Reuters
Pay-for-Exclusive
Leads to False
Claims, Abuse
of Power &
UNCA
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
July 3 -- Why
would a
professional
reporter, when
shown
that the
material in a
story he had
labeled
"exclusive"
had in fact
been published
and put in
Google News by
another
smaller media
more than five
hours before
refuse to
withdraw
the false
"exclusive"
claim?
As reported
yesterday,
this has
happened since
June 30 with
Reuters.
On
June
30, five hours
after Inner
City Press
exclusively
reported the
UK's flip-flop
on opposing
then
supporting the
removal from
UN sanctions
of
London-based
Saudi
dissident
Sa'ad Rashed
Mohammad
al-Faqih,
Reuters Louis
Charbonneau
put up the
same story,
impermissibly
labeling his
as
"exclusive."
Inner
City Press
immediately
showed
Charbonneau.
that its story
had been
tweeted and in
Google News
five hours
before. But
Charbonneau
refused to
withdraw his
"exclusive"
claim.
He now
threatens to
use the
Correspondents'
Association
Kafka-esque
bureaucracy in
his own
defense,
charging Inner
City Press
with undefined
"harassment"
and unethical
reporting.
Charbonneau,
his
Pioli and
others have
not responded
to the legal
letter of June
28, nor to two
requests
for the agenda
of the meeting
they propose,
for a time
uncertain on
the day before
the 4th of
July holiday.
Charbonneau
has
refused to
withdraw his
"exclusive"
claim. Why?
Well, ethical
questions have
been raised
about Reuters
policy on
paying for
exclusives.
On the below,
unlike Reuters
or at least
Charbonneau,
we give
full credit to
and link to
Talking Biz
News:
The
following
e-mail was
sent to
Reuters
reporters from
Martin Howell,
the news
editor for
company news
in the
Americas,
about what the
wire service
wants from its
business
reporters in
terms of
beating the
competition:
'We
are
spending a lot
of time
writing and
approving
notes
recording
beats and
exclusives...
Performance
goals will
change... We
want:
–Exclusives
that
lead to
significant
share price
moves. By
significant we
generally mean
2 percent plus
for a big cap
company and 5
percent plus
for a small
cap.
–Timings
beats
in minutes not
seconds that
lead to stock
price moves as
above. We have
to be
particularly
careful about
our timings
information
against Dow
Jones, which
can be
unreliable
depending on
how it is
measured, and
to be safe we
shouldn’t
record a beat
win against
Dow if it is
less than 5
minutes
without an
additional
assessment by
an EIC.
–Stories
that
really set the
news agenda,
even if they
don’t move
share prices.
Here are two
examples — Jim
Wolf’s great
exclusive in
December on
Obama eyeing
arms sales to
Taiwan, and
Jim Finkle’s
exclusive on
an unknown
flaw in
Microsoft’s
Internet
Explorer
browser that
allowed
Chinese cyber
attacks on
Google and
other
businesses.
–Timings
wins
of more than a
few seconds
from a massive
court case,
like Madoff,
Bear
Stearns...
“What
we don’t want
to be filed as
beat notes:
–Modest/incremental
developments
in a deal
story that
don’t move
prices of
securities.
–Timings
wins
of only a few
seconds.
–Stories
that
required major
corrections.
–When
we beat Dow
and Bloomberg
but were beaten
by
local media.
And
that appears
to be the
problem, and
why the
already
Kafka-esque
UNCA "Board of
Examination"
process is
being
re-heated,
without any
provision of
agenda, and
despite
putting UNCA
into jeopardy.
Watch this
site.
, 
