Everybody and their mother may have blogs now, but it’s still hard to integrate the blog vibe with a professional newspaper. Many major newspapers–such as The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle–boast multiple blogs. Besides this blog, we have the Clog, and it’s not even a year old. We’ve struggled to fit in this step-child of journalism and often irreverent whining, to make it a part of the paper, to box it into some sort of ethical code.

Hence The Daily Clog’s correction policy, which stipulates all incorrect facts must be corrected in a timely manner. Corrections usually involve strikethroughs, notes at the end of a post or a parenthetical citation. It is also policy to leave evidence of the previously incorrect statement to preserve transparency and honesty. Our most recent correction, however, did not leave in the original text–this was partly due to miscommunication between blogger and editor. Normally, the error would still be visible in the post.

Two years ago, The New York Times published an op-ed calling blogs to an ethical change. Blogs are quickly becoming a part of journalism–accepted or not–and they need to be held to ethical standards if they do want to be respected and, yes, accepted. Adam Cohen explains:

Bloggers may need to institutionalize ethics policies to avoid charges of hypocrisy. But the real reason for an ethical upgrade is that it is the right way to do journalism, online or offline. As blogs grow in readers and influence, bloggers should realize that if they want to reform the American media, that is going to have to include reforming themselves.

So bloggers, fight the man by playing by his rules. Get some ethics. Get some nice, institutionalized policy.

Correction Policy [Daily Clog]

The Latest Rumbling in the Blogosphere: Questions About Ethics [The NY Times]

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