Ron The Cop

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Here’s an interesting discussion thread at the Spokesman-Review’s “News is a Conversation Blog.” So far the comments have been allowed to stand a pleasant development.

Ron the Cop

Greetings from Reno

Posted by Steven A. Smith | 5 Mar 9:06 PM

Good evening,

I’m at the University of Nevada/Reno this week participating in the Reynolds School of Journalism annual Journalism Week.

As is almost always the case, I learn more at these events than I contribute.

There were a couple of highlights today.

Ken Paulson, editor of USA Today, delivered the keynote speech to an auditorium full of students worried about their future careers in journalism. He did a great job.

I sat with a couple of students today at lunch. One had done a study of our Jim West investigation and wanted to talk about the various ethical issues raised by our decisions. Another is working on a thesis examining contemporary Iraq coverage and its impact on readers.

The highlight of the day came this morning.

Fabrice Florin is the executive director of NewsTrust.net. In a provocative session, he described his website, a place where citizens can review, critique and rate news stories from mainstream publications.

That is an oversimplification of an effort to do nationally much of what we’ve been trying to do with our Transparent Newsroom initiative.

He is looking for local publications to partner with NewsTust to determine if their review and critique system can be effective on the local level. I’m interested.

If you have the time, check out the NewsTrust.net site and let me know what you think.

Thanks,
steve

There are 8 comments on this post. (XML Subscribe to comments on this post)

Good morning, Netizens…
Steve Smith asks:

He is looking for local publications to partner with NewsTust to determine if their review and critique system can be effective on the local level. I’m interested.

So am I, particularly with regard to how such a system might be implemented.

Then, going to http://www.newstrust.net, I spied the following list of objectives:

• we rate journalistic quality, not just popularity
• we invite professional journalists and editors to guide our citizen reviewers
• citizens using our tools can assess news quality as well as professionals
• our multiple-rating evaluations are more reliable than single ratings
• we track ratings for each publication in our source reputation database
• we feature stories from our most trusted sources in our daily listings
To discourage member fraud and gaming, we offer these preventive measures:
• reviewers are identified by their real names
• we rate our reviewers based on the quality of their work
• our reviewers’ ratings are weighted based on their own member level
• member levels are based on activity, experience, ratings and transparency
• our staff validates active reviewers for compliance with our terms of service

The first premise, that we rate journalistic quality, not just popularity, suggests at the outset that the quantity of page hits do not matter as much as we give them credence for. Do the quantity of page hits equate to a quality product? That raises an interesting question.

The author goes on to state, we invite professional journalists and editors to guide our citizen reviewers. Without possessing any real statistics, how much disposable time do the existing Spokesman-Review editors have to dedicate to assisting/guiding citizen reviewers? Granted the number of e-mail messages that such a guidance system would involve, not to mention the inglorious number of staff meetings that would evolve, could the Spokesman-Review accomplish such a task given its existing editorial staff? Please show me the hands of volunteers who have the disposable time to steer such a project. Does Carla still have a cuss pot?

(Rubbing my mandibles together with great glee, and a brief nod in the general direction of Ryan Pitts with whom I have had several recent discussions about this very issue, we descend with trepidation into preventative measures).

I believe that Ryan and I both are of the opinion that future Blogs or any other online features need to require members being identified by their real names. Of course, this may set off a proverbial firestorm the likes of which we haven’t seen since the last great conflict, but I submit change is nearly always a good thing. I also foresee that the highly-touted number of page hits for each respective Blog perhaps will drop once the anonymity that exists goes away. The question which I believe the Editors must ask themselves is, what do we gain/lose by taking such action? In particular, do we gain quality? Then a positively question fraught with fearsome implications arises, how do we judge the quality of any given Blog? Do we even have a criteria for that? If so, I’ve never read it.

Of course, establishing a system where member levels, perhaps even permissions, are granted based upon activity, experience, ratings and transparency all require the same personnel resources as many other of the changes. How will we quantify and qualify experience, for example? Quantifying activity is easily enough performed, by using a relatively-simple system of message counters, but most of the others appear to mandate the time and resources of Editors and/or staff members, and I ponder whether the existing resources exist for these set of tasks.

Then, if the Spokesman-Review can send Doug Clark to Turkey it should be a relatively uncomplicated task to set up such a system, right?

As much as some of the changes are positive and good for the overall quality of the product of news, implementing it reminds me somewhat of elephants mating. It always takes place at high places accompanied by great bellowing and smashing of plant life, and the outcome, while somewhat predictable, can take a longer time than one might expect.

—
Dave
I am not Steve Smith (Used with permission)

Posted by Dave Laird | 6 Mar 4:38 AM

Mr. Laird,

I recently wrote along the same lines that the mainstream media is experiencing a major paradigm shift in its business model. We are witnessing a communications reformation as great or greater than that of Martin Luther’s time brought about by the new/alternative media:

. . . The currency of the new media is the validity, reliability, and predictability of the information provided in one’s own daily life. The sources that best meet those needs will attract readers and grow Those sources which lack credibility and/or don’t correct misinformation quickly will die.

Det. Ron Wright (Retired)

Posted by Det Ron Wright (Retired) | 6 Mar 9:26 AM

Good afternoon, Netizens…

Det. Ron Wright states:

I recently wrote along the same lines that the mainstream media is experiencing a major paradigm shift in its business model. We are witnessing a communications reformation as great or greater than that of Martin Luther’s time brought about by the new/alternative media:
. . . The currency of the new media is the validity, reliability, and predictability of the information provided in one’s own daily life. The sources that best meet those needs will attract readers and grow Those sources which lack credibility and/or don’t correct misinformation quickly will die.
My first question which has arisen in an audit class in creative journalism frequently over the last few sessions, is how does the new media impact journalism at its most-technical levels? Decades ago I spent a great deal of time learning how to compose using a remarkable number of different disciplines, ranging from news format to creative writing and beyond. Although I have always had a gift for composition, I had to unlearn a great number of journalistic bad habits in order to become fairly competent as a writer. While some of the issues I have with the new media very closely parallel your criteria listed above, inwardly I cringe whenever I encounter people who, for whatever reasons, cannot compose well-designed paragraphs, sentences or that cannot use most refinements of the Kings English correctly. It truly bothers me when reading a document, regardless of its origin, when it is poorly-composed or has other glaring errors. I often encounter that in the alternative news, although it seldom seems to detract from the information, itself.
I did notice that you did mention, as a course of your discussion, the volatility of the new media, in that in our generation, we have brought new meaning to the hackneyed old phrase, “breaking news”. There is hardly a day goes by but what I do not check a list of news sites which typically carry the latest news updates. In most cases, because of the nature of these sites, I can learn about breaking news stories long before they hit the “local radar” of Spokane-centric news. Unfortunately, many times I discover information obtained from these sites prove erroneous over time, and that initial information garnered from the sites are inaccurate, misleading and often invalid once the true nature of the story is known. Are we to trade accuracy and validity when the news is a breaking story? Knowing from experience that the news from a given site is often volatile, in many cases hours ahead of mainstream news sources, how do we go about citing the source as accurate or credible?
However, I concur with your concept that we are seeing a huge change being made in the mainstream news media. Some of the old standards of news reporting are passing away, while new ideas and concepts are becoming the norm rather than the exception. I can hardly wait to see how this impacts local stories in Spokane, as we both participate in its change.

—
Dave

Posted by Dave Laird | 7 Mar 4:56 PM

Dear Mr. Laird,

Yes the new/alternative media or Blogos is in its infancy. Consider it as a vast neural distributive network like SETI albeit with smart nodes. Yes initial reports can be sketchy and error prone. But remember it was the cell phone photos/videos that hit the blogs that brought instant reporting on the tsunami in Indonesia. Also it was citizen journalists both military and self supported embeds that reported the shift of Iraqi Sunni tribal leaders from AQ that has led to the success of the surge.

The Blogos does have a self-correcting or self-righting ability. The best advice is to survey many sites and triangulate the info. This will give the most accurate and reliable view of reality. With the free wheeling debate and thought nothing that is wrong stands for long.

The old media needs to recognize the phenomenal expertise that exists within the blogos and the almost infinite paralleling processing power for fact checking. There is room for both the old and new media in cross-supportive relationships. After all the blogos is for the most part a free resource that reporters can force leverage their scarce resources.

Det. Ron Wright (Retired)

