The Era of Transparent Media Interviews

Up until now, the media interview has been a fairly closed process. Interviewer and interviewee connect via phone, face-to-face or email. There's no way we can get in on the conversation. Sure we'll all eventually read excerpts of these conversations once a journalist publishes his/her piece, but much of the best stuff is often left on the cutting room floor.

Fred Wilson and Mark Cuban are already changing the interviewing process, and with it, how news is produced. Read Fred's post today about being misquoted. Both these high-powered execs are choosing to air their gripes about being misquoted via blog. I can see a day coming soon where other senior execs will say, "Mr. Reporter, send me your interview questions and I will post my responses on my blog." This won't fly for everyone, but it will for those who have been burned and are powerful enough to exert such control.

Comments

[Amy Gahran]

Great piece, Steve. This got me thinking: When a reporter calls to interview a source, should both conversants assume that the conversation is mutually "on the record?" I think so, and just blogged about that on CONTENTIOUS (already up) and Poynter's E-Media Tidbits (should be up later today).

- Amy Gahran
Editor, CONTENTIOUS

[Stan DeVaughn]

Execs doing "interviews" on their blogs? And boring everyone into a stupor with a bunch of self-serving pap? Right. Hey, as a 30-year veteran of PR wars in Silicon Valley, I've seen more than my share of sloppy hastes-makes-waste editing and misrepresentations. I've been victimized, personally. But overall, the better journalists at the better outlets get it right more often than not. Self-absorbed, gas-bag interviewees who can't stand it when their bloviating is there for all to see should learn how to converse in plain English and consider exactly what they are trying to convey to which constituency. Jack Welch, Lee Iaoccoca and Lew Gerstner never had any problem with it. I can't imagine those dudes feeling the urge to blog...sd

[jason]

When I interviewed Jason Calacanis, Henry Copeland, and Tom Biro back in February, I posted complete, unedited transcripts of my interviews with them at the end of the blog entries...so any reader could click on the unedited text after reading my edited interviews to see what was left out.

http://networklandscape.com/index.php?p=14