‘Here’s the truth. We don’t know’: How false reports of Boston bombing arrest left media outlets scrambling
What ethical issues were raised by the article
Your reaction to the ethical issues raised by the information in the article
Play devils advocate, what opposing view could be expressed
What is your opinion about the issue, and what caused you to form that opinion
How could using a balance in research and reporting tactics have made a difference in the outcome of what was reported
Much of the reporting was done without checking for sources.
The question of “did sources even exist?”
Once the medias stories began to fall apart, many began to play the blame game.
Some pointing fingers at each other and others pointing fingers at “unnamed sources” or police.
There is much more emphases in being first than being right and the medias reporting on April 15, 2013 is a perfect example of that.
I understand the need for sources to be kept confidential, but does that bring up questions of legitimacy. Can we trust that the “confidential” sources the media uses to report are even real? It makes me feel like most were made up or that the media didn’t even care that those same sources were unreliable.
I liked the response Kelly from Fox gave, “We don’t know”. It was at least an attempt to telling those looking for answers that we don’t have the facts. The blame game seems like something that should be left out of legitimate media reporting.
The only thing that could be said of the medias reporting, in attempting to defend the sorry excuse for the type of reporting done on that day is the audience is to blame. Yes, us. I know it is again part of the blame game, but if I was to play devils advocate, I would say our need to know now is to blame.
We, as the audience, seem not to care if news is real or not. We seem to just need to know first rather than to care what the truth is. Social media is a perfect example of this. We share and share without finding out whether the news is accurate of not.
In my opinion, the entire day was an eye opener. Who are these people reporting, why are they reporting and where are they getting all of their information? It truly makes me wonder and doubt if the news we receive is accurate because of how often journalism like this is done.
The media seems to care more about ratings and their “breaking news” rather than getting us the facts and that makes me not trust them. That day was a day to do some true investigating and present facts to the world. They chose to try to be the first rather than say we are trying to find accurate and concrete information.
The inability for the media to just stop, once the inaccuracies began to surface, makes me feel as if the truth doesn’t really matter. Once their inaccuracies started they should had stepped back and started to report the truth.
If the media reported that there was a bombing then waited to find out facts from reliable sources, that day would have been completely different.
If making sure your sources had the authority to give statements would have, perhaps, made for accurate reporting.
Stop, breath and investigate. As journalist, there is no room for panic or rash reporting. Staying calm and focusing on facts rather than emotions would have allowed the reporters to distinguish legitimate sources from inaccurate ones.