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Forum for "This just in"Editor's Note: This forum was originally part of Speak Your Mind, a weekly feature of the Yale Herald Online. This forum is archived in the interest of fairness to Ms. Ladd.
11-21-97 at 8:58 11-21-97 at 14:55 Tom - Aren't you guys an online publication? It strikes me that the Yale Herald Online is a Web magazine, and that you might be doing the very thing you're reporting against. I went to the Mac Home site, and they're a real magazine that happens to have a Web site. I'm not sure what "home page reporting" means, but the Mac Home site has a story and an interview with Updegrove posted. The interview says in the text that it was a phone interview. Looks like your conclusions may be the "premature" ones. Thanks, Tom 11-21-97 at 16:37 Donna Ladd - My, What Irony.... Your "exclusive" today about my recent stories about Yale and Daniel Updegrove falls directly into the trap that it purports to expose. First of all, it is inaccurate. Neither of my articles (one of which was a two-hour phone interview with Mr. Updegrove at http://www.machome.com/news/upde.html) "asserted" that Mr. Updegrove sent the letter to freshmen in order to obtain the grant from Intel. The original pointed out that both of those events happened in close proximity to each other. Both asked Mr. Updegrove to comment on all suggestions regarding his actions. Your story also implied that I surfed the Web for a few hours and then wrote this article. However, I spent two weeks working on the original story and the follow-up interview with Mr. Updegrove, which he granted me after the original story appeared. Of particular note is how these events transpired: 1. While researching an article for the Mac Home print magazine, I saw the mention of the Intel grant on Mr. Updegrove's professional Web site 2. I both called and wrote him to ask about it. 3. He declined comment, but immediately changed his Web site, deleting the reference to Intel. 4. I published the first article on the Web after extensive factual confirmation with Yale sources, five interviews with Yale faculty, four requests for interviews with Mr. Updegrove and three calls to Intel (and a partridge in a pear tree...). 5. Updegrove granted me an interview, and I published the second article. I disagree with the suggestion that my approach was anything less than professional journalism. Using the Web as an additional way to track information is certainly not a "new type of journalism." The same journalistic standards apply, just using new tools. Your article also implied that my stories were based on "misinformation." At no time has anyone, including Mr. Updegrove in our interview, impeached my sources, including his own Web history. Most offensive is the fact that your article shies away from almost any level of journalistic integrity, while attacking mine: 1. Your article is up today on the Web, replete with errors, after I received two *email* requests for interviews yesterday and last night. 2. Never was I asked to respond to allegations in order to balance your story. 3. While attacking my credibility, you've made no mention of my experience, c.v. or other credits. Aside from free-lancing for the New York Times and the Associated Press (both on paper), I've worked in weekly newspapers for years, first in New York, then as a managing editor in Colorado. I've been an adjunct professor of journalism in Denver, freelanced for numerous national magazines and, yes, written for the occasional Web site. I understand that the Yale Online Herald is an educational tool for students rather than a professional newsgathering organization, and I'm aware this article was written by a freshman apparently in less than 24 hours. In light of that, this article may prove to be a valuable lesson in "home page reporting." If ever your reporter would like to call me on the phone, I'd be happy to discuss the details of that lesson in more depth. Best, Donna Ladd 11-22-97 at 16:53 Dan Wilchins - From the editor: In response to Tom and Donna Ladd Though I did not write this story, I edited it. Please allow me to make a few notes in Mike Colgan's defense: 1) With regard to Tom's comment, The Mac Home Journal is a print publication with an online section. Donna Ladd's article first appeared--and sparked debate--in its online form; in this regard it may be termed "online journalism." (I do not know whether or not the print edition ran the story as well, but if they did, it was after the article was posted.) And the fact that Ladd used the telephone to conduct some of her research does not change the fact that her story makes insinuations that are less likely to appear in print in a respectable publication. 2) Colgan made a good-faith effort to contact Ladd on Thursday evening, the night before the publication went up. He looked up her name in several online phone books, and wrote her several email messages. However, since Ladd does not list her phone number or city of residence on her web site, he was unable to track down her phone number. Colgan should have attempted to reach her earlier, but he will have to explain that himself. 