Getting It First

"Or is the essence of a magazine -- and its strength in a world where content has been dethroned by connections -- that it is about an ongoing relationship with a public that shares interests? Obviously -- except for the aforementioned US and other outlets of bodily fluids journalism -- I'd vote for the latter. Perhaps it is better to create the means for that community of shared interests, needs, and expertise to improve stories and gain and share knowledge. Perhaps it is better to make magazines less of a product and more of a process, less of a subscription to a thing and more of a membership to a community. Stop me before I go too far. Oh, too late.

"Now let's ask, what is the value of the scoop in the more timely media of newspaper and broadcast? Do scoops really drive the business? Or do they stoke the ego? Here, too, I'll vote for the latter."

My reaction: Easy for Jeff to say. In today's wired world, letting slip that you're working on a competitive story would lead to an immediate rip-off: by other publications, by bloggers, by talk radio hosts, you name it. Worse, they would steal your story--or just talk it to death--without benefit of the careful research you did or the nuances you've mastered. More often than not, it would be a cartoon version. Then critics and bloggers would start ripping your work before it's even been published , and the partisans denouncing you for even attempting to investigate such-and-such if it's perceived as negative to their side.

No thanks.

Quick example: Back in 1999, word leaked that NBC had interviewed Juanita Broaddrick, an Arkansas woman accusing President Bill Clinton of a sexual assault. When the network held the story--until after the Senate acquitted Clinton, as it turned out--it was hammered by the right for covering up for the president. Whether NBC's decision was right or wrong, few cared at the time whether the network felt the story was solid enough to broadcast. The act of not publishing became the story.

Sure, some "scoops" are silly: getting hold of a report a few hours before it's released or something like that. But for a detailed story on which you've done considerable homework, I'd rather present the world with the finished product and then let everyone have at it. Even if it means that Jeff Jarvis and his cyber-brethren have to wait a bit longer.

The New York Times is still all over the NSA, with this rare, four-byline story:

"In the anxious months after the Sept. 11 attacks, the National Security Agency began sending a steady stream of telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and names to the F.B.I. in search of terrorists. The stream soon became a flood, requiring hundreds of agents to check out thousands of tips a month.

"But virtually all of them, current and former officials say, led to dead ends or innocent Americans.

"F.B.I. officials repeatedly complained to the spy agency, which was collecting much of the data by eavesdropping on some Americans' international communications and conducting computer searches of foreign-related phone and Internet traffic, that the unfiltered information was swamping investigators. Some F.B.I. officials and prosecutors also thought the checks, which sometimes involved interviews by agents, were pointless intrusions on Americans' privacy."

Translation: They spied like crazy, ignored the rules and still came up empty.

Al Gore , by the way, says Bush broke the law, "repeatedly and insistently": "Former Vice President Al Gore, charging that President Bush's record on civil liberties posed a 'grave danger' to America's constitutional freedoms, on Monday urged the appointment of a special counsel to investigate Bush's authorization of warrantless domestic surveillance by the National Security Agency."