Critical Thinking

“Can You Libel a Disaster?” (And several other questions that came to mind after The Atlantic gave Ruth Shalit Barrett $1 Million)

Ruth Shalit Barrett received more than $1 million after suing The Atlantic for defamation, based on its approach to retracting this story. For that kind of money, they must have said this is a photo of Barrett drowning a couple dozen kids in a pool laced with electrical lines. 

THE LEAD: When in doubt, sue somebody, because it apparently works:

The Atlantic quietly agreed to pay more than $1 million early this summer to settle a lawsuit by the writer Ruth Shalit Barrett, who had accused the magazine of defamation after it took the rare step of retracting an article she had written and replacing it with an editor’s note, according to a person with knowledge of the settlement.

Ms. Barrett, who wrote an article about youth sports in wealthy areas as a freelancer for The Atlantic in 2020, sued the publication and one of its editors in January 2022. She said the outlet had smeared her reputation and asked for $1 million in damages.

 

DOCTOR OF PAPER FLASHBACK: I was working on another post over the weekend when I noticed a post I wrote several years ago about Barrett’s article and subsequent lawsuit was getting heavy traffic for no apparent reason. A quick Google search of her name helped me figure it out.

At the time, I figured there was NO WAY this thing was going anywhere. The strength of my prediction powers is also why I suck at Fantasy Football.

 

THE DETAILS: Barrett wrote a story about niche sports that rich parents were pushing their kids to enter, in hopes of gaining an edge when the kids applied to Ivy League schools. The story had a number of problems, including an anonymous source that wasn’t that anonymous, the creation of a kid out of thin air, the exaggeration of an injury to a kid during a fencing match and more.

Eric Wemple of the Washington Post dug into this story and started finding more and more things that didn’t make sense, something the editors of The Atlantic also began to notice. At some point, they decided, “Screw it, we can’t save the patient” and retracted the story with a lengthy editor’s note about the story and Barrett’s history in media.

As a result, Barrett filed the suit, arguing that the note defamed her in several ways. She asked for it to be rewritten and that she be given the story’s publishing rights. The two sides went to arbitration, leading to some edits to the note and a lot of cash.

 

A FEW QUESTIONS: In reading this over and over again, I found myself asking several rhetorical questions, one of which was, “Can I sue Sage for no good reason with the hopes that they give me a squillion dollars to go away for a while?”  While the answer to that one marinates in your mind, here are a couple others:

CAN YOU LIBEL A DISASTER? I’m not calling Barrett a disaster for obvious reasons, not the least of which is I don’t have a million bucks I want to throw away. I’m more or less wondering how we started with a story so bad that it required a full retraction and ended with a pay day of this nature.

The publication stated it was aware of her history of not quite exhibiting the best level of judgment in regard to journalistic integrity. Wemple dug a bit deeper into her life and found more than a few clinkers along the way, including problems with the story on these weird sports. The fact checkers were lied to in at least two cases, with one source being encouraged to lie. (The original note said “at least one” while the new note says “one,” a distinction without merit from a language position. Also, who told you it was “only” one? The person you initially found was involved in all the lying and encouraging others to lie, so… um…)

Courts have ruled on a number of occasions that certain people and situations are “libel-proof,” in that nothing further can be done to harm their reputation. In addition, courts have stated that libel doesn’t apply if only “incremental harm” can be demonstrated. In the former, the courts basically say that someone or something is so bad, any statement that might be libelous toward any other person or group won’t qualify as libel. In the latter, it’s like a person in prison for 10 counts of murder sues you for reporting that they have a dozen unpaid parking tickets.

In looping back to this situation, I fail to see how the changes to the note or the statements regarding Barrett improved the situation to the point of avoiding libel. The distinctions in here feel to me like the quote in “Great Balls of Fire!” when someone yells at Jerry Lee Lewis that  he married his 12 year old cousin, Myra, to which she retorts, “Second cousin, twice removed!” Oh. Well.

The question of how bad was the defamation in relation to what was already out there has me pondering what level of reputation she recouped as a result of the suit. In short, do people who thought poorly of her now think better of her after this? Or did people who thought better of her before the retraction think worse of her AFTER that retraction?

Or did the big check just make things better?

 

WHEN DID GP GO MIA? I seem to remember a time, not so long ago, when people did things on “GP” or “general principle.” In other words, it was standing up for the right side of something or holding someone to account for something, even if it would be easier to just throw in the towel.

Case in point, my parents told me when I first got my license that if I got a speeding ticket, I’d lose my right to drive for a protracted period of time. No muss, no fuss, no BS. Just put the keys on the table. Sure enough, when I was 17, I was ticketed for speeding along a stretch of road that was a notorious speed trap. I walked into the house, put the ticket on the table, dropped the keys on top of it and that was that for a while.

What my parents DIDN’T foresee was that I was involved in about 912 activities that required me to be at various locations at night and on weekends. It would have been far easier for them to just give me back the keys and let me drive myself. However, Mom and Dad dug in and ended up driving me to and from all those things until the predetermined punishment time had ended. It was inconvenient for them, but they decided the principle of the thing mattered. I learned a lot from that and have since avoided speeding tickets, although now that I’ve said that, I’m sure I’m getting nailed on the way home.

The larger point is: When did we stop fighting just because the fights were hard? We’ve recently had the “60 Minutes” lawsuit, the ABC lawsuit, and several other lawsuits that have the “Fourth Estate” folding like a cheap cardboard box in a rainstorm. It’s like, “It’s cheaper and easier to just pay people to go away.” Well, that’s like paying protection money to the mob, assuming it’s a one-time thing.

It’s not just the news business, but it seems like we fold up everywhere: A kid threatens us, we change a grade. A social media “influencer” pulls focus onto a post we made, we take it down and apologize. Don’t even get me started about what the kids are doing in the ice cream aisle at Walmart these days. What happened to standing on principle?

There are times where I go into a situation knowing full well I’m going to lose and there are other times, where the risks are pretty damned high that I will. Still, there’s something that says, “No. You aren’t folding. You’re gonna play this hand out, because you can’t live with yourself if you don’t.”

I feel this moment so deeply

I understand that money is a predominant factor in pretty much everything in the world today and I know that it’s easy to say what I would or wouldn’t do when it’s not my money to spend. That said, I think back to the people I admire the hell out of in this business, who would never have acquiesced as easily as it seems like so many people are so willing to do.

Charlie Kirk, shooting deaths and trying to find a way forward. (A Throwback Post)

The death of Charlie Kirk, a political activist and leader of the conservative youth organization Turning Point USA, led to a number of expected outcomes when it came to social media and public expression. Some mourned the loss of the 31-year-old, noting that this brand of political violence is never the answer to disagreements. Others pointed to Kirk’s own words about guns, especially the time he noted that gun deaths in the United States were “worth it” if it meant we got to keep the right to bear arms.

Photos of Kirk and his family have also circulated, bringing home the message that two little kids will never see their father again.

As the shooter has not been captured as of this writing, the speculation about motive continues to be a hotly contested issue. Depending on which rabbit hole you enter, this is either a deranged liberal attempting to silence a strong, conservative voice or part of a larger conspiracy to martyr him to the causes that continue to move the country closer and closer to a fascist state.

(It also didn’t escape my notice that a school shooting in Colorado basically flew under most of the media’s radar Wednesday. Part of it, I’m sure, was Kirk’s fame and the pull of that story. The other part, sadly, was that not only have we grown numb to this idea, but that “only” three people were critically wounding, including the shooter, who died later that day.)

As much as I disliked Kirk and his message, I remain appalled at his death. I have always believed, and continue to do so, that the answer to speech you don’t like isn’t censorship or violence, but more speech. That said, this message isn’t where my brain found itself going as I started to think about all of this today.

When several friends and family members were talking about who could have shot him, the idea of a “liberal with a gun” seemed a bit too farfetched for a few folks. For me, I found myself hearing UWO professor and mass shooting survivor Joe Peterson in my head. When we spoke for my “First-Person Target” series, he mentioned how there was a social media group called something like Liberal Gun Owners. He laughed at that, explaining that there are a lot of liberals who own guns out there, so it’s not really a flex to start a group like this.

When my wife asked me how I couldn’t be absolutely terrified of what all of this means, particularly as our daughter fears that we are sliding toward becoming Gilead, it was Tracy Everbach’s words that spoke to me when as she reflected on how she could be shot at any moment by one of her students: “I’ve chosen not to be afraid.”

Today’s throwback post looks at the reflection piece I did a few years after the series ran. I think a number of the points are more relevant now than ever. If you’d like to read the whole series, I’ve linked to it here. (Warning: It’s a massive slog, and I say this as the person who wrote it.) I remain grateful to the people who gave of themselves and their time to help me learn lessons that I wish no longer were relevant in society today.

 

Four things I learned about the mass-shootings debate after wearing a bulletproof vest for a week

TeachingVest

Nearly three years ago, I decided to live in a bulletproof vest for a week as part of a journalism project to find out about guns, fear, mass shootings and more. (Photo by T.R. Gleason)

Over the past two weeks, the country has suffered two mass shootings: A gunman killed 10 people at a King Soopers grocery store in Boulder, Colorado and another killed eight people at three spas in Atlanta, Georgia.

News coverage of these events have examined the motives, the shooters and the “next steps” elements of this in a way that has become all too common in the United States. For me to do so here would be redundant at best, so feel free to Google these incidents and read all about the various elements of these crimes.

A few years back, in the wake of several mass shootings, I decided to take on a project where I dug into things that went beyond what you read in the horse-race coverage after a mass shooting or the political grandstanding that comes with gun-related violence of this nature. Instead of going out to people we normally talk to in the wake of these events, I wanted to talk to people who had specific angles on the various facets of the issue and then just shut up and listen to them.

The project that had been rattling around in my head for three years. After one of my friends noted that her university had become a concealed-carry campus, she expressed concern about what this meant for her safety. After several colleagues weighed in on potential ways to deal with the situation, all to no avail, I made a simple suggestion:

“Wear Kevlar.”

In other words, if you couldn’t play offense, play defense. A bulletproof vest might get people talking about the issue in a different way. She didn’t go that route, but I thought it was worth taking a chance. What followed was a week of personal participation reporting, several months of reporting and eventually a six-part series I called “First-Person Target.”

Here is the link to the main site for that project and all six pieces if you are interested.

After these more recent shootings, I went back and reread what I wrote during that time and found a few minor epiphanies that I thought might be worth sharing. I wanted to note that these are only my opinions based on looking back at what I wrote back then. I wish I had better answers to the bigger questions, but here’s what little I do have:

 

FEAR IS A COMMON THREAD: We often talk about guns as an issue of Constitutional rights or personal freedom or safety. What we don’t talk about, but is embedded in all of these topics and more is the concept of fear.

On a basic level, we do talk about the fear of someone deciding to unleash an internal fury upon a group of unsuspecting people in a seemingly random act of violence. I doubt people who entered a spa or a grocery store earlier this month in Georgia or Colorado thought to themselves, “I’m putting myself in harm’s way by going to this place right now.”

However, once these killers opened fire, many more of us now think about how it could happen to us at any time, in any place. For most of us, the fear will eventually subside when the story is no longer leading the nightly news or filling our news feeds with updates. Then, when the next attack occurs, our fears will be stoked once again.

Beyond that, however, I found that fear is at the heart of every action or lack thereof regarding the gun issue. People who dislike armed citizens fear the havoc guns can create. People who arm themselves do so for fear of not being able to protect themselves. People who oppose legislation that would limit access to firearms fear losing rights they see as sacrosanct. People who could propose legislation to limit access to guns fear the backlash from gun owners and lobbying groups as a result of trying to move the needle.

When I tried to get this project off the ground, fear was right at the forefront. I asked the UWO police chief if he knew where I could borrow a bulletproof vest to wear. He offered me instead a dose of reality:

Vince,

I’m sure you could purchase a vest for yourself, however I do not know of any police outfitter that would loan out this type of equipment.  In fact, if you started inquiring about borrowing a vest it could cause some concern from these vendors on your motives. As you stated people have a heightened awareness because of these mass casualty events.  Sorry I couldn’t be of more help to you.

When I sought people associated with firearms to help me understand a topic I really lacked knowledge in, I found fear as well. When I asked the folks in my community for someone to talk to about sales and gun registration and so forth, they all pointed me to one person in Omro, who owned a gun shop. I reached out to him and got an initial response, but after that, all I got was silence.

In talking to other people who knew this guy, the answer was simple and common: “He’s afraid to talk about this.”

Of all the people I talked to during my project, only one really told me they acknowledged the fear that comes from all of this, and it was Tracy Everbach, the professorial colleague of mine from the University of North Texas whose initial concerns helped spawn the project:

“I don’t spend a lot of time wondering if someone in my classroom is carrying a gun anymore or thinking, ‘Are they going to pull it out and shoot you with that?’”

“It’s just a personal thing to me,” she added. “I’ve chosen not to be afraid of it. I figure I’m as likely to have that happen as a car accident or whatever. Anything can happen to anyone at any time.”

 

WE ARE NOT SIDES OF A COIN, BUT FACETS OF A GEM: Journalism always talks about getting “both sides” of a story, as a way of avoiding bias. If someone is pro-X, we need to find someone who is anti-X. When we do, we quote them both and we’re done.

While some stories, like those on sporting events, do follow that pattern, most stories are much more complex than that. Even more, the people behind those stories are far more complex than many of us care to know.

When I started this project, I didn’t want archetypes or the “usual suspects.” I didn’t want a press release from the head of the NRA that spoke in platitudes. I didn’t want a “thoughts and prayers” statement from a politician. I didn’t want to collect soundbites that I could repeat in my sleep and move on.

I wanted real people who could help me understand their lives and interests and positions without fear of judgment or reprisal. I wanted to look into the heart of the issue through their window and see what they saw, whether I agreed with what they were seeing or not.

What I found is that reality isn’t what we see playing out in the wake of shootings on the news or at protests or elsewhere. I didn’t find “gun people” and “anti-gun people,” but rather people that saw their lives intersect with firearms in a variety of ways and how those intersections shaped them in some fashion.

UWO police officer Chance Duenkel carries a gun every day as part of his job, and yet knows that the weapon and his protective gear might not keep him safe in certain situations. In referring to a fallen officer he knew, he explained:

“He had all the equipment, he had the experience dealing with these types of firearms and weapons calls and the cards, unfortunately, weren’t in his favor.”

Nate Nelson, who trains people how to use firearms safely and is an avid hunter, carries a gun as well. He knows better than most the importance of training, safety and respect for weapons of this kind as well as the ramifications of choosing to carry one:

“If you draw that gun you’re probably going to spend six figures in legal defense,” he said. “People need to take that portion seriously on top of the fact of you might end up taking somebody’s life and it might be the assailant that’s bothering you or it might be somebody else that’s innocent because of where those bullets go beyond that.”

Joseph Peterson, a professor at UWO, owns a gun and works with the FBI to help people better understand mass shootings. Peterson was wounded when a gunman entered his classroom at Northern Illinois University in 2008 and opened fire. The shooter killed six and wounded 17 more.

Peterson spent time  learning a great deal about guns and what he refers to as “gun culture,” and found both the fallacies associated with the law and the nuanced nature of people with whom he interacted:

“Gun laws don’t prevent anything,” he said. “Absolutely. Laws don’t prevent anything. It’s that most people agree with them and people agree not to break them. Safety comes from having more good people than bad people.”

<SNIP>

“I think I’ve been in this kind of journey that I’ve been trying to put myself through on this,” he added. “In learning more about gun culture, learning more about firearms and learning to appreciate them for what they are, demystified a bit, I’m learning that there is a lot more middle ground covered. It’s the extreme views that muddy these waters and that’s what’s keeping things from getting done.”

 

LISTENING VERSUS WAITING TO TALK: During one interview, a source (I can’t remember who said it) stopping abruptly to tell me that they found themselves talking way more than they ever have on the topic. The reason, the person explained, was that I hadn’t said almost anything during the interview.

A similar thing happened when I was talking to Nate Nelson. At one point, about a half hour in, he asked, “Are you getting what you wanted from this?”

My answer was honest: “I really didn’t have anything I wanted to get. I just wanted to listen.”

In many cases, we know what we “want to get” from a source. We have questions that need answers and quotes that need to be gathered. I have done it dozens of times, asking the “How do you feel about X?” question to get the “I’m proud, happy and thrilled” answer. I don’t say this with any great level of pride in my reporting acumen, but rather to explain that experienced reporters and experienced sources know how to do the dance.

In this case, I went the completely opposite way. I had questions, sure, but they were more of a “Tell me a story” variety than a “Give me an answer” form. I also came in with as much of a blank slate as I possibly could. My goal wasn’t to poke back at people, but rather just hear what they wanted to tell me. Could they have been blowing smoke up my rear end? Sure, but that goes back to the earlier point about whom I chose and whom I avoided.

In several interviews, I got the sense that the people with whom I spoke weren’t used to people who listened. They were used to people who were waiting to talk.

I understand that passions can be loud and strong around life-and-death issues and that not everyone had the luxury I had in trying to just sit back and let information envelop me. However, when we aren’t listening, we are simply waiting to tell the other people why they’re wrong, and that’s not going to get us anywhere anyway.

