for mileage and hotel rooms and airplane tickets when we realize anybody can write sports, so we're exploring all avenues to get sports copy to you dear reader at no charge to us. Anybody can cover a game."

 

[zagoshe]

LIke I wrote on the other thread - I have yet to read and/or meet a hockey writer who wasn't an embarrassing homer for the team he/she covered so this is par for the course.

 

[toomanycookies]

"We executive editors do not care about sports and wish sports would go away. Our reporters charge us for mileage and hotel rooms and airplane tickets when we realize anybody can write sports, so we're exploring all avenues to get sports copy to you dear reader at no charge to us. Anybody can cover a game."

This seems to be the thinking. And I do think more people would be pissed about the city councilman writing the city council story than a PR person writing about sports. As far as the general audience, it's two different things. The issue of public funds seems to be the clincher. The problem is if a team has used public money for a stadium, or if it's a public university, then what does that PR person write for you?

 

[Clerk Typist]

LIke I wrote on the other thread - I have yet to read and/or meet a hockey writer who wasn't an embarrassing homer for the team he/she covered so this is par for the course.

Then you have never read Helene Elliott in Los Angeles, or Kevin Paul Dupont in Boston, and most certainly never have read anyone in the French language press in Montreal.

 

[Mark2010]

I don't agree with it, but there are lots of small papers that run releases that are written by school SIDs.

In fairness, we do that, although I edit them rather tightly. The truth is we don't have a staff large enough to cover every golf, tennis and track meet. It's either run the SID stuff or not run anything at all.

 

[Baron Scicluna]

I can't wait until readers start calling the editor wanting to know why there's no coverage in the paper of the latest trade rumor or coach firing.

What's the editor supposed to say? "I'll get the team's PR person on it"?

 

[spnited]

Seriously, people, there are not enough people in NJ concerned about the Devils to make a fuss about a trade rumor. And Lamoriello changes coaches so often, most people can't keep up with it.

Again, I think this is a bad thing but 95% of the readers won't even notice.

 

[YankeeFan]

I surprised how many sports journalists are making a distinction between "sports" and "news".

It's either journalism, or it's not. And unless you treat sports like a genuine journalistic subject, why should anyone else? Reporters of any other subject wouldn't justify this, and neither should sports writers.

I had to deal with this attitude when I worked in sports marketing. We got the same, "you guys get paid to go to sporting events" attitude that many of you get.

I had to work hard to dispel that notion and show where we brought value.

And nothing pissed me off more than when someone -- one very annoying person in particular -- would make a point of bragging about being at an event or would do something stupid like try to get an autograph.

 

[Dr. Howard]

These yahoos have how many newspapers in NJ? And they can't figure out a way for one guy to staff the Devils for all of them? Didn't they take a bureau approach with the newspapers being ruined in Florida? I'm not sure which part of this is the worst -- that the Asbury Park Press (which pre-Gannett was pretty darn good) would do this or that the piece of cheese who runs the place can't understand the ethical issue.

 

[WriteThinking]

The ethics and possible conflicts of interest notwithstanding, the worst thing about this is even more obvious and troubling.

It marks the loss of more actual professional journalists' work and job possibilities.

Papers are moving beyond doing more with less in terms of what they are offering in their product. They doing more with fewer and fewer journalists...intentionally.

In finding ways to do "journalism" without journalists, they are just giving another indication of how the industry is changing, and hurting.

What this business is going through is not the evolution we all thought was going on as times and technology changed.

For journalists, this is downright devolution. There's no other way to spin it.