Recently I added my name to a mailing list consisting of journalists on deadline looking for “experts” (ahem) for quotes for their stories. It was pitched to me as a way to “build your personal brand” and “cement your place as an authority in your area”. All well and good. I definitely like building my/our brand, and someone thinking I’m an expert (even mistakenly) would be pretty cool.
But I also wanted to see what types of stories journalists are interested in, where the market for information is heading, and how exactly the journos were walking the line between reporting news and soliciting experts to help them create news.
It’s an interesting situation, made even more interesting by the recent flare up about perceived credibility issues in the wine blogging world.
Some, including me, have argued that wine bloggers aren’t trying to adhere to the standards espoused by pro journalists and that their audience hasn’t come to expect those standards from them. If they are transparent about their conflicts of interest, then they cease to be conflicts of interest.
Others argue that if wine bloggers ever want to be taken seriously, they need to adopt the ethos and standards set by the pros.
So with that background in place, let me just throw out a query that caught my eye from this past Monday, September 8th:
11) Summary: celebrities involved with wine
Category: Lifestyle & Entertainment
Name: Redacted
Email: Redacted
Title: Contributing Writer
Media Outlet/Publication: Redacted
Anonymous? No
Specific Geographic Region? No
Region: anywhere
Deadline: 5:00 PM CENTRAL – September 15
Query:
“I am always looking for celebrities (sports, fashion, film, TV,theater, etc.) involved with wine (meaning they are into collecting or have partnered with a winery to launch a vintage) to pitch to my editors at Redacted. This would be in the form of a Q-and-A where the subject discusses new projects related to his/her career as well as how the interest in wine got started and has been cultivated. If you have a client that fits this need, please contact me!”
In my opinion, writing an article is a lot like making sausage. It may be delicious at the end of the day, full of information and insight, but you really don’t want to see it getting made. Any time news coverage is generally favorable for the subject of the news, someone is benefitting. And when someone is benefitting, there is the potential, indeed likelihood for a quid pro quo. We know this as consumers of news. We understand that it is simply how the world works.
What we want is disclosure. We want to be able to calibrate our internal BS detectors on our own. We don’t trust anyone (except perhaps our friends and family), let alone the media. What we do trust is our ability as a society to increasingly shift through large volumes of biased and often erroneous information, and piece together for ourselves a passable version of The Truth.
What is remarkable to me about the query above (natch, why else would I be writing about it?) is the fact that the implicit agreement between the journalist and the subject – you know the one between the media representative and the subject who wishes to leverage said media rep for personal gain – has been made pretty darn explicit.
The journalist above makes no pretension about the fact that the celebrity subject will be able to pitch their projects or products in exchange for an interview. Is this a violation of journalistic ethics?
Personally I don’t think so. This is commerce, and it’s completely understandable. One would hope though that any article resulting from the above query would come with a statement of disclosure.
The problem arises for me, and I suspect lots of other media consumers, when journalists try to convince us that they do not operate in the same world the rest of us mortals do. When they argue that their processes and ethics prevent them from being corrupted.
Please, spare us. Just disclose. That’s all we ask. We’re all human and we can all be bought. Whether it’s by a deadline, a juicy story, or simply a pat on the back. Corruption is in the water and we’re all drinking it.
The best we can hope for as news consumers is that folks will at least give us a general idea how polluted the water is in their glass is so we can make allowances.
Agree? Disagree? Hit me up in the comments. This is important stuff.
Randy
1 year ago
Hey Josh,
I think a distinction can be made here. Just because a reporter is asking for this or that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s what the reporter is actually looking for. Subterfuge is a common way for journalists to appear to off-handedly ask questions on one subject or another during the course of an interview with an expert in order to build a story only partly related to what’s being mentioned in the request above.
Ethics dictate that facts are checked, ethics doesn’t always dictate how those facts are gathered.
That being said, most journalism is above board and straightforward in how it’s conducted. Investigative journalism is where things can get interesting.
Josh Hermsmeyer
1 year ago
Randy,
I think you are right that specific tactics are used at times, but the query above is pretty straight forward. It is indicative of what I believe to be the case with most reporting. Stringers look for an angle to pitch and will do what it takes to get the info to write the story.
Disagree with you that ethics don’t dictate how facts are gathered. In fact, the how is more important than the what IMO.