3) Ladd complains that her credentials are not listed in the article, but we did link to her personal home page, which features a complete resume, biography, and so forth. Ladd is an acquaintance of mine; I have nothing but repect for her as a journalist. This article was not meant to be a personal attack against Ladd, and as such, her personal credentials are not relevant. The article was meant to be a critique of the sort of journalism that Ladd's article typifies. 4) Ladd claims that her sources are unimpeachable. While each individual fact in her article may be true, the larger picture that these facts paint is not unimpeachable: there is no hard evidence to link Updegrove's letter to incoming freshmen with the Intel grant. Updegrove and Intel officials flatly deny any connection between the grant and Updegrove's letter. Yet Ladd claims in her interview with Updegrove that "the parallels [between the letter and the grant] are hard not to notice." In her original article, she quotes an unnamed professor who suggests that the two events are certainly linked. But he provides no evidence of an explicit connection between the two. Nor does Ladd. Note that I have changed the third paragraph of the article slightly since first posting it Friday morning. I added an explanation of where Ladd's article appeared, and I changed the word "asserted" to "implied." Because items posted in Speak Your Mind are not archived, Ladd's letter and this response (as well as any that Colgan chooses to give) will be archived in the form of a letter to the editor next week, and linked to appropriately. 11-22-97 at 21:22 Donna Ladd - Last Word Dan, I would appreciate it if you would let me have the last word. Since you are attacking my credibility, then I think you'll agree that your story can stand on its own two feet if it's accurate -- my response, then, would be superfluous. But let's allow the reader to decide.
>...in this regard it may be termed "online journalism." (I do not know whether or not the I believe this to be completely irrelevant. The Yale Herald Online is also "online journalism" and the story is an "online exclusive." If, in some way the fact that my story appears on a Web site impunes my or Mac Home's credibility, logic dictates that your publication should also be disregarded. Mac Home is a professionally written, edited and published magazine that happens to have a Web site. I'm a professional, edited, published journalist who also has a Web site.
>And the fact that Ladd used the telephone to conduct This is patently offensive. Mr Updegrove has a Web page devoted to errors in stories that regard Yale's migration effort. In his estimation, Business Week, Newsbytes, Wired Online, Computer Currents and the New Haven Register have all made grave factual errors in regards to this story. The idea that my "insinuations" wouldn't be printed in a respectable publication seems to be the *opinion* of your publication, since the story quotes no one as saying that's the case. Is your "online exclusive" an editorial? http://pantheon.yale.edu/~danu/mac_media_errors.html By the way...within a week of my original story on Mac Home's Web site, the Chronicle of Higher Education and the New York Times both followed up on this *issue* (not just my reporting of it). Both publications are highly regarded. http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/102097yale.html http://chronicle.com/data/internet.dir/itdata/1997/10/t97101602.htm
>2) Colgan made a good-faith effort to contact Ladd on Thursday evening, Isn't it funny how, as journalists, we find that all stories have at least two sides? Colgan never bothered to ask me for my phone number via email, which is how I received the interview questions. (He didn't send me just one email -- I heard from him earlier in the week, too, and he didn't ask for a phone interview at that time, either.) Sometimes the best way to get information is to ask for it. Please, anyone reading this, visit my Web site. My bio states any number of times that I work for various Colorado publications, my resume shows my Colorado clients, past jobs I've had in Colorado and the fact that I've been an adjunct professor in Denver. My Web site also points to a site about seminars I give, which are held in Colorado Springs. I do have a number listed in Colorado Springs. I wouldn't get very far in my own career if I allowed online phone books to get in my way of finding a good source. Did you read the story I wrote for Mac Home? It says at the bottom that I'm a "freelance journalist in Colorado." There's your first clue in this mystery. C'mon, Dan. The problem is that Colgan didn't *want* to ask me the tough questions. I answered every question he asked. The questions, in my opinion, were bogus. He asked no question to balance other quotes or allegations made by the article itself. As a journalist, I *always* approach the subjects of my articles with any quotes or opinions that I want them to balance with their own opinion -- as I did, vigorously, with Mr. Updegrove. Even after my original Yale migration story appeared, I requested and got an interview from Updegrove allowing him to answer all the issues. That's how I practice journalism. In my estimation, Colgan's effort was not balanced journalism; in fact, again in my opinion, his story was a very poorly researched effort to discredit me and, by association, Mac Home.