Posted by Det Ron Wright (Retired) | 7 Mar 8:44 PM

Ron and Dave, interesting points. I enjoy your insights, and am hopeful that the credibility gap plaguing mainstream media outlets can be reversed before too long.
Although this might seem a bit off topic, one of the issues you’ve touched on happens to be one I’m having a tough time sorting out right now: the feeling that truth can always/only be found in the blogosphere because of the ability to compare and contrast information/conclusions from a diverse range of sources.
I suspect that those who suggest this are typically referring to national and certain types of international issues, because there’s no shortage of people weighing in on whatever Congress, the Pentagon, the White House, etc. might or might not be up to.
But there’s another layer of news and information that tends to affect people in a daily and more direct way: local and regional issues, which is where “mainstream” news organizations such as The SR devote their greatest attention.
The Inland Northwest has a lot of great independent bloggers. But how many are actually digging into issues of substantial regional significance and presenting information that adds to or brings greater understanding that would otherwise be lacking?
I haven’t seen, for example, many bloggers exploring why Spokane city and county leaders keep cutting taxes by millions and millions of dollars for developers (including a subsidiary of the company that owns The SR) but then tell Joe and Jane Average the government treasury is too bare to pay for things such as jail operations and new emergency radio equipment so now taxes need to be increased?
Or, why was it so important as a matter of good public policy to fire the region’s chief health and environmental regulator without having a backup plan in place, which means we’ve now gone for a year or more without one?
Those are just two examples and there’s legitimate answers and points of view on all sides of them. I mention them only for illustrative purposes because my primary point is that both of those have been examined in SR news stories and vetted (at least partially) on our letters to the editor pages and in some SR-sponsored blogs.
Sorry to seem like I’m rambling here, but if one of the key litmus tests for determining the reliability of a news organization is the ability to compare its information against an abundance of competing and alternative information sources covering the same issues, then no organization covering local or regional issues — mainstream or otherwise — will ever pass muster in a small- to mid-sized market such as Spokane because local issues are unlikely to ever draw the kind of broad, insightful scrutiny from as diverse a range of news and information sources that national issues receive from around the globe on practically an hourly basis.
Which, I guess brings us back to the original dilemma.

Posted by David Wasson, assistant city editor | 8 Mar 2:01 PM

Mr. Wasson,

Do you jest:-) If not, I’m ROTFLMAO! How long have you worked for the S-R? Mr. Smith will perhaps clue you in when he gets back to town.

Honestly it was the bum’s rush given to Dr. Thorburn by the Regional Health Board that got me digging deeper into the very questions you are raising. It’s obvious to me the key resides with the public health building sitting dead center in Kendall Yards.

Dr. Thorburn is a consummate professional in her field. Other in her professions have black-balled this town because of the politics. I’d be willing to wager she would not bend in the wind regarding ensuring the public was not short changed if the building needed to be relocated. This was the pivotal reason for her departure and not her lack of tact with the politcos. She was a potential roadblock in this development project.

Det. Ron Wright (Retired)

Posted by Det. Ron Wright (Retired) | 8 Mar 2:49 PM

Ron, too funny — and, please, call me Dave (well, maybe Dave W to avoid any confusion).
Perhaps the Thorburn example was too much of a softball, even just for illustrative purposes.
But you actually help establish the underlying point.
That assertion was examined by The SR, giving those involved the opportunity to provide their answers (and in some cases non-answers), while giving readers the ability to evaluate the responses and decide who to believe or disbelieve, particularly when they head to the polls (actually now just the mailbox).
Yet if, as some suggest, the only way news and information sources can achieve credibility in the 21st century is if consumers/readers have an abundance of separate sources all covering the same topic, none of the coverage would pass the test because just two (at best) independent news- and information-gathering sources put noticeable effort into covering this issue with any degree of depth.
Personally, I thrive on competition and spent several years in one of the most competitive media markets in the nation. And, yes, readers in those kinds of markets have broad choices of news organizations to choose from and decide for themselves which have credibility and which lack it. (As an aside, they also have to deal with insanely congested freeways and a dumpster load of other urban ills that Spokanites will thankfully never understand.)
But my concern is that it seems news organizations serving regions such as the Inland Northwest risk being assigned less credibility in the digital age simply because the population base is too small to support large enough pools of competing news organizations to satisfy the information appetites of those who have become accustomed to the hundreds of choices available when it comes to coverage of national affairs.

Posted by David Wasson, assistant city editor | 8 Mar 5:32 PM

Dave W.

You are a breath of fresh air. Sounds like you’re from where that I just left. I took my pension and fled the state.

Here’s the fundamental issue here that I summarized in a comment regarding the S-R and the new code of ethics that is under development. This is a comment I posted in response to “Sam” over at HBO.

The second concern goes to the heart of a Code of Ethics re a major regional newspaper of record. The question is how to restore editorial integrity that separates the business interests of the owners from the newsroom floor. Historically there is a bright line between editorial content and the business side of a paper. In our unique circumstance a similar bright line needs to be drawn between editorial control and the owners of the paper to have any credibility with the readers.[…]

Even the Washington News Council recommended that the S-R separate itself from the Cowles Co attorney, Duane Swinton of Witherspoon & Kelley because of inherent conflicts of interests. This was recently evident in the withholding of more RPS documents from public disclosure. Witherspoon & Kelley were objecting to this release on behalf of the owners of the Cowles Co.