Also disagree that most reporting is straightforward, at least when the subject of the reporting stands to gain or lose something of value. There’s a reason people hire PR pros!
Ryan
1 year ago
Great points. Disclosure, upfront, before you start talking, will only lead to good reporting.
Lenn
1 year ago
I know that TV and radio are different outlets with expectedly different ‘rules’ but this “let me interview you and you can promote something” happens all over the place.
Have you ever seen someone on Letterman or heard someone on Howard Stern who isn’t there to promote a new show/book/movie/project? It’s not a matter of ethics at all.
I agree with you, Josh, that bloggers (as a whole) don’t NEED to adhere to the rules of old media. And I agree that disclosure is important.
Josh Hermsmeyer
1 year ago
Lenn,
I agree it isn’t a violation of ethics. But one of the big issues surrounding the furor over Rockaway was that there was a perceived quid pro quo.
As you point out, this happens everywhere. So much so that we discount these types of promotional appearances automatically as consumers of news.
But we still continue to watch, read and listen! And that’s it in a nutshell. The audience doesn’t care, as long as we aren’t being deceived that Objectivity is involved.
winebroad
1 year ago
I’m with Lenn. Why else would a celeb agree to an interview if not for publicity’s sake? No scandal there. As for the Rockaway thing, the icky part was that the winery said it would send the bottle only if A) the bloggers agreed to write about it and B) that they’d do so within a certain time frame. If someone offered me that deal I would tell the winery that I’d be happy to receive the sample but couldn’t guarantee that I would publish a review at all, let alone during a certain period of time. I receive lots of samples but I don’t write about every one of them, for a variety of reasons. As a journalist, that decision has to be up to me.
Josh Hermsmeyer
1 year ago
Tina,
Thanks for the comment and for your perspective.
As I said I agree, no scandal, but doesn’t it seem strange at all that a journalist can initiate a quid pro quo and no one bats an eye, but when a winery attempts such a thing some folks level charges of unethical behavior?
My argument is that neither causes a loss of credibility. Both are just how business gets done.
The sooner we stop putting reporters on a pedestal and begin treating them like any other person with a pen and an opinion, the better IMO.
Which isn’t to say that you can’t have your own personal standards. I totally respect that. Its to say that those who choose not to adhere to them for whatever reason shouldn’t be labeled unethical.
Tina
1 year ago
Why do you think I got into this business, if not to have winery and PR people kiss my ass and give me free wine? Hahahahhahahaaa. Yep, that was a joke.
Wayne Young
1 year ago
I think that there are different levels and therefore different standards that exist in journalism. A journalist who is working on “hard news”, looking to uncover, or explain facts of an important nature, is held to a different standard of honesty and accountability. You have to site your sources and attribute your quotes. You may have to play with quid pro quo in order to uncover the facts (“I’ll help you with X and Y if you agree to tell me about so-and-so”) or get to the truth, but you can’t change the story or ignore or distort facts if you decide that the facts don’t coincide with the point you’re trying to make or the end you’re trying gain. That’s a corrupt journalist.
A “feature”, as a piece like this would be called, is simply entertainment, and doesn’t need to adhere to the high standards of hard journalism. If there something about Mr. Wine-Star’s personality that you don’t like, but he’s offering you cases and cases of free vino, you can overlook the bad stuff, accentuate the positive and no one gets hurt. You get your feature, he gets his publicity. You get paid and published, and wine, or tickets, or books get sold. We all know that’s the deal.
The conundrum comes when you find out during the course of a fluff interview that Mr Wine-Star is exploiting illegal workers to harvest his fruit and prune his vineyards. If you’re willing to overlook the damage and injustice being committed for a few cases of wine, then you’re corrupt, and have no place calling yourself a journalist. You’re a freelance publicity agent.
Blogging on the other hand is a personal endeavor and you can write whatever you want. Anyone who gives a blogger the importance of a journalist is making a mistake. A blogger is expressing himself online, and you’re dealing with opinions, reactions and emotions, regardless of whether the bottle was bought, or given for free in exchange for publicity. That’s one of the problems with blogging now: that too many people give bloggers too much credit, and expect them to adhere to standards of journalism (siting sources, attributing quotes). Add to the mix that a journalist is held accountable (a by-line) and many bloggers are anonymous, allowing then to spread unsubstantiated rumors out of spite.