In listening, I got to hear important points that made a lot of sense:

  • If people are going to say that mental health concerns are more to blame than guns for mass shootings, they need to be willing to put forth the money, research and resources to deal with that. They also need to be willing to look beyond that issue if this issue becomes a definitive red herring in the issue of mass shootings.
  • We’re often looking at the wrong thing when it comes to guns and death. Although the mass shootings draw the most attention and an ever-increasing body count continues to work people into a media frenzy, guns do far more damage in far less public ways. Gun statistics demonstrate that more than half of the gun deaths in the United States are suicides. Homicides account for another third of those deaths, with the majority of the deaths coming at the hands of people who knew their attackers, as in the case of domestic violence. Less than one-fifth of one percent of the gun deaths in the U.S. come from mass shootings.
  • People who don’t know a lot about guns actually talk the most about guns. Joe Peterson mentioned in an interview that shortly after the NIU shooting, he found himself talking a lot about the topic of guns and mass shootings while knowing much about either. He then did the academic thing and really researched the topic like a scholar would: Open the aperture on the lens, see the full picture and come to some provable conclusions. Nate Nelson mentioned that people get freaked out by the AR-15 because of its look and misunderstandings about the reason the gun is preferred in some legitimate circles. He noted the light weight and limited recoil make it valuable for hunters like his son. I also dug around after our interview to find that he was right about its role in mass shootings: Most mass shootings were committed with weapons OTHER than an AR-15. (For example the shooter at Virginia Tech killed 32 people with a pair of handguns. The shooter at NIU employed a shotgun and a handgun as well.) However, if all you see are social media posts, memes and news clips, you might be left with the impression that banning the AR-15 would solve all of our shooting problems.

I figured out a lot more along the way as well and I find myself pushing back at a lot of things I might have otherwise accepted as gospel before this project. I also figured out that I can understand a lot of things people believe without completely agreeing with them, and vice versa.

WE SUSTAIN MENTAL SCARS THAT NEVER COMPLETELY FADE: Of all the things I heard in doing this project, the one that stuck with me the most came from Chase Cook, a reporter at the Annapolis Capital Gazette. In 2018, a man with a long-standing feud against the paper came to the newsroom armed with a shotgun. He killed six of Cook’s colleagues.

Cook was off that day, but upon hearing of the attack, he went to the office where he began to report on the events of the day. The work of Cook and the fellow survivors earned national honors and praise, including a spot as Time’s “People of the Year.”

As the incident faded from the collective consciousness, Cook continued to deal with the aftermath of his experiences.

“I have a hard time in movie theaters now,” he said. “I get anxious when the lights go out, which is a bummer because I love going to the movies. I think about it a lot when I’m in really crowded places… That fear factor has kind of permeated through everything. I’m at work, I’m in danger. I’m at school, I’m in danger. I’m at church, I’m in danger. I have to convince myself that I’m not because while mass shootings are a problem in the country and they’re up, they’re still a rare crime.”

I haven’t spoken to Cook for at least a year now, but I often think about him when a shooting occurs. I wonder if he reads the news coverage. I wonder if he’s been able to enjoy movies again. I wonder if he is OK.

In talking to Kelly Furnas, the former adviser of the Collegiate Times at Virginia Tech, I found he also had residual mental scars after dealing with a mass shooting. He mentioned to me simple things, like noticing how certain door handles were replaced because the campus shooter had chained the doors of a building to prevent escape. He mentioned trying to be more aware of certain things but not letting fear dominate his life.

As a newshound of sorts, however, he also found difficulty when it came to reading about each subsequent shooting that occurred in the U.S.:

“Quite frankly when I hear about a mass shooting I read the headline and I mention it to my wife and that’s about it,” he added. “That’s about all I can handle at this point. It’s obviously overwhelmingly sad and it’s frustrating and it makes you angry and upset but it’s also just like not where my energy can be. I think every single time that happens I think back to my students and what they went through and maybe that’s part of it.”

Joe Peterson, who was wounded in a mass shooting, talked about therapy and life changes and other major issues he dealt with. He also discussed minor things like seeking out exits in movie theaters and not being able to sit with his back to the door at a restaurant for a long time. In explaining his experiences, he told me that a lot of those personal difficulties were shared among people who had gone through situations like he had:

“With every one of these tragedies there are more and more survivors,” he said. “We are all members of a club we don’t want to be a member of and we don’t want any more members in it.”

If there was a single thing I think everyone I spoke with would agree on, it would be that.

The Ethics and The Collateral Damage of Outing ‘Phillies Karen’

 

THE LEAD: A viral moment during the Marlins/Phillies game on Friday has turned the lives of several women upside down, as internet “sleuths” have tried to “out” an enraged and entitled fan.

THE BACKGROUND: When Harrison Bader’s home run reached the outfield stands, several fans grabbed for it, including Drew Feltwell who retrieved it for his son, Lincoln. The female fan who lost out on the chase confronted Feltwell and demanded the family give up “her ball.”

After several moments of being berated, Feltwell turned the ball over to the woman who has been dubbed “Phillies Karen.”

Feltwell appeared shaken by the confrontation, the video shows. After a brief interaction, he plucks the ball out of his son’s mitt and hands it to the woman in the Phillies jersey.

He said he made the decision because he did not want to do something he’d regret in front of his kids.

“There was kind of a fork in the road, like, I’m gonna go one direction and then probably regret,” Feltwell said. “Or go this direction and do something in front of my kids that, you know, like a teaching moment.”

In probably two of the best PR moves in recent memory, the Marlins organization dispatched a staffer with a swag bag for Logan, who was there to celebrate his birthday, while the Phillies arranged for Logan to meet Bader, who gave the boy an autographed bat.

 

THE FALL OUT: The woman in the video has yet to be identified, despite the fact more people recorded her than recorded the finale of “M*A*S*H*.” In addition, her photo has been shared around the internet, both as kind of digital “wanted” posters and some pretty amusing memes:

My favorite is this reference to “Field of Dreams.”

What’s less amusing is what has happened to the women who apparently bear a passing resemblance to this woman and have caught hell for it.

“Ok everyone,” Cheryl Richardson-Wagner posted on Facebook Saturday. “I’m NOT the crazy Philly Mom (but I sure would love to be as thin as she is and move as fast)… and I’m a Red Sox fan!”

Richardson-Wagner has been roasted online as the heartless Phillies fan caught on viral video throwing a stadium-sized tantrum at LoanDepot Park in Miami, bullying dad Drew Fellwell into turning over a home run ball he gave to his young son, Lincoln.

Also…

The other name suggested was Leslie-Ann Kravitz’s, with claims circulating that she was the woman in the clip and had been fired from her job at the Hammonton school district in New Jersey. Here’s the truth of what happened.

Is Leslie-Ann Kravitz the ‘Phillies Karen’?

The claim that Leslie-Ann Kravitz is the ‘Phillies Karen’ came from several anonymous social media handles. It was circulated on X without any substantiating proof. HT.com cannot verify these claims.

Accusing someone of doing something that the public hates a person for isn’t made any better when toss a vague, bold-type caveat in there. That said, it’s at least better than what these people did, flat out saying it actually was Kravitz.

 

DOCTOR OF PAPER HOT TAKE: Not to be too curmudgeonly here, but today’s “citizen vigilantes” apparently aren’t as good at ruining the “right” person’s life as they once were. In 2003, it only took about 8 hours for Steve Bartman to be the most hated man in Chicago Cubs’ fandom.

Setting that aside, the question of when is it OK to name someone involved in a public act like this requires more than rushing to social media so you can yell, “FIRST!” Traditional media outlets would often debate the merits of naming someone in this situation, the confidence the journalists have in their reporting and the potential fallout of naming someone, even if the identification is accurate.

Not everyone receives that level of ethical training, as the dissemination of content no longer rests in the hands of the venerable “Fourth Estate.” That said, even legacy media have rushed out stories or identifications for fear of being late on the deal, even if the reporting is shaky or the impacts can devastate people. Of the interest elements we preach in the FOCII mnemonic, apparently “Immediacy” seems to be the dominant one.

Being first is one of those things that can kick the adrenaline into high gear for journalists, and I say that as a former “scoop junkie.” The idea of breaking a story and getting your info out to the public first can feel better than a first kiss.

However, I’ve also been on the back end of a few of situations where reporting missteps taken while running down glory road had me an inch away from being fired. Had I been more cautious and less interested in being first, I probably could have avoided more than a few of those situations.

In looking at a situation like this, I’d argue that we should remind ourselves of the most cautious journalist adage I’ve ever heard: “The duty to report is not the same as the duty to publish.”

In short, it’s better that 1,000 guilty Karens should go unshamed than one innocent Karen become an internet meme.

DISCUSSION STARTER: As a reporter, how far would you go to identify this person? When would you feel comfortable publishing a name? What benefit do you see in publicly naming this person, and what do you think would force you to reconsider naming her?

 

Do students need to memorize things anymore? (A Throwback Post)

Rote memorization was a large part of my education and my life as I grew up. The nuns had a way of smacking the hell out of you if you couldn’t remember all 50 states or their capitals. We also got put through the paces on our “times tables” with speed and accuracy showing equal value at that point.

Beyond that, we had to memorize a number of crucial things like our locker combinations and crucial phone numbers for home, grandma’s house and our friends.

(If you don’t believe me, ask anyone over the age of 40 what their home phone number was and they probably still have it committed to memory. Even more, when I was a kid, I would always call my buddy, Mark, who lived across the street to see if he could come out and play. Fast forward to me being in my late 30s and needing to have someone check on my dad. I still remembered that number, so I called his parents’ house at that same land-line number and got the help I needed.)

Today, we lack the need for such things in so many ways. I honestly have no idea what my kid’s phone number is, as my phone tells it to me. I also don’t have email addresses or websites memorized, as they are auto-filled or replaced by apps.

So, is memorization dead, and if so, is that OK? That question took on new meaning when I saw a couple opinion pieces in the Wall Street Journal. The first by professor Alex Green, talked about the ways in which AI has robbed his students of the ability of important thinking skills:

these core skills are no mystery. They involve an ability to sift through information and understand who created it, then organize and pull it together with logic, reason and persuasion. When teachers dream of our students’ successes, we want to see these skills help them thrive.

For that to happen, students must gain the ability to synthesize information. They must be able to listen, read, speak and write—so they can express strategic and tactical thinking. When they say AI is eroding their ability to speak and write, this is what they’re losing, often before they’ve ever fully gained it.

As much as I totally feel what this guy is saying, I can understand how students (or AI-proponents who aren’t students) could dismiss this as, “OK, Boomer” level complaints really boil down to a professor feeling less important than usual.

However, the second piece, by WSJ ed board member Allysia Finley, has me a bit more concerned about what AI is doing to younger brains through “cognitive offloading:”

The brain continues to develop and mature into one’s mid-20s, but like a muscle it needs to be exercised, stimulated and challenged to grow stronger. Technology and especially AI can stunt this development by doing the mental work that builds the brain’s version of a computer cloud—a phenomenon called cognitive offloading.

<SNIP>

Why commit information to memory when ChatGPT can provide answers at your fingertips? For one thing, the brain can’t draw connections between ideas that aren’t there. Nothing comes from nothing. Creativity also doesn’t happen unless the brain is engaged. Scientists have found that “Aha!” moments occur spontaneously with a sudden burst of high-frequency electrical activity when the brain connects seemingly unrelated concepts.

With that in mind, I go back to this early question and I wonder what you have to say about it as professors, journalists and generally smart reader-type folks:

Is memorization a necessary skill for college journalism students?

I know this might seem like a click-bait headline or like I have the answer to it, but this is an honest question for my fellow J-folk out there.

The reason I ask is because I heard a number of students grousing in my writing class about a gen ed course they all are taking that requires them to do (what I consider to be) an insane amount of memorization for tests. The exams are between 80 and 120 questions each and are to be completed within two hours. They also allow no aids, such as notes or books.

Since most of my classes are skills-based, I tend to avoid multiple choice questions or exams that go this route. However, since I let the students pick their poison when it comes to in-class exams, we do have a mix of “write this” and “pick this” kinds of questions, including multiple choice. However, I let them have the AP style book and whatever notes and homework I’ve turned back to them. My rationale is that the point of this course is to help you improve your writing/editing/reporting/whatever, so learning from previous successes and failures is par for the course in our field.

However, I have plenty of colleagues who teach large pit classes with more dates and places kinds of stuff who do use the “choose A, B, C or D” kind of questions, some of whom allow notes while others don’t. Is one better than the other? I don’t know. That’s the point of my question here.

Here are a few caveats for the discussion:

  • I know some fields need memorization because looking everything up at the time in which the information is needed doesn’t work well. If you’re majoring in a language, fluid speaking, writing and reading are crucial, thus, memorization is at the core of what we do here. Also, when it comes to the medical field, I don’t want to hear my doctor or nurse saying, “I don’t know… Just Google it!”
  • I used to be of the “what if you CAN’T look it up” denomination of our field. The idea of quick recall mattered when you didn’t have an AP style book at hand or you couldn’t get to the clip files to look something up. Now, we all carry computers with us that can tell us everything we need. (And if you’re going to make the “What if you don’t have service?” argument, I’d counter with, “You’re probably going to be eaten by the “Hills Have Eyes” people, so not knowing when the Council of Trent happened is probably not a priority.”
  • I also used to be of the “You need the basics of our bible” kind of person as well. That meant a lot of AP memorization or at least knowledge of where to go in the book. I still force the kids to read the actual book in early classes so they know where stuff is or what is in there, but now everything is searchable for a reasonable subscription fee on AP. We also have dictionaries online. (It also makes less sense to memorize AP these days, since it seems like AP is changing rules at a maximum volume every year.)

What I’m looking at is the idea of forcing memorization in journalism classes and requiring gen ed classes of our majors that rely on this kind of approach to education. Is this the best path forward for our students? If so, why? If not, what should we do then?

I look forward to your thoughts in the comments or via email.

As Promised, Here is Dr. Vinnie’s Bin of Journalism Exercises, Complete with AI Toys

It might not be as cool as opening Marcellus Wallace’s case, but I hope this pile of exercises will still make you as happy as Vincent and Jules.

 

As many of you are starting back to school, I figured I’d break radio silence with some goods I promised to deliver by the end of the summer. Back in May, I asked what kinds of things you needed from me and you were all nice enough to hit me with some ideas. Some were really concrete (“These kids need stuff to learn how to write a #%^#ing lead.”) while others were more nuanced (“They need to play with AI, but in a way that helps them see what it can and can’t do. I have no idea how that would work, though…”)

I’ve put together a bin of stuff that tries to cover the gamut of needs, while offering you choices as to how to apply the exercises in your own schools and for your own needs. Think of each of the files as kind of a Swiss Army knife of opportunities that you can use as you see fit.

It should go without saying that the content is either made up or fictionalized versions of stuff that actually happened, so don’t freak out if you see something and think, “Oh my lord! What hath hell wrought!”

Here’s a brief overview:

Breaking News/Ongoing Situation Stuff: A couple files contain information that is divided into several stages of release. The idea is that, just like a breaking news story, or an ongoing event, information is important compared to other information you receive.

It’s meant to mirror the “King of the Mountain” exercise approach we blogged about some time ago, with newer information forcing students to reconsider what’s most important in updating their content and giving them the critical thinking skills needed to do so.

There is also a straight-up crime story with some quotable material for you to play with.

Raw Materials Folder: There is a collection of nothing but interviews on topics that seemed relatively universal (Fires, Campus Illnesses, thought on Gen Ed classes, TikTok etc.) that students did over the years. I stripped out all the names/identifying features for this and left you with some red text where you can insert names that reflect your student body, places your students would know and so forth.

There is also a couple city council stories that are god awful that I rebuilt from local newspapers with name changes, area changes and so forth. Those can be helpful if you want them to work on revising bad copy or with some of the AI stuff we’ll talk about later.

Standard Story Stuff: I’ve put together a list of standard stories that we all tend to write in various types of journalism (breaking news, meeting/speech/news conference, localization etc.) with some suggestions regarding length and source count.

If it’s more of a reporting class, obviously, you can send them out to do stuff, but I included these for the media-writing folk who might not have students ready to go the full “Lois Lane” out there. These can meld nicely with some of the stuff in the raw material folder.

I also tossed in a “canned game story” for people who need to take a shot at sports writing before they cover a game. It includes stats, scores and post-game interview quotes that can be used to build a solid game recap on a pretty fun game.

AI Fun: I build several AI exercises that allow the students to see how AI can be really helpful and where it can fall short. It includes a trial run for them at something I did for the blog over the summer, involving interview questions. A couple of them also can be used on the raw material files to have AI build a story either before or after they do. This can show them how AI might or might not get the gist of what is important in a story.

HOW DO YOU GET THIS STUFF:

In normal times, I’d just post it here, but between AI and overly industrious students, I’m a little leery of just leaving a pile of stuff on the open web. So, to give you the goodies while protecting the pile a bit, here’s what you do:

Hit me up via the contact form on the blog, which is linked here. Just tell me your name, your school, your email address and anything else you think is important. I’ll then send you the unlock for the folders and you can go hog wild.

It’s all freebie and you can do whatever you want with it for your class. If you run into a better way to use this stuff, or have an idea you want to share, I’d appreciate it. Also, I don’t care if you’re using any of my books or not, so this isn’t an exclusive party for adopters. I just like helping people.

Have a great start to the semester. We’ll be back full time next week after Labor Day.

Vince (a.k.a. The Doctor of Paper)

 

 

Journalists: If your mother says she loves you, go check it out (and then be damned sure it’s true)

As the Russian proverb says, “Trust, but verify.”

The long-held adage of journalists saying, “If your mother says she loves you, go check it out,” needs a little more updating these days, as it seems like NOTHING is as real as it seems. Thanks in large part to corner-cutting, scam-baiting and general laziness, we’re finding a lot of cases in which it never hurts to make absolutely sure you are sure. Here are a couple examples:

 

AT THIS POINT, JUST ASK THE MAGIC 8-BALL:  A few months back, we highlighted Rob Waugh’s story about journalists being duped by AI “experts” who churned out content that ranged from generic to highly suspect. Waugh’s latest piece found that journalists who are using supposedly “legitimate” systems to connect with sources are also now at the mercy of AI spamming, all while paying for the privilege of getting screwed:

A PR agency is selling an AI tool that automatically answers pitches from journalists on services such as ResponseSource, HARO and Qwoted.

The AI tool, called Synapse (not be confused with PR pitching platform Synapse Media), “reads” questions sent for for expert comment by journalists via the services, then analyses sources such as books, podcasts and reports per query and uses AI to draft email responses.

Journalist-request services such as HARO charge a fee for connecting PR agencies with journalists. PRs can send out story pitches to journalists and also get access to requests for expert comment.

<SNIP>

The makers of Synapse, Lithuania-based PR agency Wellstone PR, boast that it has a 7-8% acceptance rate, and that used by a human “editor”, it can answer around 20 pitches per hour with one human PR person able to do the work of five.T

The company brags in its pitch to potential clients that it will provide them with fictional content that sounds so much like the real thing, journalists won’t know the difference. I don’t know if it bothers me more that a) it would appear journalists are getting inept/lazy enough not to notice that they’re being fed total bullpucky or b) that the PR professionals are writing such average, generic stuff so often that journalists can’t distinguish it from whatever garbage an AI can produce.

The cost for this service is a one-time fee of $2,500. The only saving grace is that they apparently haven’t sold this to anyone. Yet.

The PR experts quoted in Waugh’s piece are clearly not thrilled by this breach of trust.

Andy Smith, founder of Sourcee, which aims to offer credible, video-checked experts, says that using AI tools in this way erodes trust.

Smith said: “When journalists post a journo request, there’s an implicit level of trust in the person replying. They’re hoping to hear from real people with genuine insights, experiences, and expertise that can bring their story to life.

“They certainly don’t want to receive an automated, AI-generated reply… if that’s what they were after, they could’ve just used ChatGPT themselves.

One thing that has me rethinking my “stop using these stupid “OK-Cupid-For-Quotes” sites” was a point that Smith made about how a good expert pool, like the one he says he’s built, is meant to broaden the reach of journalists. That can prevent them from only reaching out to familiar contacts and ending up with the “usual suspects” in every story. Still, if I had to pick between usual humans and a random lottery of AI word salad, I’ll stick with my boring peeps, thanks.

 

WSJ PLUS AI EQUALS WTF: If Cliff Behnke isn’t spinning in his grave over this situation, it’s only because he’s actively crawling out of it to come smack the shit out of somebody right now:

A story about development plans for a vacant downtown block that appeared on the front page of the Sunday, July 13, issue of the Wisconsin State Journal was removed Wednesday from the Madison daily newspaper’s website before being replaced by a “re-reported” story Thursday afternoon.

An editor’s note on the re-reported story states that the original “contained incorrect information and quotes that were created by an unauthorized use of AI, which does not adhere to the Wisconsin State Journal’s editorial or ethical standards.”

The story topic itself, both in what I can find of the original and the reboot, is a simple, boring tick-tock story about a development project, in which the material for the proposals are all easily accessible. This wasn’t like the reporter needed whatever the hell Tom Cruise is using in the latest “Mission Impossible” movie to create a miracle out of thin air.

It’s not quite clear what’s more terrifying: That a reporter decided to cut a corner on something this vanilla and didn’t bother to make sure on at least a few basic facts or that the editorial process didn’t catch something that was so wrong:

One section about “The Grove,” a proposal from Neutral, a Madison real estate development firm, outlined plans for a “food hall prioritizing minority-owned vendors” and a “community advisory board” that would shape the development’s public life. Neither of those features, nor the name “The Grove,” appear in Neutral’s proposal linked from a city press release listing the firms that responded to its RFP.

“It’s all wrong,” says Daniel Glaessl, Neutral’s chief product officer. No reporter had contacted the firm about the project before Isthmus reached out on Thursday afternoon, he says.

The Synapse people in the story above are like, “Hey, AI will write all your stuff, but don’t worry! The editor will be there to ‘create enough friction’ to prevent anything terrible from getting into the public sphere.” I’m having even bigger doubts about that concept now, especially since I know the folks involved at the WSJ and I have always respected and admired them. It always hurts a little more when it happens where you live.

And finally…

FOUL BALLS: It’s not a stretch to say that the sports memorabilia world is a multi-billion-dollar industry, in which athletes get paid exorbitant amounts of money for scrawling their names across all manner of items. What makes an athlete’s autograph worth the big bucks is a confluence of the awesomeness of the athlete and the rarity of their willingness to sign items. The more people want an athlete’s signature and the fewer of them exist, the more likely there will be fraud involved at some level.

In the 1990s, the FBI dug into the world of fraudulent autographs with “Operation Bullpen,” a multi-year investigation that took down a series of forgers who made a living faking the signatures of Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Mark McGwire and others. In response, the major sports leagues and the preeminent autograph certification houses began using holograms, certificates, registration numbers and QR codes to assure buyers that the autographs they owned were, in fact, real.

It didn’t work as well as they had hoped:

Brett Lemieux, a 45-year-old resident of Westfield, Indiana, was the founder of sports memorabilia site Mister ManCave, which claimed to have sold millions of counterfeit items with net profits exceeding $350 million, and had “the largest framed jersey inventory on the web.”

Lemieux made the claims in a now-deleted Facebook post on the “Autographs 101” group Wednesday, saying the money was “too good” to pass up and that he wanted to stop the fraud, which had been going on for the better part of two decades.

Part of Lemieux’s post, bragging about his fraudulent creation of autographs and the holograms of multiple companies meant to prevent such fraud.

Over the past week, I’ve seen a ton of people submitting their Shohei Otani, Mike Trout, Derek Jeter and other autographs to online authentication groups, only to find that the balls, bats and photos are fakes. Many of these items have one, if  not more, authentic-looking holograms, to boot.

I know this seems far afield for journalists, but it really emphasizes an important point about how and why fraud persists in our space as much as it does everywhere else: If there’s money to be made in an easy way, people without scruples are going to take advantage of the situation.

That means we have to all be extra cautious about what we are willing to accept at face value and what we are willing to walk away from if the situation doesn’t feel right. It’s especially true when we really want something to work out, like getting that crucial source or making that tight deadline.

I’ve often said that paranoia is my best friend. Feel free to make it yours as well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

’60 Minutes’ leader quits, citing lack of editorial freedom and limited backing from his bosses

 

THE LEAD: Bill Owens, one of only three people to run “60 Minutes” over its lengthy stay on CBS, resigned this week, telling his staff that he felt the show’s editorial independence was compromised.

“Over the past months, it has also become clear that I would not be allowed to run the show as I have always run it. To make independent decisions based on what was right for 60 Minutes, right for the audience,” Owens wrote. “So, having defended this show- and what we stand for – from every angle, over time with everything I could, I am stepping aside so the show can move forward.”

Much of the concerns related to what “60 Minutes” is or isn’t doing is, spoiler alert, related to President Trump’s attacks on the show, network and parent company. He has filed a $20 billion lawsuit against anything that breathed within the vicinity of the program, stating it was fraudulent in its actions as they related to an answer on the Middle East that Kamala Harris gave.

Trump sued CBS, which is owned by Paramount, a few days before the November election, alleging that the “60 Minutes” interview with Harris was deceptively edited and therefore violated a Texas consumer protection law. He then expanded the lawsuit earlier this year, alleging an additional claim under the federal Lanham Act and seeking at least $20 billion in damages. In March, Paramount and CBS filed two motions to throw out the lawsuit, calling it an “affront to the First Amendment.” And on April 7, their lawyers filed another motion asking the plaintiffs to produce the documents requested in discovery.

“Despite their insistence that discovery move forward, Plaintiffs have shown very little desire to produce their own documents, relying on unfounded objections and delay tactics,” the Paramount and CBS legal team said.

Paramount is in negotiations to sell the company, which requires FCC approval and that means it’s a really awkward time to be in a pit-sticking match with the administration. Therefore, trying to settle the suit and trying to keep its watchdog on a leash is in the financial best interests of Paramount.

 

SECOND VERSE, SAME AS THE FIRST: This isn’t the first time that independent media outlets have gotten the muzzle treatment out of fear of Trump.

The Washington Post, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had several tussles between speaking truth to power and trying not to piss off power. Artist Ann Telnaes quit the paper after Bezos spiked one of her political cartoons about how the corporate interests in the country worshiped Trump.

Ann Telnaes says the rough version of the cartoon she drew for The Washington Post , shown above, was rejected by the paper's editorial page editor.

Bezos also took heat during the election season when he spiked the paper’s editorial endorsement of Harris for president. The L.A. Times had a similar situation, in which its editor resigned when the paper’s owner killed a Harris editorial prior to the election.

Yep, this is the hard-hitting journalism I’m getting these days from Bezos media….

