Regret the Error

Lessons in geography etc.

A story in Sunday's A section about a couple planning to sail 1,000 days without a stop incorrectly said the waters around Cape Horn would lead them from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean. Those waters connect the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Also, the area around Cape Horn is infamous for "waves as high as 100 feet, as well as icebergs," and not the Indian Ocean. Link

"No students jumped out of a second-story window"

Apr. 24--Due to a reporter's error, an article on Page A1 of Monday's edition incorrectly portrayed a tradition at St. Patrick School as unsafe. No students jumped out of a second-story window. Barbara Yarbrough's favorite memories included the St. Patrick program, May Crowning and the prayers, dedication and love of children and parents.

All Governors look alike

The caption accompanying the April 19 Photo From the Attic ("Sunny Strategy Session") mistakenly identified former Oklahoma Gov. Henry Bellmon as former Ohio Gov. James Rhodes.

CBC.ca apologizes for photo manipulation

The excellent Inside the CBC blog has the background (also see here) and apology after the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation published a manipulated photo on its website. The apology from CBC.ca chief Sue Gardner:

We made a mistake.

The photo shows smoke billowing from stacks at the old Lakeview coal-fired generating plant in Mississauga, once said to be the world’s largest. The Ontario government called it a heavy polluter when it was shut down a couple of years ago not only because of the quantities of greenhouse gases it produced – difficult to photograph – but because of the noxious fumes and particulates that contributed to the murk obscuring downtown Toronto seen in the photo.

The stacks were demolished a few months ago but it remains a powerful image of the kind of emissions the Kyoto Accord wants to limit and that is why we used it in the April 19 story on John Baird’s concerns about the “risks” of meeting Kyoto.

It was the right photo, but not the right version.

CBC.ca uses images in number of ways: It is our policy not to alter those accompanying news stories and depicting actual events or people. Those used as graphics in promos or to illustrate feature stories, columns or the like may be changed in minor ways – slightly heightened contrast, different colour filter, slight cropping – to enhance their visual impact and appeal.

In this case, the original image was treated with a “warming filter,” which gave it the sepia tone, and cropped slightly to use as a graphic image. Fair enough, except it was – mistakenly – dropped in a file accessible for use with news stories and subsequently posted with the Baird story.

It was an inadvertent error, but I should also point out that the “dramatically different” versions the blogger found are, in fact, exactly the same photograph both showing exactly the same thing – emissions from an acknowledged heavy polluter. There was no “misrepresentation” and no attempt to mislead.

So what did it show?

A picture from The Illustrated London News did not show Queen Victoria on a visit to Australia in 1886 as captioned. Queen Victoria did not visit Australia; in fact she never toured her empire (page 40, Weekend, April 20). Link

Quote, unquote

An article on Sunday about a military report that found that senior Marine Corps commanders had contributed to a “willful” failure to investigate the killing of 24 unarmed Iraqis by marines in the town of Haditha in 2005 misstated a word in a quotation from Brian J. Rooney, a lawyer for an officer punished in the Haditha matter. Mr. Rooney said his client, Lt. Col. Jeffrey R. Chessani, had promptly reported what he knew about the killings and “I don’t know how that’s untimely, inaccurate and incomplete.” He did not say “untimely, accurate and incomplete.” Link

A television review last Tuesday of the documentary “Gangs of Iraq” on PBS omitted a word in a quotation from a motivational speaker shown addressing Iraqi police trainees. He said, “‘I am not here to impose my American will upon you” — not “I am here.” A listing of credits with the review carried outdated information from PBS about the program’s producer and erroneously credited another executive. The producer is Marcela Gaviria — not Martin Smith, who was correctly identified in the article as the PBS correspondent. Sherry Jones is a senior producer — not an executive producer, the position held by David Fanning. Link

Drink up!

Saturday's letter ``Ethanol Panic Unnecessary'' incorrectly stated that ``ethanol is basically wood alcohol.'' Wood alcohol, also known as methanol or methyl alcohol, is highly toxic when consumed. Link

Mystery source

In an April 14 story about a debris-filled home, The Associated Press attributed facts to Erik Kinney, a firefighter who now says he never spoke to a reporter. It is unclear who at the fire station provided the information and identified himself as Kinney. Fire chief David DeSetta verified the facts of the article. Link

Plagiarism at the Daily Pennsylvanian

IvyGate has the details on an incident of plagiarism at the Daily Pennsylvanian, a student newspaper. It also previously reported on an incident at the Yale Daily News. From IvyGate:

The DP fired columnist Jamie France '10 this weekend after her column on caffeine Friday bore uncanny similarities to a Yahoo! Food piece from March. The former ticks off facts on Diet Coke, Water Joe, Red Bull, Tab Energy, Enviga, Rocket Chocolates, Starbucks and Spike Shooter; the latter ticks off facts on Diet Coke, Water Joe, Red Bull, Tab Energy, Enviga, Rocket Chocolates, Starbucks and Spike Shooter. Five health benefits are duplicated, too. And all those things are given in the exact same order, the odds of which occurring naturally are one in (math nerds, speak up) 6,227,020,800.
...less than 24 hours later, France was canned. "While we still believe that she did complete other research to get her information, the similarities in writing style and structure are too noticeable to ignore," Tillman emailed us. "The DP does not tolerate plagiarism in any form, and we're currently discussing implementing more in-depth workshops on these issues for staff in the future."

All, ahem, athletes look alike

A photograph in the April 20 Sports section purporting to show Louisiana State University quarterback JaMarcus Russell instead showed teammate Craig Davis. Link