Josh
1 year ago
Wayne,
Great comments! Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
Where in the pantheon of journalism do you suppose wine writing and reviews fall? Completely on the entertainment side, or is there some expectation of hard news standards?
I still have a problem with quid pro quos of any kind given the furor over an agreement by bloggers to write a review on deadline, but your explanation is the best I’ve heard about the different tiers of ethics.
Again though, if audiences can come to grips with the fact that quid pro quos take place in entertainment news, they can surely come to grips with the idea that a winery asked a blogger to write a review on deadline. Right?
Dr. Horowitz
1 year ago
What celebrity interview about wine would you want to read about most?
Paris Hilton?
Michael Jackson?
Hanna Montana?
I digress…
That’s interesting to know how the Wine Enthusiast makes its sausage.
winebroad
1 year ago
I’m still not sure what the quid pro quo is for wine writers. Free wine samples? Frederic Koeppel made a great point about this on his blog: nobody considers it a quid pro quo situation when book reviewers receive sample copies, or when movie reviewers attend free press screenings. And by the way, nobody has ever offered me “cases and cases” of wine–or even a single bottle–in exchange for a feature story. And I hope they never do, because that would be creepy.
I don’t necessarily think it’s “unethical” of a winery to place conditions on a sample offering, but I do think it’s sort of bad form. I’m betting the winery would never do that with traditional wine media, but as Wayne said, bloggers are a different animal and the same rules don’t necessarily apply. That’s what’s so tricky about this whole thing.
Josh
1 year ago
Hi Tina,
I don’t think for wine writers there is a quid pro quo that applies generally, and I’m not the ethic police by any means. I see no problem with samples in any shape or form.
I’m just pointing out that it seems strange to hold bloggers to an ethical standard that many pro journalists don’t even share (i.e. no quid pro quos under any circumstances).
I think wine writers do a great job and I’ve never said there is an ethical issue with anything they do. Those accusations are coming from elsewhere and directed toward bloggers. I’m simply tying to understand the ethical landscape. :-0
Just because some/many pro wine writers wouldn’t agree to writing a piece on deadline as part of a blog experiment, that shouldn’t cast a cloud of ethical suspicion over those folks that do, IMO.
Totally agree with you that bloggers are different than traditional media. Traditional media would be offended at a request like the above. But bloggers were delighted!
I celebrate that difference. I’m tired of the whole distance breeds objectivity argument in wine criticism. It’s all subjective, let’s revel in it! Bloggers can be effusive and over the top in both their praise and in their criticism, they can talk about all the inside baseball stuff about how they got the sample, what the PR pitch is, and generally peel back the curtain on how wine gets marketed.
As long as there is disclosure people won’t care, just like with entertainment news and celebrity interviews.
Thanks again for you comments Tina!
Tom Wark
1 year ago
Josh,
The journalists query is not promising anything. She’s saying that if anyone works with a celebrity involved in wine, please let her know, pitch the story. However, the stories that she does run come in the form of Q&As. Anyone who contacts her does not get to have their celebrity interviewed. The Journalists will evaluate the angle and if they think it’s a good one, they will then pitch the idea to their editor. If the editor agrees, then an interview with the celeb will take place.
Steve Heimoff
1 year ago
“Just because some/many pro wine writers wouldn’t agree to writing a piece on deadline as part of a blog experiment, that shouldn’t cast a cloud of ethical suspicion over those folks that do, IMO.”
Actually, yes, it should.
“Totally agree with you that bloggers are different than traditional media. Traditional media would be offended at a request like the above. But bloggers were delighted!
”
This is the whole problem.
You can’t have it both ways, i.e., you want to be taken seriously the way traditional wine writers are, but you don’t want to adhere to traditional standards.
The problem with Rockaway was simply the indebtedness the bloggers incurred to the winery. There should never be any quid pro quo, period. If the winery wants to send samples, fine. In the Rockaway case, there may not have been a conflict of interest but there was the appearance of one.
By the way, Dr. Horowitz, you might want to read Tom Wark’s comment regarding how Wine Enthusiast makes its sausage.
Dr. Horowitz
1 year ago
Okay, I guess the sausage metaphor might seem to denigrate the Wine Enthusiast. I do look forward to reading your new blog posts Steve, but I don’t subscribe to the Wine Enthusiast.
Perhaps a more appropriate ending to my comment might have been:
“That’s interesting to know how the Wine Enthusiast contacts pigs and then uses its editorial process to produce charcuterie.”
Do the pig and charcuterie metaphors have more neutral tones?
Or, is anything associated with pigs, even lipstick, taboo?
Wayne Young
1 year ago
I liked the point about books and movies… No one considers it quid pro quo for and advance copy of a book, or a screening of a movie.
There are 2 things to think about here:
First, you can’t possibly show a Book or Film Critic A DIFFERENT BOOK OR FILM THAN THE PUBLIC GETS. With wine, this practice is commonplace.
Second:
An author or director never gives a copy or screening on the condition that the review will be good. It’s your risk that you’ll get panned.
Therefore, I’d say that if a blogger gets free wine (just like EVERY WINE MAGAZINE IN THE WORLD GETS FREE WINE) and reviews it honestly, there’s no ethical problem.
Wayne Young
1 year ago
I didnt address Josh’s question: Where does wine journalism fall?
Just like Film or Books, wine REVIEWS are simply educated opinions, and aren’t really hard journalism. The only ethical standard is that you don’t violate the implicit trust between you and your readers to give an honest opinion about the wine, and not let your review be biased. If a famous movie reviewer gave “two big thumbs up” to a movie because the producer gave him a cut of the profits, or cast his daughter in his next feature, that would violate that trust.
Josh
1 year ago
Hi Tom,
Thanks for the comment. Yours is certainly a valid interpretation, though an extremely charitable one. You also don’t address the statement where she says that “the subject discusses new projects related to his/her career as well as…” the wine related items that she’s interested in pitching to her editor.
My interpretation, though less charitable, wasn’t out of left field by any means. Tina (a magazine editor), Lenn (a published writer), and Dr.Horowitz (a Marketing Prof at Sonoma State) all shared my opinion that the query as stated is very suggestive of a quid pro quo. They all also agreed that such quid pro quos, especially with celebrities, are commonplace and nothing to get excited about.
That aside, I’m prepared to accept your interpretation. As I said in the post and multiple times after in the comments, I don’t think she’s done anything unethical (because I don’t think quid pro quos are unethical if you disclose them).
But here’s my issue with such a charitable reading of the query: why wasn’t such charity on hand when discussing the bloggers involved in the Rockaway kerfuffle?
The most charitable reading of that situation was that Jeff, a blogger at Good Grape, approached the participants with the idea of reviewing a wine together. The deadline and requirement to write were Jeff’s ideas, not Rodney Strong’s. That Jeff approached RS in the first place, not the other way around. And that the participants didn’t even talk to RS about the deal. They only talked to fellow blogger Jeff.
Given the above info, a much, much more charitable review of the situation could be written than what was on your and Steve’s blog.
Why such a hard line with bloggers. and such a soft hand with pro journos? Given that multiple people in this thread saw, like I did, pretty clear evidence of a quid pro quo, what happened to even the appearance of a quid pro quo being unacceptable?
Josh Hermsmeyer
1 year ago
Hi Steve,
Thanks for the comment!
We disagree fundamentally on where a writer derives his credibility. My position is that a writer derives credibility from being Knowledgeable and Authoritative, Honest and Consistent.
You can be biased and pass the above test. You can be wrong and pass the above test. You can be involved in quid pro quos and pass the above test (as long as you disclose).
In short, the rules the traditional wine media live by are in place not for the sake of the audience (which basically doesn’t trust anyone anyway, or much care), but for the sake and employability of the authors.
A published author’s audience isn’t their readers so much as it is their editor. IMO that’s why these ethical standards were put in place: its is a way for writers to vet themselves and prove to other writers and editors that they are Honest and Consistent.
But a blogger has only themselves for their editor. They already know if they are Honest and Consistent, they don’t need to prove it to themselves.
Thus the only thing that a blogger need do to prove to his audience that he is Honest and Consistent is to disclose.
Also, when I speak about bloggers getting taken seriously, what I’m talking about is raising the level of wine knowledge in the wine blogosphere.
One way I’ll personally be helping to raise this bar: Capozzi will be sponsoring a scholarship so promising bloggers can take WSET classes and increase their level of wine knowledge.
