QUOTE(A Horse With No Name @ Wed 3rd March 2010, 4:14pm)
QUOTE(John Limey @ Wed 3rd March 2010, 11:11am)
BLP disasters and fake DYKs are as old as Wikipedia, but this one was particularly bad. I think, in retrospect, that we might have done better at attracting media attention if we had found some reporter and tipped him off before we announced the hoax on the blog, thus allowing the reporter to have the exclusive scoop.
Seigenthaler was worse because it was a
real person. A phony BLP that wins a worthless award is not news, sorry.
To be sure, Seigenthaler was much more significant in that he was real. However, quantity of news coverage generated is not at all proportional to the severity of the BLP incident. The Akcam incident was FAR worse than what happened to Seigenthaler but didn't make it into nearly as many papers. Why? Well perhaps because Seigenthaler was first, but I think it's more likely that it's because Seigenthaler is extremely well-connected in media circles.
This post has been edited by John Limey: