Part four of Internet journalism and the Starr investigation

On September 9, 1998, the House of Representatives received special prosecutor Starr’s report. The report — formally titled Referral From Independent Counsel Kenneth W. Starr in Conformity With the Requirements of Title 28, United States Code, Section 595(c) — was a document without precedence in U.S. history. It contained graphic accounts of Clinton’s affair with Lewinsky and alleged that the president had committed perjury, obstructed justice, tampered with witnesses and abused his constitutional powers. The report laid the foundation for Clinton’s impeachment by the House along party lines in December 1998; he was acquitted in his Senate trial two months later. Two days later, the House voted to release the report — on the Internet — and for one improbable afternoon and evening, the Net had the spotlight all to itself. [Read more…] about The Starr Report

Part three of Internet journalism and the Starr investigation

During press coverage of past scandals such as Watergate or Iran-Contra, perhaps the biggest challenge facing journalists involved news gathering: teasing out enough information from reluctant sources for a solid story. In the Clinton sex scandal, information flowed like water. It was everywhere, but much of it was murky or polluted. The real challenge came in filtering the information to sort out fact from rumor. Authenticating the news became critically important in two ways:

• News organizations covering the story first-hand had to determine the reliability of the information obtained from sources with politically tinged motives (many participants had Republican ties and had a strong, visceral hatred of President Clinton from the outset of his 1992 presidential campaign) as well as from sources in the independent counsel’s office who were using the press by selectively leaking information to gain tactical advantage with reluctant witnesses such as Lewinsky. Reporters and editors worked out these calls based on their experiences, news judgment and gut instinct.

• News organizations, especially those from small and medium-size markets, had to wade through the digital datastream pouring through the newsroom from outside channels each day to decide what to publish. The difficulty was that even established news providers like the Wall Street Journal and Dallas Morning News were stumbling, while newcomers like cyber-columnist Drudge seemed to be wired to some reliable — if ever-anonymous — sources.

In the Clinton-Lewinsky case, editors had an especially difficult time determining what was fit to print. They were often troubled by the endless leaks and constant parade of unidentified sources, particularly when they had to rely on the judgments of other news organizations. A study commissioned by the Committee of Concerned Journalists found that in the early stages of the Starr investigation, 21 percent of the reporting was based on anonymous sources and almost half of those stories were based on one source only. [Read more…] about The sourcing problem in the Lewinsky scandal

The following five-part 10,000-word research report appears in Thinking Clearly (Columbia University Press, 2003), a textbook on journalism case studies. It’s already in use in college classrooms around the country. Syndicated columnist Geneva Overholser and former Los Angeles Times Washington bureau chief Jack Nelson are among the other chapter contributors. Also see the teaching notes on the topic. Posted Jan. 20, 2000.

The Internet came of age as a news medium in 1998 during independent counsel Kenneth Starr’s investigation into whether President Clinton had a sexual affair with a White House intern and lied about it. This case examines three principal issues: (1) the rise of new media as legitimate and important sources of breaking news; (2) sourcing and verification of Internet news, and (3) how the Internet impacts the role of today’s journalists.

A new medium is born

At the beginning of 1998, nearly all news organizations had put up homesteads on the web. But few were taking advantage of the online medium’s inherent advantages of immediacy, interactivity and depth. The vast majority of newspapers updated their sites once a day, following the print cycle, preventing the Web site from “scooping” the newspaper. Most news sites relied almost exclusively on “shovelware” — content that had the twin disadvantages of being written for a different medium (print) and being untimely, i.e., yesterday’s news. Breaking news, if covered at all, was left to a wire service feed on the site. Interactivity was almost nonexistent; in many cases bulletin boards set aside for reader forums were digital wastelands that attracted few users. News sites associated with television, such as CNN Interactive and MSNBC, were experimenting with multimedia, but most news sites used video and audio sparingly or not at all.

For the most part, users came, they clicked, they yawned. They sensed, early on, that newspapers considered the Web a reluctant obligation rather than the future of their business. [Read more…] about Internet journalism and the Starr investigation