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The court elimination of Phizer’s Norvasc patent saved Ratiopharm about $170-million a year. Due to an editing error, the wrong figure appeared in The Price Is Wrong by Aidan Hollis in the Financial Post on Tuesday. Link
Thanks, Morgan!
A brief in World Report yesterday incorrectly depicted U.S. envoy to the Middle East George Mitchell with a photograph of Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel. The Post regrets the error. Link
Does that mean they confused the two men? Or that the photo somehow depicted Mitchell in a strange way?
A photo caption on a World page Monday mischaracterized the exchange between two people during a demonstration on Sunday in East Jerusalem. The masked Palestinian and Orthodox Israeli Jew, a member of Neturei Karta, a fringe anti-Zionist bloc, were in alliance, not opposition. Link
James Elliott Coyne, a former governor of the Bank of Canada, is still very much alive and well. Incorrect information appeared in a column on March 16. The National Post regrets the error. Link
Earlier this week, news started spreading via both mainstream media and on Twitter that Canadian singer-songwriter Gordon Lightfoot had died. Not true. And after the correct news started making its way around, people started pointing fingers.
First off, here are a couple of the mistaken stories, as presented in a good post by Montreal blogger Steve Faguy (click for larger):
In terms of laying blame, Mathew Ingram of GigaOm and Peter Kafka at AllThingsD argue that people should stop blaming Twitter because good old traditional media played a big role in this. Here’s Ingram’s take:
… Once it became known that Lightfoot had not in fact gone to his eternal reward, plenty of people spent the next several hours doing another thing that people love to do on Twitter: blame Twitter for spreading a fake news report. But as Peter Kafka correctly points out, Twitter didn’t kill Gordon Lightfoot — traditional media did. It appeared to start with a prank phone call (remember the telephone?) to the management company representing Lightfoot’s close friend and fellow musical legend Ronnie Hawkins, from someone pretending to be Lightfoot’s grandson.
Hawkins then started calling people to let them know, who in turn alerted Canwest News Service, which called Hawkins to confirm the news and then published a brief news item that got picked up by a number of the chain’s newspapers. That report was then spread by reporters on Twitter, including Canwest political reporter David Akin, who later wrote a blog post about the role he played in the story.
As Akin notes in his analysis of what happened, traditional news wires regularly report things that turn out to be wrong, including the deaths of famous people. Back in the PT days (pre-Twitter), only traditional journalists saw those reports, and while they occasionally made their way into print or onto a TV news show, for the most part newswires like the Associated Press and Reuters corrected them before they escaped into the real world …
Not that I want to pile on against evil big media but in fact there are many examples wherein AP or Reuters were the ones who falsely reported a death. One famous example came years ago when AP shunted Bob Hope into an early grave. In fact, death by media is so common that I dedicated a chapter to it in my book and also came up with a specific term to describe it: obiticide. You can read an excerpt from that chapter here. And go here to have a look at the many obiticides collected on this site. Update: Oh, and I forget to add a link to a CJR column I wrote about obiticide, which includes this quick list of death by media victims from 2008:
Just this past year, newspapers have killed off Frank McCourt, Billy Graham (twice!), Muhammad Ali, Pat Robertson and Victor Willis of Village People fame. (Okay, it’s a bit of a stretch to include the last one.)
A lot of not-so-famous people were also victims. Heck, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution even killed a funeral director …
So the next time you hear somebody talk about the Internet killing off celebrities, be sure to remind them that newspapers, wire services, magazines, and radio and TV have been doing it for a whole lot longer. And they’re still the champs.
A story that ran in the National Post yesterday incorrectly suggested that Ehud Telem was a broker in an alleged Ponzi scheme. Mr. Telem was not named or alleged to be a broker in the final report issued by the court-appointed receiver. The Post regrets the error. Link
No apology?
Canwest News Service described Helmut Oberlander as a “Nazi collaborator” in a story about a Nov. 18 court ruling that ordered the federal Cabinet to reconsider revoking his citizenship. Neither the Canadian government nor the Federal Court has stated that Oberlander was a collaborator. A judge ruled in 2000 that Oberlander worked, lived, and travelled as an interpreter for a Nazi mobile death squad and, although there was no evidence he participated in atrocities, he must have been aware of them. Further, the use of a file photograph of the Auschwitz concentration camp in the National Post to illustrate the story was inappropriate. The Post retracts the description of Oberlander in the story as a Nazi collaborator and apologizes for the use of the unrelated photo. Link
A Howard Levitt column in the Financial Post on Wednesday regarding Kelly McDougald, the former chief executive of the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp., said the Ontario government should be “suing her for fraud for her own expense account abuse.” However, no evidence has arisen of abuse in Ms. McDougald’s expense account and the Post withdraws the statement. Link
In last Saturday’s Post Homes, the cover story about Peter Freedand the Fashion House development incorrectly said his father hadp assed away. Mr. Freed Sr. is very much still with us. We apologize for the error. Link
Yes, there’s a typo in the correction.
This was published on the National Post’s NP Editors blog this evening:
Today, a Financial Post reporter responded unprofessionally to another Twitter user on his personal Twitter account.
While the remarks were made on the reporter’s personal Twitter account, the conversation first began when the reporter was acting in his capacity as a reporter for the Financial Post.
We hold — and will continue to hold — all our reporters to a higher standard in how they address anyone, in any forum.
We apologize for the reporter’s conduct. Link
The exchange in question is detailed here. It’s rare, but not unprecedented, to see a paper apologize for a reporter’s personal conduct. It’s also rare to see an incident and apology on the same day but, hey, that’s the power of the Internet.
Cathy Carretta was murdered but she was not among the women killed at Ecole Polytechnique on Dec. 6, 1989. Incorrect information appeared in a photo caption yesterday. The Post regrets the error. Link
A story on residential schools payments that appeared in yesterday’s National Post, and was provided by the Canwest News Service, incorrectly attributed quotes to Brenda Reynolds. All of the quotes attributed to Ms. Reynolds, regarding deaths in British Columbia and recipients’ reactions to the payments, were made by Sharon Thira of the Indian Residential Schools Survival Society. Ms. Reynolds, a psychologist who works with former residential school students, did not make any comments for this story. Canwest News Service regrets the error. Link
Thanks, Morgan!
The Putnam Prime Money Market Fund did not post a loss or “break the buck,” nor did its closure and distribution of all fund assets have any impact on retail investors as this fund is solely owned by institutional investors with a minimum initial investment of $10-million. Actions to unwind the fund by Putnam’s Board of Trustees was done to treat all fund shareholders equitably in the face of significant redemption pressures and was not related to the credit quality of the portfolio. Incorrect information appeared in yesterday’s edition of the Financial Post.
A story yesterday on the Toronto Maple Leafs roster this season incorrectly credited Moses — rather than God– with writing the 10 commandments. Link to both
Prime Minister Stephen Harper is suing the Liberal Party of Canada. Incorrect information appeared yesterday in the Financial Post. Link
Thanks, Morgan!
A quotation on Saturday from theologian John Stackhouse about the United Church of Canada should have read, “their Church is just slowly centrifugally swirling apart — there’s nothing centripetally to hold it together.” The quotation failed to distinguish between the opposing forces of nature. Link
A story Saturday on a Toronto page contained incorrect information. Link
This was one of two June 17 corrections issued by the paper. The other correction appears to have no relation to this entry because it refers to a story published on Monday, rather than Saturday. So is this really the full correction, or did someone forget to add a few pertinent details?
A photo caption accompanying a June 6 article entitled “B. C. Internet firm pays $9M to avoid U. S. gambling charges” incorrectly stated that Dan Parmar is the chief financial officer of ESI Entertainment Systems Inc. and that Mr. Parmar agreed to have ESI pay $9-million in profits in civil forfeiture to the U. S. government. Mr. Parmar resigned from ESI more than 18 months ago and is no longer associated with the company in any way and, accordingly, did not agree to any terms for payment of $9-million in profit nor did he make any admission or acknowledgement of any conduct in relation to ESI. The National Post apologizes to Mr. Parmar for any harm he may have suffered as a result of the publication of the photo caption. Link
With respect to a settlement offer they have made to Maclean’s, the Canadian Islamic Congress and Naiyer Habib of British Columbia say that they have not, at any time, asked the magazine’s editors to relinquish control of the treatment of a possible rebuttal to a Mark Steyn piece published in 2006 or insisted that the possible rebuttal be a cover-page feature. The complainants say they have consistently demanded a mutually acceptable response of adequate length to the Steyn article. A story on Thursday in the National Post and an editorial on Friday did not include this position.
Further, the complainants have a few potential mediators in mind who might help them and the magazine settle on the author of a possible rebuttal. The story on Thursday did not differentiate between the two roles. Link
Due to an editing error, a section of Richard Salsman’s commentary, The Fed’s Printing Press, on FP Comment last Friday contained a section that should not have been published. The section begins with the words “Losses are not being ’caused’ by illiquidity …” and ends with the words “… It’s only losers who require government help in order to look good.” The words within that section were from an August, 2007, commentary by Mr. Salsman and were repeated out of context. The Post apologizes for the error. Link
Reader Morgan sent along a shot from the website of Canada’s National Post that showcases two very different versions of the same story:
The (sadly true) tragic version:
The happier version:
Both were on the site at the same time.
James Wakeford was granted statutory permission to use medicinal marijuana by the federal government on June 9, 1999. A photograph of Mr. Wakeford was inappropriately used to illustrate a Jan. 14 column on compassion clubs, which until a Federal Court ruling in January provided marijuana to patients outside the law. Mr. Wakeford remains opposed to compassion clubs and the Post apologizes if any readers were left with the impression that he is a supporter. Link
There is no documented evidence to suggest dance poles sold at Condom Shack cannot bear the weight of a user. An unsubstantiated claim appeared in a Post Homes feature on Saturday. Link
A story in the Nov. 14 edition of the National Post said journalist Stevie Cameron had been identified as an RCMP informant. Ms. Cameron denies she was an RCMP informant. Link
Due to a production error, incorrect information appeared on the sports results page in some editions of yesterday’s paper.
The Post regrets the error. Link
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