[…]

Because of the significant amount of property that the Cowles Co owns or controls in Downtown Spokane and along the Spokane River to the Idaho border, there inherently is a conflict of interest regarding its involvement in development projects and reporting by the S-R. [See the Fancher Report]

I’m presently surprised it’s still up and wasn’t given the axe:-) I might add that Mr. Duane Swinton was the front man funneling money into to Preston & Gates to set up the Foundation that would hold title to the now infamous parking garage. I would say more but I’m treading on thin ice here as it is re the “thought police”:-)

Det. Ron Wright (Retired)

Posted by Det. Ron Wright (Retired) | 8 Mar 6:09 PM

UPDATE I:

This thread remains intact and has continued on with these additional commets

Good morning, Ron…

Det. Ron Wright writes:

Honestly it was the bum’s rush given to Dr. Thorburn by the Regional Health Board that got me digging deeper into the very questions you are raising. It’s obvious to me the key resides with the public health building sitting dead center in Kendall Yards.
Dr. Thorburn is a consummate professional in her field. Other in her professions have black-balled this town because of the politics. I’d be willing to wager she would not bend in the wind regarding ensuring the public was not short changed if the building needed to be relocated. This was the pivotal reason for her departure and not her lack of tact with the politcos. She was a potential roadblock in this development project.

Now THAT is fascinating, as conspiracy theories go. Is there any proof of this that could be found on the public record?

Like you, I had no issues whatsoever with Dr. Kim Thornburn’s acumen nor her professionalism. I found nearly all her statements on pandemics to be both cogent, scientifically sound and surprising, given we tend to be a backwater town when it comes to such things. Despite having met her several times, including during a heated press conference, I never noticed any of the issues which the Health Board felt so important.

I have been quite fortunate in my time in life to have met and befriended some true or near-geniuses, and nearly all of them were what I would term “natty dressers”. I vaguely remember that Buckminster Fuller often showed up for various public appearances dressed in some pretty incongruous haberdashery including one time, when speaking at a U.C. Berkley science symposium he donned a beanie with a propeller. I saw nothing of the sort in how Kim Thornburn chose to attire herself.

Of course, the one facet of this story is that Mayor Mary Verner was a member of the board that fired Kim Thornburn. Given the manner in which my public comments regarding the snow emergency were received by Mayor Verner, I cannot help but wonder how she would receive any questions today about the Health Board being unable to replace Dr. Thornburn. Do you think that might be a sore spot with Mayor Verner? 😉

—
Dave

Posted by Dave Laird | 9 Mar 12:05 PM

Mr. Laird,

I just have a moment or two. Regarding Dr. Thorburn, no nothing in the public records. This is yet another deal in the works out of public view. I’ve personally spoken with both Cherie Rodgers and Dr. Thorburn and the consensus is the public health building is what was in play by the “usual suspects.”

Mind you Mayor Verner chaired the Regional Health Board that fired Dr. Thorburn. But if you listened to the Mark Fuhrman Show, Verner said she was having second thoughts about Dr. Thorburn. You may have noticed that even though Dr. Thorburn initially was favorable to Dennis Hession, she was on Mayor Verner’s list of endorsers. That’ telling in my mind that they compared notes and made amends.

I think Mayor Verner was led down the garden path by the “usual suspects” re the cover story that Dr. Thorburn was difficult to work with to facilitate the play in the works on Kendall Yards. I tried to “clue in” the S-R reporters but non seemed willing to pick up the bit and run with it.

I’ll write more later.

Det. Ron Wright (Retired)

Posted by Det. Ron Wright (Retired) | 9 Mar 1:16 PM

Mr. Laird,

As I promised yesterday here’s some more re citizen journalism, bloggers, and the Blogosphere re hyper focused local news and national coverage.

You may have taken “the heat” on the snow removal not from any misunderstanding of your comments here but from a thread started by Garyc regarding the S-R’s editorial at S=R’s “A Matter of Opinion.” Here’s an example of the immediacy re the Blogos on a developing local news story. I sent an email to Mayor Verner on this thread and received this reply that she gave me permission to post.

Also awhile back I posted at S-R HBO this fascinating aside regarding the Joseph Duncan Case on how it was a group of bloggers that linked him to a previous unsolved child murder in Riverside County, CA.

