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, have a look at the comments here. The AFP advisory:
WASHINGTON (AFP) - On January 27, AFP ran a five-part series on the impact of the US mortgage crisis on the city of Cleveland, including a description of one of the most devastated areas, the southeastern neighborhood of Mount Pleasant. Unfortunately the area was mis-identified as Shaker Heights, a prosperous suburb of Cleveland.
Once the error was discovered, the story was immediately killed on all AFP wires and a new dispatch filed with the correct name of Mount Pleasant. AFP regrets the error and the distress that it has caused to the officials and people of Shaker Heights. Information about Shaker Heights can be found at www.shakeronline.com. Link
Thanks, Brian and Dianne!
3 Comments
I saw that over the weeked; nice feature piece. I don’t know Illinois well enough to have realized that it was unlikely that happened to Shaker Heights, though.
And in fact, it seems to me that anyone who knows the area well enough to be affected by the mistake knows it well enough not to *believe* the mistake, either… but maybe it’s just me.
So many things are just me.[tm]
A relatively TONY suburb?!?
Yup, tony.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tony