On Feb. 2, 2008, the Boston Herald reported that a member of the New England Patriots’ video staff taped the St. Louis Rams’ walkthrough on the day before Super Bowl XXXVI. While the Boston Herald based its Feb. 2, 2008, report on sources that it believed to be credible, we now know that this report [...]
ON April 23 we reported that the fiancée of Gregg “Opie” Hughes, one half of the Opie and Anthony radio show, was involved in an X-rated sex video with MTV star Bam Margera. We reported that Hughes was taking legal action against a disgruntled ex-employee of the radio duo who had acquired the rights to [...]
April 18, 2008 – 12:48 pm
Gawker spotted this incredible error/correction in the Columbia Spectator, a student newspaper:
The paper subsequently retracted the piece. This text has replaced the article on the Spectator’s website:
Because this piece was based on unreliable sources we have decided to retract the article and remove it from the Web site. We appreciate all the letters we have [...]
This morning the Los Angeles Times issued a formal retraction for its March story about an assault on rapper Tupac Shakur. It had previously apologized for the article. (Regret post here.)
The apology did contain elements of a retraction, but it’s not a bad thing to see the paper follow up and drive home the point [...]
Ottawa Citizen columnist David Warren has had to backtrack on claims made in a couple of recent columns. From February 20:
A retraction. In my Sunday column, I wrote in passing about the kind of Shariah practised in Iran, “where a little boy caught stealing gets an arm amputated under the wheel of a truck.” [...]
February 18, 2008 – 8:00 am
In the Feb. 13 “Human Nature,” William Saletan said that research in mice indicated that the embryoblast-trophoblast distinction began at the two-cell stage. As evidence, the article linked to a 2006 paper in Science. That paper has since been retracted due to “falsified or fabricated images” by one co-author. However, according to subsequent communication with [...]
February 1, 2008 – 8:52 am
Agence France Press mistakenly declared that Shaker Heights, a relatively tony suburb of Cleveland, was being hit hard by the mortgage crisis. It had meant to refer to Mount Pleasant. After noticing its error, AFP killed and replaced the story. But if you want to see the kind of reaction generated by the original piece, [...]
January 2, 2008 – 8:00 am
From the AP:
Arkansas star Darren McFadden said Saturday he fully expects to play in the Cotton Bowl after a television report raised questions about his eligibility. Arkansas television station KARK has since backed off the report, apologizing to McFadden and his family.
“It’s something that’s uncalled for — people not getting their facts straight,” said [...]
December 4, 2007 – 8:00 am
From Roy Greenaslade of the Guardian:
Last Tuesday I carried a report headlined 11 relatives of Iraqi journalist killed. It now transpires that the story, widely carried in the United States, was false. Dhia al-Kawaz, editor of the Jordan-based Asawat al-Iraq news agency, has since admitted that his claim that gunmen had killed 11 of his [...]
December 4, 2007 – 8:00 am
From Slapshot, the New York Times’ new hockey blog (post):
The Toronto radio reporter who caused a stir by claiming that Rangers forward Sean Avery had made derogatory comments about Maple Leafs forward Jason Blake’s recent cancer diagnosis before a game last month, retracted his report in a broadcast Monday.
Howard Berger, a reporter for FAN 590, [...]
December 3, 2007 – 9:28 pm
After four-and-a-half months of re-reporting, long bouts of silence, and tangling with the US Army and various publications and bloggers, The New Republic today published a lengthy article by editor Franklin Foer that attempts to offer the magazine’s final word on the veracity of columns written by Scott Thomas Beauchamp, its Baghdad Diarist.
We’ll skip to [...]
November 20, 2007 – 8:00 am
Last week the Associated Press ran with a story about Paris Hilton raising awareness about the plight of drunken elephants. Though many, including the AP, are willing to believe anything when it comes to Paris Hilton, this particular tale was completely false. (Our previous post with the original story and correction is here.)
AP had picked [...]
November 15, 2007 – 8:00 am
In a Nov. 13 story, The Associated Press incorrectly reported that Paris Hilton was praised by conservationists for highlighting the problem of binge-drinking elephants in northeastern India. Lori Berk, a publicist for Hilton, said she never made any comments about helping drunken elephants in India. Link
From the original article:
GAUHATI, India (AP) — With Rwanda off [...]
January 25, 2007 – 8:00 am
WENN ran a story in it’s fourth feed on 19 January 2007 headlined “MATHEW KNOWLES FUMES AT HOLLYWOOD ‘RACISM’”. We are advised by Mr Knowles’ lawyers that comments attributed to Mr Knowles in the story were in fact not made by him and we’d like to take this opportunity to apologise unreservedly to Mr Knowles [...]
An item in Tuesday’s People column on Page 4A contained incorrect information obtained from WENN Celebrity News on IMDB.com that Oprah Winfrey would be taking part in a documentary series in which she would live in a tough Chicago neighborhood for a month. Winfrey will not appear in any such series, and WENN has retracted [...]