Here’s another example of the expertise of the Blogos on a developing story that the MSM has so far ignored regarding on the significance of the recent “disappearance” of Moqtada al Sadr. Here’s another point regarding the fact/error checking ability of the Blogos. Many reporters from journalism schools lack any credible experience with our modern military. They can be easily misled and report enemy propaganda as the truth and achieve what the enemy can’t on the battlefield by undermining the political will to fight. There is a group of bloggers that this was apparent to that created Media Mythbusters consortium. This is similar in concept to Snopes.com re Urban Myths/Legends to put a stop to the MSM endlessly recycling false reports as fact.

Muck-Raking BS Using Amateur ‘Experts’Mar 8th, 2008 by Terresa Monroe-Hamilton

From The Strata-Sphere:

The liberal media and pundits are so technically illiterate it is sometimes scary. And this complete illiteracy leads them to wild-eyed fake accusations based on the ‘testimony’ of ‘experts’ who are not experts and cannot hold a candle to some of us professionals in the telecommunications business. While I would not even consider myself a security guru (though I deal with it on a daily basis) I can tell you without hesitation the latest ‘expert’ to arise in the NSA-FISA wars is clearly not.

[…]
Read More

A similar discussion took place at News is a Conversation last year on citizen journalists and bloggers. This was split into two threads re Mr. Smith’s trip to a conference in Boston. Here’s the first one where I first mentioned using hyper focused new media in an experiment on a local issue of significance. This carried on to a second post. This was the source of my amusement and snarky ROTFLMAO remark above to Mr. Wasson from the S-R’s censoring of comments that reflect the emperor wears no clothes:-)

Det. Ron Wright (Retired)

Posted by Det. Ron Wright (Retired) | 10 Mar 10:12 AM

UPDATE II: 

OK Gary Crooks open the door with this question and I responded.  As suspected my comment was pulled shortly after it was posted.

 Ron the Cop

If a tree falls in a forest there is now a medium to report it even if the MSM deems it not newsworthy.

Show me the local version of this. That is, a site that reports (not comments on) local news.Thanks.

Posted by garyc  |  11 Mar 10:44 AM

Garyc,

OK I’ll bite:-)

Even though Mr. Smith believes this to be from the realm of little green men and conspiracy theorists, I would invite folks to read and decide the credibility, reliability, and objectivity for themselves of the collective work of award winning journalists Tim Connor and Larry Shook at:

http://www.camasmagazine.com/

Some how I believe this post won’t survive the day:-)

Further from their investigative work re the death of Ms. Jo Savage in my opinion and that too of former Sheriff Tony Bamonte this death should be aggressively investigated and prosecuted as negligent homicide – a first degree manslaughter in WA.

I have yet to see any real investigative zeal displayed by the S-R on this case to compel the governmental investigative agencies do give it the due diligence it deserves. Yes, I believe this case is now being reviewed by the US Attorney’s Office in Seattle now that US Attorney McDevitt has recused himself along with RPS fraud case unless the FBI chose to handle Chief Kirkpartick’s referral locally.

Did I miss something. In this previous S-R report by Jim Camden, McDevitt was quoted as saying:

He expected to hear within a few weeks who would be assigned to the case, and would make that public. If the investigating attorney wants to take anything before a grand jury, there’s usually one in session in Spokane, he said.

I don’t recall any follow-up report that the RPS fraud case was reassigned to the US Attorney’s Office in Seattle. There’s really no mention in the two S-R reports on Sheriff Bamonte’s letters regarding investigating the Savage death as a manslaughter:

Story attributed to “Staff Reports”

Sheriff supports passing case to FBI

and Jonathon Brunt’s story of August 24, 2007. BTW this story does not show up in a Google search either inside/outside the S-R and is not listed in the S-R list of RPS Crash Investigation stories:

Manslaughter charges urged in RPS garage death: Former sheriff says city bypassed rules to favor ‘financial interests’.

The reassignment can be inferred in very tangential mention in a later story by Jim Camden that has some factual errors BTW:

Parking garage claims settled

I have personally spoken with Sheriff Knezovich who has great respect for Sheriff Bamonte and is closely watching the outcome of the federal investigation. Sheriff Knezovich was not in the loop when the decision was made to refer the Savage case to the feds. Sheriff Knezovich still retains jurisdiction as the chief law enforcement officer of Spokane County to do his own criminal investigation under the WA criminal code if he chooses or ask the Washington State Patrol to investigate independent of anything the feds choose to do or not do.

How about giving the US Attorney’s Office a call for a status report on the RPS fraud and the Jo Savage cases instead of just watching the kettle come to a boil?

Det. Ron Wright (Retired)

Posted by Det. Ron Wright (Retired)  |  11 Mar 1:00 PM