DOCTOR OF PAPER HOT TAKE: We can call this situation a number of things (disgusting, nauseating, terrible, autocratic), but we shouldn’t call it surprising. Money isn’t everything, but it always beats the hell out of whatever comes in second, so when doing the right thing and speaking truth to power get between a money-person and a payday, it’s pretty obvious what’s going to occur.

We also shouldn’t lay this all at the feet of Donald Trump, as if he were the sole factor in the squelching of public debate and awareness. Sure, he can wave a bigger stick at bigger institutions, but let’s not pretend that this kind of thing hasn’t happened long before he came down that escalator.

A former student of mine worked at a newspaper along the East Coast where he was doing business journalism. The woman who owned the paper had no interest in journalism, as she had inherited it from her publisher husband. When my student wanted to do investigations into local businesses doing shady stuff, she shut him down because she didn’t want him “bothering my friends.”

Another former student worked at a radio station where he found out about a police chief behaving badly. After the station published its stories on the web, the police chief and his lawyer threatened all manner of things. The message was simple: Pull the story down or we’re suing you out of existence.

Had it not been for some legal help from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, he likely would have folded under the pressure of the threats. The story stayed up and won an award, while the chief moved on and the threat of the suit went away.

And, not to put too fine of a point on it, student newspapers always find themselves dealing with some level of “external pressure” as it relates to covering things administrators, athletics or student “leader” don’t want mentioned. Just because it’s happening to “grown-up journalism” doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened before elsewhere.

As we outlined in various posts before, the First Amendment doesn’t protect against all the stuff people tend to think it protects against. It also doesn’t help people hoping to turn a profit grow a spine.

DISCUSSION STARTER: Is there a difference in your mind between the government stepping in and prohibiting speech and an organization self-censoring for fear of negative external outcomes?

Also, is resigning from the show the best thing Bill Owens can do, or is it not? It’s easy to make the argument in both ways, but focus on the WHY you think what you think about this and what it says about his ability to leave a job like this in this way.

 

 

 

How AI “expert sources” have duped journalists and four tips on how to avoid being the next victim

 

Meet Elizabeth Hubbell, a 25-year-old skin-care expert who is willing to be a great source for your next story on anything makeup or skin-care related. She’s actually completely fabricated. Her picture came from an AI generation site and her name is a combination of my car (Betsy) and a baseball player whose card I had laying around (Carl Hubbell). Careful. It’s dangerous out there…

When it comes to doing interviews, I always tell students they need to do them in person.  In response, they often look at me like I’m asking them to use a teletype machine or some semaphore flags. It’s easier, faster and more convenient for both parties if they can do a text, a chat or an email interview, the students say.

I argue that the face-to-face interview allows for a deeper connection for profile and feature pieces. This approach also can prevent sources in news stories from weaseling out of answers they could otherwise work through via several drafts of an email. Plus, if I spend some time in the source’s environment, I can probably find a personal effect that could give us something to talk about, like a family photo, a kid’s drawing or a sports item. At the very least, it’ll help with scene setting.

Apparently, there’s another good reason for my approach these days: Your easy-to-access, extremely helpful, expert source might be AI:

Since the launch of ChatGPT in 2022, anyone can generate comment, on any subject, in an instant.

It is a technology that appears to have fuelled a rise in expert commentators who have appeared widely in national newspapers but who are either not real, not what they seem to be or at the very least have CVs which do not justify their wide exposure in major newsbrands.

The rise in dubious commentators has been fuelled by companies that charge the PR industry in order to share quotes via email with journalists who have submitted requests for comment.

Journalist Rob Waugh found that in a number of cases, digital outlets were mass-generating content from these supposed experts, giving everyone from news journalists to PR practitioners the exact the quote or information they needed on a wide array of topics. However, when challenged to engage more deeply regarding who they are or what they have done in life, the “sources” suddenly had difficulty:

She has been quoted in Fortune talking about “loud budgeting” and by Business.com talking about the best countries in which to obtain a business education (both sites are based in the US).

A profile on Academized describes her as a “biochemist and science educator”. The same byline picture also crops up on a publisher called Leaddev, for someone called Sara Sparrow. Rebecca Leigh has written for DrBicuspid.com about how to write a business plan for your dental practice where she is described as a writer for Management Essay and Lija Help (two online writing services).

When challenged via email to do something that would be difficult to do with AI image-generating software (send an image of herself with her hand in front of her face) or prove that she was an environment expert, Rebecca stopped communicating.

One AI source, “Barbara Santini,” was particularly prolific in the volume and array of topics she could cover for journalists. Waugh found this roster of publications that had included Santini quotes:

She has been quoted in The Guardian talking about the benefits of walking (paid content), in Newsweek talking about white lies, Marie Claire talking about the meaning of money, the Daily Mirror talking about the benefits of sleeping with your dog, in The Sun talking about sexual positions, Pop Sugar talking about astrology, and Mail Online talking about how often to change your pillow.

Santini was recently quoted in a BBC article examining the lifelike responses of AI to Rorschach tests used by some psychologists saying: “If an AI’s response resembles a human’s, it’s not because it sees the same thing but it’s because its training data mirrors our collective visual culture.”

Despite her ability to be all knowing and wise, Santini apparently couldn’t receive phone calls, a relatively easy giveaway that the “person” on the other end is AI. Waugh also found other examples of journalists who were getting taken for a ride by an AI source, including one case where the non-human pitched a sob story about breast cancer survival:

“Seeing my scarred chest in the mirror was a constant reminder of what I had lost,” Kimberly Shaw, 30, told me in an emotional email.

She had contacted me through Help a Reporter Out, a service used by journalists to find sources. I cover skincare and had been using the site to find people for a story about concealing acne scars with tattoos.

<SNIP>

Shaw’s experience may not have been relevant to my acne story, but it tapped into the same feelings of empowerment and control I wanted to explore. Thinking she could inspire a powerful new piece, I emailed her back.

But after days of back-and-forth conversations, something in Shaw’s emails began to feel a little off. After idly wondering to my boyfriend whether she could be a fake, he suggested that I run the emails through a text checker for artificial intelligence.

The result was unequivocal: Shaw’s emails had been machine-generated. I’d been interviewing an AI the entire time.

As a result of Waugh’s story, a number of these information clearinghouses have tried to cull their ranks of AI “experts” while the deceived publications have retooled or removed the stories with fake people in them. Although the founder of one of these “expert mills” blamed much of the situation on “lazy journalists,” he kind of gave up the game a bit when it came to explaining why these platforms don’t prevent the frauds from gaining access in the first place:

Darryl Willcox, who founded ResponseSource in 1997 and sold it in 2018, says that the simplicity and speed of platforms like ResponseSource is key to their appeal and that attempts to add authentication risk slowing down the system.

Willcox said: “The other factor which complicates things a little bit is that these platforms are quite an open system. Once a journalist makes a request they can be forwarded around organisations, and sometimes between them, and often PR agencies are acting for multiple parties, and they will be forwarded onto their many clients.”

In other words, “If we slowed down to make sure things were accurate, we wouldn’t be as appealing as we want to be.” Eeesh.

So what can you to to avoid quoting a fake person? The overarching theme is basically, “Don’t be a lazy journalist,” but here are a few more specific tips:

TRUST, BUT VERIFY: The old Russian proverb really comes into play here and for good reason. I often say that paranoia is my best friend and has kept me out of a ton of problems. To that larger point, not only did I click on every link I could find in Waugh’s story, I also Googled the hell out of Waugh himself. Why? I imagined that it would be the most epic “Punk’d” moment on Earth if the media world was flocking to this story about AI screwing with journalists, only to find out that Rob Waugh was also an AI fake. I found LinkedIn, X, Bluesky, media staff pages and at least a dozen photos. I wouldn’t bet the house on the fact he’s real, but I’d probably bet the lawn tractor.

This can be harder in situations like the one involving the cancer scammer, as regular people tend not to have as big of a social media presence or digital footprint. That said, even regular people under the age of retirement should have left a few breadcrumbs out there for you to find.

KICK THE TIRES: If you can’t find the person clearly through a digital search, feel free to play a little game of 20 Questions to see if you can get some things ironed out. Experts who have kicked the tires on a few bots can offer you specific ways to ask questions that will tend to ferret out fakers. The author in the cancer-scam story revealed that asking for specific photos based on prior conversations can be helpful as well.

I learned about this kind of thing in trying to defeat scams when it came to buying sports memorabilia. When unknown sellers offered either exactly what I wanted when I couldn’t find it anywhere else or provided me with a ridiculously low price for something I knew should cost more, the pros who had been around the block a few times suggested I ask the seller to “coin the image.”

What this meant was that I wanted the person to take a picture of the item with a coin (usually asking for either heads or tails, or maybe even a specific coin) so I could tell they had the item and weren’t messing with me. Turned out, that advice helped me dodge a bullet or two. As weird as it might seem, asking someone to take a picture with their left hand raised or holding a quarter with “heads” showing might help you avoid a problem.

