Lies, Damn Lies and Newspapers

People ask me why I cover the newspaper industry.  My answer is always that I cover the newspaper industry because it can't be trusted to cover itself.  Journalists consider themselves watchdogs, the fourth estate, essential for democracy, whatever, but when they cover themselves, they refuse to follow even the basic standards disclosure and transparency that they demand of the rest of society. 

Let's take an example from today's Republic.  The Audit Bureau of Circulations released the latest newspaper circulation numbers yesterday. 

Here's what the Bureau said about the Republic. 

The Arizona Republic in Phoenix was down 5.7% in daily circulation to 389,701 while the paper gained 0.2% on Sunday with a total of 516,562 copies.

Ok, so let's say you want to write a perfectly transparent and fair story about that report.  What would you say? 

First, you would have to be careful not to make a statistical error.  The Sunday circulation rose, but it rose "point" two percent.  That means Sunday circulation went up one fifth of one percent.  If you have a reporter who is not paying attention, he could easily think that weekly circulation drooped 5.7% and that Sunday circulation rose 2%.  But he would be inflating the Sunday increase by a factor of 10.  In fact, the increase in Sunday circulation is about 1,000 additional subscribers, while the decrease in weekly circulation reflects a loss of over 20,000 subscribers.

So how would you write a fair story?  Here's what the Republic wrote this morning.

Sunday circulation up at 'Republic'

Sunday circulation for The Arizona Republic increased slightly for the most recent six-month period, helping the newspaper join the ranks of top 10 Sunday newspapers for the first time.

Average circulation on Sundays for The Republic rose by 1,039 copies to 516,562 for the September 2008-March 2009 period, as reported in the March Publisher's Statement, part of the Audit Bureau of Circulations' semiannual Fas-Fax accounting of newspaper circulation.

There was no mention of the large decrease in weekly circulation numbers. 

If the Republic had simply tried to emphasize the Sunday increase while still disclosing the weekly decrease, they would be guilty of the type of spin that they don't tolerate from corporations or politicians.

But in this case, they refused to disclose the real story of the 20,000 drop in weekly circulation and instead, chose to manipulate you by focusing exclusively on the paltry increase in Sunday sales. 

This type of manipulation doesn't even meet the basic requirements of ethical corporate disclosure. Yet the newspaper should be held to a much higher standards.  After all, the newspaper demands honest disclosure from the corporations it covers, so the Republic's manipulation screams hypocrisy. 

Remember that hypocrisy when the Republic moans that the state budget process isn't "Transparent."

 

Comments

[azucena74]

dang, kick a horse while it's down why don't you. any bit of grow this reason to celebrate, i love the daily newspaper and will be sad when it goes away. i'm sure there are more newsworthy topics to investigate...

[Tod]

Greg -

I smiled as soon as I read the head line this morning ... in anticipation of your blog post ... especially since I saw the raw/real numbers in a blog post yesterday.

I expected a blog post from you about the raw data ... but when I saw the article this morning I knew I would see something from you today.

It is absolutely amazing how shamelessly they publish these articles.

[Richard]

Imagine what other things the Repulsive leaves out of its stories if it can't even honestly deal with its own circulation situation.

[ron]

I am glad that the Arizona Republic is going to court to pursue the information about the Apache rapes.

I wonder if the blogosphere will have the resources or interest in pursue such cases.

Probably not as most blogs are only opinions about what mainstream media does.

[Name:]

Ron: So, the police, the prosecutors, the victims, the families of the victims were unable to find the rapist. Now Dennis Wagner is going to try to do it? And that's the reason we have journalists?

Sure, there's a public interest to be served in Wagner's efforts, but only if they lead to something. Like Justice. But to say only a newspaper could serve that interest is just phony.

[Ty]

I can't say I lay mush, or any, blame at the feet of The Republic for not writing the true story. It's not like an editor said, "let's bury the lede. no let's remove it all together."

No, you have to blame the corporate masters at Gannett. They routinely would lay down the law, force our hands, then let us take all the blame. There is no way they'd allow The Republic to report a story like that about itself.

Things are bad enough for the editorial staff in mainstream media. There's no way they would go against a company directive and give the people paying their checks any more ammo to fire them.

[Ty]

Ah! Typo! I meant "much". Where's an editor when you need one.

[Kelli]

I normally am a big defender of the dying news industry, but this is inexcusable and frankly, quite embarrassing for everyone else in the news industry.

[Kristen]

The AZ Republic has joined the herd of soon-to-die papers which have collectively lost more than seven percent of their circulation in a year-to-year metric.

I hope the AZ Republic dies quickly and painlessly and doesn't resist its inglorious death. What replaces it, however, is a far more interesting topic. Will its reporting role be replaced by blogs, such as yours? Will concerned citizens twitter their knowledge? Will it be aggragated, somewhere?

I wish I had a crystal ball.