Blog Retraction PCIJ-Style

Blogs are said to be superior than traditional media because bloggers can easily acknowledge their mistakes without burying them in the lower right hand corner of page 15, beside the obits.  After all, the retraction appears on the front page and lingers until enough posts are made to push it to the archives.  Still, this made me think about how best to make a retraction on one’s blog. 

Here’s what I came up with:

1. Make a new post with the retraction, quote the odious language, link to that post,  state the correct facts and say “I’m sorry.”  Copious amounts of regret and contrition are highly recommended.  Self-flagellation, too, but noone’s requiring it. 
2. Do not amend the original post except to add at the beginning a new parapraph (maybe in bold or italicized text) to the effect that certain portions of the following post are erroneous and we have acknowledged them in another post.  Make a link  to the retraction post.
3. If you like, you can rewrite the original post with the correct info and post it anew.  Create links to-and-from the original, retraction and corrected posts.

This way, you acknowledge the mistake, make the proper correction, express regret, explain your side and direct users away from the erroneous post.  Based on this standard, did the PCIJ Blog properly issue a retraction?

A few weeks ago, Alecks Pabico reported that UP Law Dean Salvador Carlota issued a gag order upon UP Law Center officials who were headed to the Senate to testify on the Northrail Project.  The story was, of course, completely untrue.  Since Alecks is a journalist, I suppose he took the trouble to confirm the story from another source.  If so, nakuryente siya.  The Dean promptly issued a denial which resulted in another post in the blog the after the original post.  (I understand that in the phone conversation between Alecks and the Dean, the latter reminded the former that they were both former Collegian Editors-in-Chief.) Then, PCIJ did something interesting.  Instead of issuing a retraction, they merely reformatted the original post inserting strikethroughs upon the erroneous entries. 

I call this the Quasi-Retraction.  By keeping the offending language (albeit reformatted), they’re not sweeping this whole thing under the rug.  If one reads the reformatted post for the first time, one is led to the conclusion that they did make a mistake that they’re trying to correct.  But by not issuing a formal retraction, they’re keeping us in the dark as to why it ever happened in the first place (or if they regret the electric shock).  The strikethroughs are therefore mute reminders of something that should not have been written — a symbolic retraction, nothing more.

Maybe I’m wrong and a retraction appears elsewhere. That retraction should be properly referred to.  It’s not. In fact, the original post and the post on the Dean’s denial aren’t even linked to each other.  In fact, I didn’t see the latter post until I did a Google search of the blog while preparing for this post. 

My sense is that the PCIJ Bloggers did not want to attract more attention than necessary to this issue.  After all, we all make mistakes.   I’ve had my share and some of yours too.  We don’t want it pointed out.  But PCIJ is a top blog simply because everyone expects them to have a level of integrity higher than traditional media.   While they have done enough for an intelligent person to realize they made a mistake, maybe they should have done more.

Having blogged about this now, I’ll hold myself to the same standard.  I know I’ll make a mistake some time.  You can count on it and if I don’t follow my own advice, crucify me.  I’ll expect no less from you.