What's The Hashtag?
Did Neil P. Munro of The Daily Caller, the conservative blog, challenge my integrity as a journalist because he does not use Twitter and understand how it works? Perhaps that's what happened here. Can't think of any other reason -- except to take a cheap shot, as the Washington Post reported. As the social media reporter at The New York Times, I use hashtags to set up streams on Tweetdeck to follow the conversation on important news events. After President Obama asked people to use Twitter to contact lawmakers about the debt ceiling on Friday, I needed to find out what hashtag to follow. I first asked my followers on Twitter if they knew. Then, on Twitter, I asked two White House aides if they could tell me. I assumed reporters in the White House pressroom were already informed. For me, Twitter is my pressroom. So, here's my three tweets. As you can see, I did not suggest or advise the White House as The Daily Caller claimed. One of the WH aides responded within minutes to my question. You will also see that I did not suggest #compromise as the hashtag, as some have suggested. I was simply doing my job as a reporter, asking a followup question after the POTUS speech. What's worse, is that his misleading story was picked up by Yahoo News, Drudge, Andrew Malcolm at the LA Times, FoxNews and others. Mr. Munro's uninformed knowledge of Twitter not only questioned my integrity but unleashed a torrent of ugly attacks from right-wing and conservative Twitter users (including socks and operatives) who accused me of all sorts of things. I have been a journalist for 30 years. Taking abuse comes with the job. But, as a journalist, I am disappointed Yahoo News picked it up without even looking at my two tweets. And that Andrew Malcolm of the LA Times picked up the story without picking up the phone or apparently looking at the tweets in question. Reporters make mistakes all the time. I know that I do. Just last week. But we correct them. I didn't know Erik Wemple from the Washington Post before Friday. I was lucky that a real reporter was watching and got the story right. Here's a link http://wapo.st/mZHoPR -- So, here's my first tweet from Friday morning, shortly after President Obama spoke, and then my tweets to WH aides. @macon44 works as the WH New Media Director. @jesseclee44 works in the press office.
- As you can see, within minutes @macon44, who is the new media director for the White House, responded with the hashtag, "compromise."
At the time, I was away from my computer because I had visitors at the Times so I didn't see his response or retweet until almost two hours later, at 1 p.m. I retweeted exactly what he said.
What I did not realize -- because I was not on Twitter -- is that The Daily Caller had posted its misleading inaccurate story shortly after noon. New York Times reporter advises White House media staff on Twitter | 'People responding to POTUS shld use #compromise'
Here's the Tweet they posted, with the link to their story:
Then their smear challenging my integrity ended up on Drudge. And Yahoo News.
I didn't know this misleading headline and story was rocketing around the Web because after my visitors left The Times, I met Maurice Carroll for a long-planned lunch outside the building. He's an old friend who covered politics for decades at The New York Times, NY Herald Tribune and New York Newsday. He runs the Quinnipiac Poll now. When I came back to the office, I was shocked to see the ridiculous story in the Daily Caller and that it was being retweeted hundreds of times.
I had two phone messages when I returned. One from Neil Munro of the Daily Caller. He had already published his story without talking to me (or apparently reading the tweets.) And a call from Erik Wemple of the Washington Post. I called them both back. I spoke with Mr. Wemple and explained that I was just trying to find out the hashtag to set up a stream. I got Mr. Munro's voicemail. A few minutes later, his immediate editor, Dave (I can't remember last name) who sounded very nice on the phone, apologetic even, told me that he would correct the Daily Caller story. He acknowledged his reporter was not familiar with Twitter and that might have been the problem here. I also alerted Andrew Malcolm of the LA Times on Twitter and via email that he got it wrong. Meanwhile, the damage was done. Drudge and Yahoo News had picked up the Daily Caller story with the misleading headline that NYT Reporter Advises White House and the attacks on Twitter from conservatives began.
Fortunately, others knew enough about Twitter to see that The Daily Caller got it wrong. And Erik Wemple's story from The Washington Post went up.
Oh, and I spoke to Tucker Carlson on Friday night. He called me from the Denver airport after I sent him an email, saying that the "update" of the flawed story continued to report that I suggested a hashtag to the White House. He said he was going to look into it. Haven't heard back from him yet.
The attacks continued through the weekend. But I also received an overwhelming amount of support from many, many people, including people I have never online or offline, including conservatives and people who could care less about politics.
