I spent the day yesterday off and on updating my Washington Post vs. Boing Boing post, and just sitting back and seeing how everyone reacted. I didn’t really post my personal thoughts on how Krebs (Washing Post), Singel (Wired), Norton (Wired) and Bonner (Metblogs) reacted, nor did I respond to any of them. That’s what this post is for.
What happened: I did this post about Washington Post writer Brian Krebs snagging a story (about an online boarding pass generator and the FBI fallout) from Boing Boing and not even giving a nod to the lengthy and detailed reporting already being done at BB. This happens *all the time* with Boing Boing and lots of other blogs — just read Gawker, as they call MSM Old Media Dirty Media out on it all the time. I was sick of it, and my point was to call attention to bloggers getting ripped off and having our work repurposed by dirty media.
Then: Krebs wrote me an email and I blogged it. I got lots of mail. Bonner blogged his angle, which was specifics about the story being snagged. Norton wrote me a terse email defending Krebs, then she wrote a blog post. Singel slammed bloggers on Wired and credited Bonner for my post and starting the discussion, ripped on Bonner and made it look like I was just following the boys. Bonner corrected him, Singel edited his post.
More after the jump.
* * * * * * *
What I think of the original news story: Don’t you wonder? You don’t know because that’s not what I was blogging about. But my opinion is that it makes the FBI look pathetic, because this info has been around for a long time, and it looks like anyone can do this. I think that taking down the boarding pass site and intimidating people who call attention to these serious security risks is the same as confiscating my Pellegrino at the United Airlines gate.
My response to Krebs: You still haven’t updated your WaPo piece with links to other journalists covering this story. I’m still in disbelief that you claim you didn’t know Boing Boing was covering the story or read their posts — but if that’s true, you should really read that blog, it’s great. They have news on it, usually before you do. And in the last part of your email you wrote, “Btw, I tried to leave a comment/reply to your blog, but I notice you don’t accept comments. I’d be interested to know why not.” Funny you should ask, since you work at the Washington Post. Having open comments on blogs with controversial issues is more work than it’s worth — actually I think in some cases it’s a mistake. Apparently the Washington Post agrees with me on comments and controversial issues (like sex, or in WaPo’s case the Abramoff scandal), learning the hard way back in June of this year when your ‘paper’ had to shut down comments on one of your blogs — transcript of what happened in a PBS debate here. People email me and I run their emails, no matter if I’m right or wrong. I consider every post here ‘living’. You should do the same with yours. Lastly, I’m really wondering where you got that email address for me. The only other stranger who has emailed me this year using that address is the creep who runs the xenisucks site.
My response to Norton: I got your email and by the time I did my update you had your post up so I didn’t publish your text. Your post only furthered confusion, not by defending Krebs, but by not explaining why you had to defend him, or including links. When you did link, you only linked to the one person who agreed with you, Ryan Singel at Wired. I linked to you, and you didn’t link to me even though I was clearly your reason for getting into this whole thing. And, it’s my understanding that you asked a mutual friend to *ask me* to link to you, and when you posted you sent me the URL. That, combined with the thread throughout your post of discrediting bloggers and portraying Jardin, Singel and Krebs as the three musketeers of journalism and breaking news makes me realize you blogged your personal agenda — at the expense of my respect for your opinions. In my opinion, you made the rift between us bloggers (like me and Bonner) and “reporters” like yourself and Singel even bigger. I think it’s really amusing how you and Singel responded with such hysteria so quickly about what Sean and I had to say, and how emotionally Singel reacted to Sean saying the word ‘plagiarism’.
My response to Singel: Thank you for correcting your Wired post and attributing me as the original source. You did the best job of trying to make Sean and I look bad, but you just came off as bitchy and hysterical. You mostly went after Sean, but it’s a man’s world, I understand that. I’m actually glad you disagree with me, and I know Sean is fearless about open debate. But the way you signed off your email to me was one of the most condescending things I’d received in a long time. You wrote me, “I’ve been guilty of the jumping too hard too fast, something that’s easy to do when there’s no editor between you and your readers. That lack of editorial control is a great gift to have but sometimes it’s better to slow down and contact people before assuming the worst. Anyhow, I gots to get to some other work, but thought a back channel might be a better way to communicate some of this.”
You basically tell me to get an editor and to think before I blog. Which is funny coming from someone who is writing to apologize for jumping to conclusions with attribution throughout an entire post. Also, it assumes that I just plucked this post out of the sky and did it all by my little blogger self. I didn’t. I communicated back and forth with plenty of people on this — other writers, your peers — and have been having ongoing discussions with people that would surprise you throughout *all of this*. It’s a myth that us bloggers operate as lone gunmen posters without feedback from our communities. I stuck my own neck out with this topic on my blog for sure, and have made some enemies on the way, but that’s because I’m not afraid of anyone — not because I was the only one upset about it, *and* the constant problem of MSM Old Media Dirty Media snagging our stories without credit as they attempt to get into blogging. I mean, remember when MSM was just getting their shit into HTML and you’d read a story about something online and they didn’t link to websites and you’d have to search for what they were talking about because they *just didn’t get it*?
Here is the fucking point, and take notes, because from now on there will be tests. Sean Bonner put it perfectly in a late-night email exchange last night, saying,
“For the record, I think the MSM on one hand belittling the legitimacy
of anything that comes from blogs, and with the other repurposing and
trying to take the credit for things coming from blogs is nothing
less than plagiaristic, and because it’s the kyptonite of words for
reporters it needs to get used a lot more often in these situations.
Why is ok to steal an idea wholesale so long as you paraphrase?
Let’s not forget or overlook that this whole thing took place because
of something on the Washington Post’s Blog, a section they were
forced to set up to compete with what was happening on real blogs,
and that wouldn’t exist if what we were doing didn’t hold value.
Value they want to take from us.”
*** I’m getting that tattooed on my ass.
