Engadget Responds to Apple Memo Mix-Up
Engadget got caught in a fake memo trap on Wednesday when the site reported that Apple's iPhone launch was being pushed from June to October. Turns out, the original memo -- which appeared to come from within Apple and was actually forwarded to Engadget by an Apple employee -- was a well-constructed fake. It fooled everyone. Within hours, Apple formally denied the memo and Engadget promptly took back the original story.This sort of memo forwarding happens all the time and there's no way to stop it (nor should it be stopped -- like 'em or not, leaks are an essential part of journalism). Engadget can be faulted for being overzealous with this scoop, but I'm impressed with the site's handling of the fall-out. Rather than employ the standard print technique of correcting a story in a small box on a page no one ever reads, Engadget kept the original story up, crossed out the incorrect information but left it visible for folks to see, then outlined how they were duped and where things stand. Yesterday, Ryan Block, managing editor of Engadget, posted a long and transparent mea culpa .
"Credibility and trust is the currency of our realm, and it's clear we lost some of that," Block writes. "We take what we do very seriously and would never knowingly pass along information that we believed could be false or inaccurate ..."This is exactly how blogs and Web organizations should handle themselves when they screw up.
More Recent Stories:
• iPods and Violent Crime, Together at Last
• The Real Format War Has Yet to Begin
• New Currency in a Free World
• Web Analytics Stay Ridiculous
• Time for the "Oh My God It's Cold" Stories
• Memo to Jerry Yang: Use Your Shift Key
• Tutorial: Create a PDF with a Web Browser
• What's Behind that Multimedia Presentation?
• Microsoft Courts Yahoo with $44.6 Billion Deal
• Wi-Fi Comes to Boston Commuter Rail
