By: Lucia Moses Alternative Press Discusses Rumormongering
Watch what you read on the Net - it might not be, well, true. As
the Web takes news delivery into warp speed, the debate over when and
what to publish rages on.
Journalist Joe Conason, speaking at a recent gathering of alternative
newspaper people, warned that the practice of rumormongering on the Net
could lead to a backlash in the form of government controls. 'It's a
license to print things that are a lie, and it's not the healthiest
thing for journalism. It's just going to hurt the Internet,' Conason,
who writes for The New York Observer and Salon.com, said in a
stab at fellow speaker Lucianne Goldberg, the book-agent-turned-
cybergossip.
Predictably, Goldberg countered that the Net is no place for limits:
'It's the wild West, and there are no rules.'
Mickey Kaus, a contributing editor at The New Republic magazine,
took the middle ground, arguing for a looser standard for reporting on
the Web where mistakes can be corrected quickly. 'Do you have to loosen
the rules of libel because of the Internet? I think so,' he said.
Conason also urged alternative papers to scrutinize the mainstream press
the same way they've delved into the lives of public figures. 'They're
not going to do it themselves,' he said. 'The alternative press is in a
position of watchdogging the press.'
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