MEET IN PERSON: Again, this is the most obvious one to suggest. If you meet a person, in person, it’s a pretty safe bet that you can consider them real. The rest of the stuff (Are they the expert they claim to be? Did they really do what they say they did? Do they actually have cancer?) remains a risk without substantial additional reporting, but at least you’ll know they exist.

If that can’t happen for legitimate reasons (the person lives too far away etc.), look for other ways to get some human connection with the source. That could be a Zoom/Teams/Whatever video chat or an actual phone call at an actual phone number. In the cases where the frauds proliferated, it was pretty clear that the only connection between the source and the journalist was through a keyboard. That’s especially dangerous when you don’t have a prior relationship with a source.

WHEN IN DOUBT, DO WITHOUT: At the end of the day, there is no journalistic rule that says you have to use a source, a quote or a “fact” just because you have it. If you don’t feel comfortable with how a source is providing you with information or you aren’t 100% sure this person is a person, it’s better to leave that source out of your story than it is to run the risk of getting bamboozled.

If you say, “Well, the whole story will fall apart without this one source and I can’t get anyone else to provide me with this information,” maybe that’s more revealing than anything else we’ve said here.

 

I$ Ca$h $peech? Elon Musk has a couple million thoughts on that…

Make It Rain Money GIF - Find & Share on GIPHY
An artistic rendering of Elon Musk’s rally in Green Bay on Sunday…

THE LEAD: Elon Musk handed out two $1 million checks Sunday as part of his efforts to rally voters for Brad Schimel in the Wisconsin State Supreme Court race.

Musk apparently decided that dumping $20 million in ad money into my home state’s Supreme Court Election wasn’t doing enough, so he decided to start handing out money to potential voters like it was parade candy.

Aside from offering people $100 each to sign a petition against “activist judges” (a thinly veiled swipe at the Democrat-backed candidate Susan Crawford), he took it a step further in offering the big cash prizes to a couple Wisconsin voters.

State AG Josh Kaul filed suit in an attempt to block this move, even as Musk was reshaping his offer:

Kaul is asking a Madison-based state appeals court to issue an order barring Musk from handing out $1 million checks to voters ahead of a planned Sunday event in Green Bay. The Democratic Attorney General first sought the ruling from a Columbia County judge who declined to act before Sunday, according to Kaul.

In a since-deleted post on X, Musk said he would hold an event Sunday in Wisconsin and hand out $1 million checks to voters “in appreciation for you taking the time to vote.”

But after election experts and Democrats raised questions about whether the offer violated the state’s election bribery laws, Musk deleted the post and said he would instead be handing over the checks to two people who would serve as spokespeople for his “Petition In Opposition To Activist Judges.” The new post also no longer said attendance would be limited “to those who have voted in the Supreme Court election,” as the original post had stated.

The appeals court rejected Kaul’s efforts on Saturday, noting that he hadn’t fully supported his application properly, so the judges denied his request. The Supreme Court also shot down his request.

BASIC BACKGROUND ON THE RACE: If you live outside of Wisconsin and have a limited interest in politics, you probably never heard of Susan Crawford or Brad Schimel. If you live in the state of Wisconsin, you probably know their names better than you know the name of your current pets.

(It’s also likely that you think all the Supreme Court will do is rule on when to set pedophiles free, given that seemed to be the gist of every attack ad on both sides of this.)

Like most court races, the Wisconsin Supreme Court election is supposed to be a non-partisan affair. As has become the case everywhere, that’s not entirely true, as both Republicans and Democrats basically pick sides and pour time, effort and cash into getting a candidate more to their liking onto the court.

Unlike most other statewide races in the country, people all over the place have taken a vested interest in whether Crawford or Schimel wins. According to a Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel analysis, people from all 50 states have dumped a record amount of cash into this election. The Brennan Center reported last week that the two campaigns and outside groups have spent more than $73 million on the race, which doesn’t account for whatever was spent since March 24.

The main reason is that whoever ends up winning will tilt the “non-partisan” court 4-3 toward a more liberal or more conservative side of the spectrum. With questions about gerrymandered state maps, women’s rights to bodily autonomy, state workers’ union rights, gun regulations and more likely coming down the road to the Supreme Seven, this race is seen as a really big deal for Wisconsin and beyond.

BASIC BACKGROUND ON FINANCIAL SPEECH AND ELECTIONS: In 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court voted 5-4 in the Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission case that outside interest groups could spend as much money as they wanted to influence the outcome of elections via messaging of all kinds.

According to the Brennan Center, this led to the creation of giant “Super PACs” (political action committees) that wealthy interests could use basically steer election outcomes:

In other words, super PACs are not bound by spending limits on what they can collect or spend. Additionally, super PACs are required to disclose their donors, but those donors can include dark money groups, which make the original source of the donations unclear. And while super PACs are technically prohibited from working directly with candidates, weak rules that are supposed to enforce this separation have often proven ineffective.

The court in the Citizens United decision did note, however, that the law could limit money in politics if it was clear that the money was being used in a form of outright bribery, or  “quid pro quo corruption.” So, in short, Rich Dude/Dudette X can drop $500 billion into ads, mailers, events, social media posts and people wearing sandwich boards promoting a candidate for the Omro Dog Catcher Election, but they can’t hand $100 bills to voters outside a polling place for the purpose of buying their votes.

THE SMELL OF MUSK: Elon’s offers are clearly outside of the norm of what we’ve seen in politics to date (at least in recent years). To be fair, he’s giving out cash to people who sign a pledge that has no legally binding requirements and isn’t capable of creating any legally binding action if he reaches a certain number of signatures. In fact, people could take his money, use it to print up a boat load of Susan Crawford lawn signs and move on if they chose.

He also initially tried to skirt the rules meant to tamp down on bribery by making the two $1 million offers a kind of Publishers Clearinghouse Giveaway of sorts. His offer this time was for those folks who helped get the signature, which again, have no actual value in the broader sense of this election, so offering money for them is kind of like when the tooth fairy would pony up cash for your baby incisors.

What becomes a concern here is the psychological impact of reinforcing desired behaviors. The approach Musk is taking to get people to lean toward his liking is like Pavlov’s dogs, Skinner’s pigeons and Bandura’s bobo dolls all in one. Although the law has outlined strict rules for what is and isn’t bribery, psychological researchers have found the line between bribery and reinforcement to be a little fuzzier.

DISCUSSION STARTER: Where do you stand when it comes to the ideas outlined in the articles linked throughout here, particularly as they relate to the offering of money to complete a task like the petition Musk wanted people to sign? Is this a harmless stunt, a bribery attempt to undermine electoral legitimacy or something in between? Explain what you think and why and see if anyone can change your mind.

 

You are always in the public eye, so it pays to keep that in mind (a.k.a. we used to call it the World Wide Web for a reason)

This ensemble is from the “Dress to fire people” line…

THE LEAD (Part I): Being a social media influencer can take a lot of work, but multitasking between firing people as part of the Office of Personnel Management and showcasing clothing options that collectively cost more than my first car tends to lead to problems:

On the day O.P.M. sent a memo to all federal department and agency heads asking for lists of underperforming employees to terminate, she flaunted a “work look” that included a purple skirt that her followers could also purchase, retailing at $475. She would get a commission if they used her link.

The spokeswoman, McLaurine Pinover, is not the only member of the Trump administration to have used her federal office to promote outside business interests, but former agency officials and ethics watchdogs say that the timing and content of the videos were both unlawful and especially tone-deaf.

 

I wonder how they tracked her down after she scribble out her… Oh… Yeah…

THE LEAD (Part II): Being a racist jerk tends to lead to a lot of backlash, particularly when you leave enough clues for people to find you.

On March 2, Stephanie Lovins, while dining at Cazuelas Mexican Cantina in Columbus, Ohio, left a message for Ricardo, a U.S. citizen serving her.

In the signature section of her receipt, Lovins wrote: “I hope Trump deports you,” followed by “Zero. You suck.” The incident occurred after Lovins grew upset over the restaurant’s “one coupon per table” policy.

A restaurant employee who found the receipt shared a photo on social media, and it quickly went viral, provoking widespread condemnation and calls for Lovins’ termination.

 

DIGITALLY DUMB: In both cases, the people involved tried to wiggle their way out of this situation. In Pinover’s case, she did the “Ugh… like, why are you making such a big deal about this?” thing, arguing that she didn’t make any money and trying to garner sympathy for her influencer attempts:

In a statement, Ms. Pinover said she never made any money from the fashion videos.

“While I was battling breast cancer as a new mom, I felt so unlike myself. I turned to social media shortly after as a personal outlet,” she wrote. “I never made any income and with only about 800 followers, I’m surprised the so-called ‘newspaper of record’ finds this newsworthy. My focus remains on serving the American people at O.P.M.”

 

In the case of Lovins, she went with what I call the “Shaggy Defense” when confronted:

Lovins initially denied any involvement, claiming on social media that her credit card had been lost or stolen and that someone else had used it.

“My credit card was lost/stolen, and someone attempted to use it. Thanks for the notifications! This has been reported through my bank,” she wrote on Facebook.

