I didn't see a thread to fit this into, so I guess it gets it's own...
Sure, the NYT has been going downhill for quite awhile, but I'm still surprised by this:
NY Times published fake letter from Paris mayor
So, apparently someone at the NYT gets a letter claiming to be from Delanoe, edits it for publication and sends the changes back to the original emailer.... and gets no reply. So what do they do with it? Publish it as fact obviously.The Times blamed the mistake on a failure to verify the authenticity of a letter that arrived by e-mail.
"In this case, our staff sent an edited version of the letter to the sender of the e-mail and did not hear back," the paper said. "At that point, we should have contacted Mr. Delanoe's office to verify that he had, in fact, written to us. We did not do that. Without that verification, the letter should never have been printed.
Why on earth would you bother to check up on it's authenticity with the alleged source of the letter? Surely an unverified email address that doesn't respond to queries is enough basis to send it to the presses, right?
Astonishing.
I think most posters in the backroom have higher standards than that.
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