It is in this area that bloggers are lagging behind the pros generally, due to the very low barrier to entry in starting a blog. Folks need to get the Knowledgeable and Authoritative part handled if they want to be taken seriously.
The ethics part can be handled simply and easily with a disclosure statement. No need for the ethics police. Again, IMO.
Thanks for the comment and for your perspective Steve!
Jennifer Burke
1 year ago
HI there,
Scott over at Roshambo referred me here. I didn’t expect to land in the midst of such an important topic.
I am all about new media–authentic voices, opinions. I’m a big believer in Joe Trippi’s : The Revolution Will Not be Televised. I just put blogger on my resume. I feel it’s a veritable profession.
I’ve been talking to a lot of people on how to develop my website. The thing that it comes down to is authenticity. Out of all this competition in the world for products, wine, talent, the only thing that sets us apart from the world is our individual, bi-directional perspectives.
But that is just my opinion.
I’ve just set up an RSS feed aggregator on my site. I’m streaming your perspective live.
Let me know what you think.
Regards,
Jennifer
Thad W.
1 year ago
Bravo, Josh, for getting to the essence of what this issue is all about: disclosure.
I agree with you that as long as there is more transparency in wine blogging, consumers can decide for themselves what to believe as “the truth”. And more transparency is needed, not just in the general disclosure statements some bloggers provide, but in individual posts themselves.
For example, it is unfortunate that many bloggers review a wine, yet never disclose in that same post how they acquired the bottle. Even worse, far too many focus their wine reviews on positive experiences, without ever mentioning negative ones (see Breaking the Unspoken Code).
Again, many thanks for taking us all from the moral relativism of this issue to focusing on a standard of transparency that all wine bloggers should strive to meet in every post they publish.
Peter Shankman
1 year ago
Randy:
The one rule of HARO (HelpAReporterOut) is that queries may NOT be reposted on blogs. Can I ask you to please remove this query as soon as possible? Thanks so much.
-Peter Shankman
K. S. Jones
1 year ago
I’m a journalist who specializes in other areas, but I dabble in wine on the side, so I am coming late to this discussion. To repost a communication without permission is a violation of copyright. You can get sued putting this up. I know. My brother the attorney pursued someone who did the same thing with one of my emails and, let’s just say his bank account is much lighter now. You need to take this down before either Shankman or Hansen talks to a lawyer (and even when it’s down, that fact that you posted it may still follow you legally).
I didn’t make the copyright law, but I sure do understand it.
Josh Hermsmeyer
1 year ago
As requested, I have redacted the name and publication from the post at the request of the journo and Peter Shankman.
K.S.,
HelpAReporterOut is a public mailing list. No vetting process takes place other than a short signup process and anyone can join. Therefore communication isn’t confidential. Peter (the list moderator) and the journo asked that I remove the journo’s name and I am happy to do so. I wasn’t out to smear her, quite the contrary. I don’t believe she did anything wrong.
The larger points covered in this conversation are important however, so I won’t be taking down the substance of the query.
Thanks for your comment!
Josh Hermsmeyer
1 year ago
Peter, this is straight from your online sign up form:
“This is really the only thing I ask: By joining this list, just promise me and yourself that you’ll ask yourself before you send a response: Is this response really on target? Is this response really going to help the journalist, or is this just a BS way for me to get my client in front of the reporter? If you have to think for more than three seconds, chances are, you shouldn’t send the response.
In the end, we could probably all stand to do this a bit more, huh?
That’s it. No other rules. Sometimes the journalists will request anonymity, in which case, you’ll email me directly, and I’ll forward. Otherwise, I’ll include journalist contact info at the bottom of the list.”
I keep getting the one rule confused, apparently. :-p
Alan Kropf
1 year ago
What is funny about this situation is that the person that sheds light on company HARO that generated this post is Peter, who runs the company. So he is seeking privacy, yet engaging this issue on a public forum and conveniently name dropping the name of his company. I myself signed up for the query feed, and it literally took 10 seconds and involved no credentials whatsoever, so when Josh says that this isn’t privileged information, he’s right on the money. I don’t see what the big deal is.
Also, how many “one rules” can you have? I mean, having multiple rules that fall under this “one rule” may seem simpler on the surface, it really is quite confusing, because if you say you have “one rule” on your home page, people probably aren’t going to go out of their way to look for the other, hidden “one rules”.