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May 17, 2007
Proprietary journalism
Proprietary journalism: Ryan Block of Engadget goes mea culpa on yesterday's Apple hoax. The problem is that he doesn't release the source code to his journalism -- he doesn't cite his sources, doesn't show the chain-of-custody on the data he was releasing, and we readers can't check and recompile the story itself. All we have is whatever trust we already have in the Engadget brand. He's asking for our Belief... it's not the Scientific Method. You can test a piece of code by whether it works or not, but data... we need the source data to evaluate what we're reading. Anonymity works some places, but not here.
Posted by JohnDowdell at May 17, 2007 07:03 PM
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You're kidding, right? You actually expect us to publicly disclose our sources? Journalism != software. There are journalistic shield laws for this very reason.
[jd sez; If you want my belief, you need to tell me how you know what you say you know. Mysterious sources taken on faith are closer to religion than science. (AP and Reuters get lots wrong, particularly when they ask readers to take things on faith and don't link to source evidence.)]
Furthermore, I'm not asking for belief. What we published is factual, and if you want to call Apple and ask if those email really did get distributed to Apple employees, you're more then welcome to -- that's how you can ply open source to this case.
What's more and on the side, I don't exactly think of Adobe/Macromedia as being too open source with their products! ) [jd sez: Like I already said, you can test whether code fulfills its purposes. But data which cannot be checked, cannot be checked.]
Posted by: Ryan Block at May 18, 2007 08:59 AM
The only item on your juvenile list of demands that holds any water at all is citing one’s sources. Journalism and “code” cannot be compared, but since all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
[jd sez: Ad hominem, but retained due to Joe's rep.]
Posted by: Joe Clark at May 18, 2007 01:16 PM
I don't believe "Ryan Block of Engadget goes mea culpa on yesterday's Apple hoax." is quite the correct wording. I would say he teek the blame for being the first to REPORT what TURNED OUT to be a hoax. Anyway, is engadget a journalism source? I don't read it, and this isn't likely to get me started... a pretty big story to run with, without talking to the company.
Posted by: george Girton at May 18, 2007 04:05 PM