On 9/21/06, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
In avoiding original research we create a composite. With thousands of eyes watching the development of a topic from different angles we are in a better position to represent multiple sources. A for-profit media outlet can't possibly afford to take into account whether its sources are independent of each other. In the interest of getting the information out quickly, or at least more quickly than its competitors it needs to go with what it considers reliable sources,. like the wireservices. Once the story is public it can't unprint the newspapers. The opportunities for broadcast media are a little better. We (especially in Wikinews) are in a position where we can more easily adapt our report based on evolving information. Not only that, but our article histories are able to chronicle how the story developed. Background information can be tracked down almost on demand.
And frankly we can often tap our community of experts and quasi-experts in ways that journalists and editors of traditional media seem to often not do. About 80% of the mainstream media could not understand or convey the difference between a "heavy water production plant" and a "heavy water reactor" when Iran announced the completion of the former (but was reported over and over again as the latter by many different news organizations, even sometimes in contradictory ways; they are, to say the least, not the same thing at all). That sort of things gets noticed in about two seconds on Wikipedia and Wikinews, though. There are just more eyes looking at things which can have input into them. It doesn't catch everything by a long-shot but in many cases I trust the community of Wikipedians more than I trust one journalist and his/her editor(s) to ferret out nuanced details (or even not-so-nuanced details) where there is a high opportunity to make a sensationalistic point by blurring them.
FF