jayrosen:

Reuters vs. Reuters: News agency makes an ass of itself by trying to connect George Soros to Occupy Wall Street.

But some Reuters people realize it, and call their company out!

Reuters then backs down, changing the story line on its report.  Or does it? [more]

Jay Rosen has really shown his value as a media commentator in the past few weeks, and this piece is another example of that. We didn’t shout loudly about this story earlier, but we were confused as to why Reuters ran it. One person responded to our earlier piece, which asked aloud if it was worth Reuters’ time to report an in-depth investigation on this topic, by suggesting this: “Responsible journalism requires checking of ALL claims, not picking and choosing which to follow up on.” Maybe so, but in this case, perhaps there was a point where someone could’ve said after doing due diligence, “this isn’t a story, and it’s not worth our time.” Because, let’s face it, connecting tens of thousands of dollars indirectly donated by a billionaire a couple of years ago seems silly when you consider that two other billionaires notably give millions of dollars each year to a similar movement. It’s a revelation that puts this story in sharp relief — a sharp relief that isn’t even mentioned in the original article.