The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
By Jonathon Naylor News-gathering may seem like a straightforward business, but there are a million little complexities that make it unique. This week, I'd like to take the opportunity to answer some of the questions that have come my way, as editor of The Reminder, over the years. Q: Is it difficult not having an opinion? A: It's not that the opinions don't exist; it's that they aren't allowed to surface (except in editorials). When I am writing a piece, my opinions never cross my mind. I'm too focused on ensuring all sides are heard and giving readers a full understanding of the issues at hand. Reporters with whom I've spoken are highly sensitive to accusations of bias. We work to avoid the B-word at all costs, though not always successfully. Several weeks back, for instance, I received a call from a frustrated reader accusing us of bias in favour of the NOR-MAN Regional Health Authority. More recently, however, came an e-mail suggesting we hold a bias against the NRHA. If there are people who sense a bias, at least it's coming from both sides. Q: Why does it sometimes take days for major news to hit the paper? A: Our deadlines. The newspaper you read actually has to be written and edited well before you ever see it. Our Wednesday paper is completed by Monday afternoon. Our Friday paper is done by Wednesday afternoon. And we have to put a wrap on our Monday paper by the preceding Thursday afternoon. It can be a daunting schedule. We do our best within our deadline limitations to keep the news fresh and interesting, but this is a challenge all small-town papers face. Q: How do you hear about the news? A: Lots of ways, but quite often through taking the initiative of making phone calls and firing off e-mails. Other times we get much-appreciated phone calls or e-mails from readers like yourself. Sometimes we hear of items through the grapevine, just like you do, and then work to examine their authenticity. Further tips emerge from meetings or events we attend, or news releases we receive. The odd time, another media source will detail an issue of local interest, so we follow up. Q: How many letters to the editor do you reject? A: Not that many, but it happens. Sometimes a letter will cross the line between fair comment and fallacious critique, though just where that line should be drawn is a highly debatable proposition. Usually we know right away whether a letter makes the grade. One that comes to mind was received about six years ago from a gentleman whose parked car had evidently been hit by another vehicle. The author claimed to know who hit his car and sarcastically "thanked" the offending driver, by name, for accepting responsibility. In fact, the driver had fled the scene Ð or so the author wrote. There were no injuries in this incident. The offending driver was not a public figure or anything of the sort. He was, to our knowledge, not even an adult yet. Clearly we just had an angry guy trying to embarrass a kid who may or may not have hit his car. Something like this cannot be dealt with in the pages of a newspaper. Q: Why are government spokespeople often not quoted by name? A: This is actually a government rule, at least in Manitoba. Whenever a newspaper gets info from low-level communications people, they tell us to refer to them only as "a government spokesperson" or a similar title. Q: When do you grant a source anonymity? A: Different media outlets have different criteria. Our feeling is that if there is a reasonable rationale to grant anonymity, and the information the source is providing is important for the public to know, we will consider it. One example would be the woman who in 2008 told us of how she was repeatedly kicked in the head by drunken assailants Ð and how the attack should serve as a wake-up call to the community. Nor did we name two men living with AIDS who spoke in Flin Flon a few years back, or several clients of the food bank interviewed on poverty within the community. Of course reporters know the identity of sources not identified in print. Local Angle runs Fridays.1/24/2011
