Katefan0 wrote:
News organizations make it a point not to repeat the original error that was made; we take pains to state the corrected information only in a correction.
Well, simply asserting that's the case doesn't make it so. Here's a representative quote of a recent correction from _The Economist_; their corrections all take basically this form:
"Correction: In 'Open, but not as usual' (March 18th), we said non-registered users could not modify most Wikipedia entries; they can, save for some controversial ones. Also, a chart of Wikipedia's articles and contributors incorrectly showed a downturn in December 2005, because we used incomplete data. We apologise."
Lest you object that isn't potentially libelous, here's an apology for an error that is (from a few months ago):
"In our article last week on the Volcker report on the UN oil-for-food scandal ('Naming names') we mistakenly identified a company cited in the report as being the Taurus Group of New Zealand. In fact, the Taurus Group listed in the report is 'an oil trading consortium based in Europe and the Caribbean'. The Taurus Group in New Zealand and its subsidiaries have had nothing to do with Iraq. Our apologies to all concerned."
In fact I can't recall ever having seen a correction that *didn't* restate (at least in paraphrase) the incorrect statement being corrected, since otherwise the apology would be out of context and make no sense.
-Mark