Geneva Overholser is director of the School of Journalism at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication.
Updating “On Behalf of Journalism: A Manifesto for Change”
“Journalism as we know it is over,” I wrote in June 2006. Today I would add, “and a whole new world has opened before us.” “On Behalf of Journalism: A Manifesto for Change” was a document intended to bring hope in a time of difficulty. Two years later, there is even greater difficulty – and still more reason for hope.
Geneva's Notebook
Getting it on the record
By Geneva - Posted on May 12th, 2008
In preparing materials for this site, we ran across this 1996 PBS Frontline interview. The ideas are still worth contemplating:
I really do feel strongly that the use of quotations from people who are not held accountable for what they are saying is one of the main reasons that reporting is as destructive as we all feel it is today. And I think it's an under-recognized reason. I think, for two reasons, it's just a very dangerous thing to do, to let people talk off the record. And to use their information.
One--we rob the reader of an ability to judge the speaker. You don't know if the guy has an axe to grind. You don't know if he was just fired. You don't know if it's the best friend of the person he's talking about.
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