“Thank you for all the recent notifications of scammers and profile hackers! I recently discovered a lost/missing credit card and an attempted use/purchase. I appreciate your patience while I manage the situation,” she wrote in a post on LinkedIn….

However, this was discovered to be a false statement after the restaurant reviewed CCTV footage and confirmed that she was inside the restaurant, leading to her termination.

 

DOCTOR OF PAPER FLASHBACK: Two things came to mind in reading these stories. First, it was the idea that anything we do nowadays is private is almost quaint, but particularly so when you actively jump online.

I remember in the early ’00s when I had a student who wrote a blog post/diatribe about a conservative student on our campus. When that conservative kid saw the post, she put out the Bat Signal to conservative websites and media outlets, thus leading to this exchange between me and my student:

HER: This isn’t fair! I’m getting attacked by all these people who she shared the piece with.

ME: What do you mean it’s not fair? You published a hit piece on her, so she’s telling people to tell you what they think about it.

HER: But that wasn’t supposed to be for her! It was only for my friends! It was supposed to be private!

ME: What part of the “WORLD WIDE WEB” do you not understand?

Second, I had a similar situation where we were going to launch the reporting book and the folks at Sage wanted me to do a whole new social media profile:

ME: I’ve got a Twitter account and I’ve got a ton of followers already. Why should I delete that and do a different one?

EDITOR: Vince, do you remember what you ate for lunch yesterday?

ME: Um… No…

EDITOR: How about last week Tuesday?

ME: Not a clue…

EDITOR: Right. So you’ve been on Twitter for about 10 years at this point… How many of those tweets are things you remember well and are totally proud of?

ME: (Quietly setting fire to every digital account and device I ever owned…)

To be fair, I’m sure I wasn’t asking for money or to deport a server, but I was extremely upset about the Cubs stealing the 2016 World Series from my Cleveland squad, so I’m sure I didn’t cover myself in glory there…

 

BLOG FLASHBACK: We’ve had a number of these cases in which people behaving badly ended up getting shared online, leading to terrible outcomes.

There was the college student who didn’t think anyone would share her “Finsta” tirade about Black people. We also had the kid at UW-Madison, who apparently thought her “private thoughts” on forcing the ghosts of Black people to “pick cotton”   wasn’t going to go viral. Then, there was the kid who had a swastika flag and a whiteboard full of slurs getting outed at UW-Oshkosh.

I’m sure there were more, but I started getting depressed, so let’s just leave it at those and say these are not rare occurrences.

 

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: Given that the sheer tonnage of time people spend online each day could stun a team of oxen in its tracks, there are a couple key takeaways for folks that bear repeating:

Nothing is “just” anything anymore: If you’re thinking you “just” sent that photo to a friend or you “just” made that less-than-savory joke to your private Facebook friends or you “just” acted like a dipstick in public once, welcome to your reality check.

Dad used to tell me stories about guys at work who would tell off-color jokes or poke fun at each other in ways that boggle my mind. I don’t know if it’s so much that these things were terrible or if now I’m just so attuned to the crap storm that could come from those jokes or putdowns that freak me out.

I like to think that it’s half of a piece of each, in that more people had thicker skin while fewer people were perpetually offended and that we have evolved to prevent some truly unsavory behavior in the work environment.

Either way, we are clearly beyond getting free passes in life with the justification of, “C’mon, it was just…”

 

Everything is public: I don’t like that everything I do is public these days or that someone could decide, “Hey, it’s F— with Filak Time!” and look for a McDonald’s receipt I was writing stupid crap on back in 1998 or something.  However, that’s the field I’m in and that’s the reality of our surroundings.

You can avoid a lot of this by not being online as much or not sharing as much stuff online, but for digital natives, media operatives and anyone under the age of 60 who wants to remain part of broader society, that’s a tough ask.

This is why paranoia is my best friend, why I try to count to 10 before I write anything out of anger and I always imagine the headline in the Advance-Titan of “UWO professor suspended for (Dumb thing I’m thinking about doing)” before I do anything.

It doesn’t solve everything, but it does tend to keep me more centered than I would otherwise be.

 

Know the rules: This more applies to the first case, as opposed to the second one, although understanding “one coupon per table” before losing your mind on a server has a tangential connection here.

When social media first emerged, a lot of people running organizations were in their 50s and 60s and they knew two things about it: 1) They didn’t know what it was or how it worked and 2) They wanted to use it somehow for the betterment of their organization.

Thus, they tended to turn to young people who had grown up a bit with this and really didn’t give them any major rules. It was like the Wild West, although I’d argue you could probably do more damage with one tweet than you could with a trusty six-shooter back in the day.

Once things started to go haywire, due to missteps by the posters or generally not paying attention well enough to the hashtags involved in other posts, the leaders at those places started putting some basic rules in place. By now, most places have a pretty solid rule book on what people can and can’t do on social media, which includes where and when they can or can’t do it.

One of the things most organizations (and the cops who tend to pull Amy over) say is, “Not knowing the rules is no excuse for not following them.” This is why it’s important, upon getting a new job, to know what it is that you can and can’t do, especially in terms of your outward-facing presence.

I know there are things I can’t put up in my office (political endorsement signs) and things that probably could get me in trouble if they upset people (Vintage Cleveland Baseball nodders come to mind). There are also things that are a little more nebulous, like, “What is the rule of the thumb on using my computer to blog like this?”

Long story short, it pays to know what the rules are before they become problematic. And it also pays not to be a racist ass-hat, even if you don’t think people will call you out for it.

 

Whether you agree or disagree with Mahmoud Khalil, you need to watch his case

THE LEAD: Mahmoud Khalil, a graduate student at Columbia University and a legal U.S. resident, was picked up in an ICE raid Saturday and faces deportation. Khalil was a leading voice in the Palestine protests on the university’s campus last spring.

Khalil was detained Saturday night as he and his wife were returning to their Columbia University-owned apartment in upper Manhattan by officials from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

The agents told the couple that Khalil was being detained because his student visa had been revoked.

When his wife provided documents proving he was a green card holder, the agents said that was also being revoked and took him away in handcuffs, according to a lawsuit Khalil’s attorneys filed challenging his detention.

President Donald Trump discussed the matter in a social media post in which he supported the arrest and potential deportation, calling Khalil a “terrorist sympathizer” for his stand on the Palestine situation.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio concurred, saying Khalil’s protest actions were “aligned with Hamas” and thus it was acceptable to revoke his green card (and his marriage to a U.S. citizen, I guess) and deport him.

A court held up his deportation and his lawyers will be arguing Wednesday that he’s essentially being punished for exercising free speech.

 

DOCTOR OF PAPER FLASHBACK: We talked about the issues related to protests last year when a number of campuses were dealing with upheaval and cracking down on students who peaceably assembled. As we noted back then, you can’t just support free speech when it’s speech you like. The same is essentially true for all of the other aspects of the First Amendment.

In other words, if you’re cool with people standing up for Side A of an issue, you have to be cool with people standing up for Side B of that issue. As long as the protests and speech don’t run afoul of what the law has already stated as being out of bounds (fighting words, child porn etc.), the Bill of Rights protects those actions.

 

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE: You could easily make an argument that this is one guy, speaking out on a topic in a way that a lot of people don’t like, so it shouldn’t really matter.

You could make that argument and it would be both dead wrong and dangerous.

The actions here underlie a broader set of concerns for anyone who supports free expression. Earlier in March, the president noted he would crack down on colleges and universities that allowed for “illegal protests” to persist. It wasn’t clear what made something an “illegal protest” in the eyes of this administration, but I imagine that the translation would be “anything the president doesn’t like.”

Anyone who has an opinion about anything should probably be concerned about this approach, even if you disagree with everything Khalil stands for. Without legal protections for expression, it could be just a matter of time before whatever you think is worth talking about could land you in prison under some sort of trumped up charge.

 

DOCTOR OF PAPER HOT TAKE: Again, I don’t like a lot of speech or protests, and I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t agree with most of what Khalil has to say. That’s not the point of sticking up for his rights.

The law has long held that the government can’t suppress speech it doesn’t like, but it seems like we’re living in some sort of parallel universe right now where the government tends to do something beyond the pale and ask questions later. The Elon Musk line about how the administration will “make mistakes” but fix them up once they realize they made a mistake is a bad idea in general, but it’s even worse when it come to the inalienable rights associated with our country’s founding.

If the courts give the administration a pass and say, “Well, it’s just this one guy and, yeah, screw Palestine anyway,” it sets a dangerous precedent for when someone else upsets this administration. The cure for speech we don’t like is not to crush that speech. It’s more speech that presents a counterbalance to the original speech.

Even if the courts let this guy go, we still have the problem of how these actions have the potential to chill speech throughout the country. It’s like a bad parent smacking a kid in the head for voicing an opinion. That kid is probably not going to pipe up again, but the rest of the kids in that family are probably also going to keep their mouths shut.

That’s not how we’re supposed to roll as the United States.