Why ‘journalists’ might need the likes of Wikileaks

There’s obviously a lot of discussion and debate about the value of the service Wikileaks provides, following the release of 90,000 documents on British and American involvement in Afghanistan.  You can see more about it unfolding all the time.

And perhaps this isn’t the most important piece of news to use as an example of how ‘journalism’ can massively fail when it comes to fact checking (I’m using ‘journalism’ in speechmarks to differentiate from the very fine work a good number of very good journalists continue to do), it’s a timely one.

The Daily Star issued an apology at the weekend for publishing a story claiming that a videogame based on the case of Raoul Moat. I’m pretty sure I can let the apology speak for itself (Hat tip to Tabloid Watch)

‘ROCKSTAR GAMES – GRAND THEFT AUTO – AN APOLOGY

On 21 July we published an article claiming that the video games company Rockstar Games were planning to release a version of their popular Grand Theft Auto video games series titled “Grand Theft Auto Rothbury”.

We also published what we claimed would be the cover of this game, solicited comments from a family member impacted by the recent tragedy and criticised Rockstar Games for their alleged plans.

We made no attempt to check the accuracy of the story before publication and did not contact Rockstar Games prior to publishing the story. We also did not question why a best selling and critically acclaimed fictional games series would choose to base one of their most popular games on this horrifying real crime event.

It is now accepted that there were never any plans by Rockstar Games to publish such a game and that the story was false. We apologise for publishing the story using a mock-up of the game cover, our own comments on the matter and soliciting critical comments from a grieving family member.

We unreservedly apologise to Rockstar Games and we have undertaken not to repeat the claims again. We have also agreed to pay them a substantial amount in damages which they are donating to charity.’

In case you missed it, here’ it is again:

‘We made no attempt to check the accuracy of the story before publication and did not contact Rockstar Games prior to publishing the story.’

Although to be fair, if the Daily Star was entirely made from the contents of The Onion, B3ta and 4chan, it’d be a far better product.