>3) Ladd complains that her credentials are not listed in the article Maybe you should have read it. (See above.) My resume states very clearly that my clients and past jobs have been in Colorado. If you missed that, what else did you miss on this story?
>Ladd is an acquaintance of mine; I Dan and I have only met through efforts, together, on a very particular project, to research an online story. Ironically, we've only met through our mutual efforts in "online journalism."
>This article was not I surely don't take this story personally -- you didn't say I was fat or lazy or an egomaniac. But the article does speak to my credibility as a journalist, because my story is supposed to be indicative of some "sort of journalism" other than the, uh, good kind. It's not. It's a professional, researched, complete story, written with the same diligence that I would afford an effort destined for ink and paper. Actually, my credentials are more than relevant. The story is supposed to be about online journalism and journalism ethics -- as an adjunct professor and otherwise, I've lectured on these topics. If your reporter had asked the right questions, you might have gotten interesting -- dare I say printable -- responses. >4) Ladd claims that her sources are unimpeachable. It would be naive to say that my sources are unimpeachable, so I didn't say it. No source is ever unimpeachable. They can suddenly turn on you, prove criminal, leave the country, say they didn't say something they did -- any number of possibilities. What I did say is that my sources have not been impeached, even by Mr. Updegrove, who has publicly criticized coverage in Business Week and elsewhere, as discussed earlier.
>While each individual Your argument is problematic. No investigative story would be written if the criteria for publication was whether or not the principals "denied it." The connection is the month. The grant proposal and the letter came into being within a few weeks of one another. The connection is also the year 2000, which is the end of the first Intel grant, and it's the (potential) end of Mac support on Yale's campus. The connection is further the word "migration," which was used in Intel's request for proposal, various documents released by Yale ITS and is implied in the letter to freshmen. Why shouldn't readers have that information? In my research I found a connection that I wondered about, then asked people at Yale and elsewhere what they thought. Mr. Updegrove told me that making the connection was "absurd," Intel wouldn't talk about it, and Yale professors came down on different sides of the issue. Then I found that there was a memo posted regarding discussions between Intel and Yale's staff that talked about the planned migration. I found instructions to Yale's departments telling them how the migration will take place. I read the Intel Request for Proposal, which states clearly that the grant is for the purpose of stimulating migration. I put these facts together, I asked many quotable people about these facts, then I wrote a story. Some people (like Updegrove and Intel officials) think it's wrong to make this connection. Others -- even Yale professors -- whom I interviewed made the connection without prompting. The grant is about migration. The letter was about migration. The connection, I'm afraid, is appropriate. It's Journalism (online or otherwise) 101.
>Note that I have changed the third paragraph article slightly since first Not something that you could do in print journalism, is it? In academic journalism circles, this is an interesting ethical issue that is hotly debated. In "home page journalism" it's possible to change your story once you decide it's too incendiary or potentially libelous. That's not something you can do in print journalism, where my training lies.
>Because items posted in Speak Your Mind are not archived, Ladd's In the same spirit of disclosure, I've posted both of Mr. Colgan's e-mails and my responses on my Web site. Finally... Dan, I understand this is a student-run publication where the participants may not have as much experience as paid reporters. But ignorance isn't a defense in the free press or elsewhere. I'm taking time to defend this attack on my work because these criticisms can show up in my Web history (keyed to my name as a keyword) and could potentially affect my career and livelihood. I don't take that lightly; I hope you and Mike Colgan have the same respect. Your publication has already correctly perceived that inaccuracies published on the Web can be damaging. That's why I endeavor to bring the highest journalistic standards to my Web-based work. I encourage you to do the same in the future. - Donna Ladd |
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