NYT uses anonymous source to expose anonymous blogger but gets it wrong

This evening, the New York Times published a post claiming that the anonymous blogger behind the NYTPicker blog was actually David Blum, former editor of the Village Voice and several other New York publications. The times credited the information to an anonymous source, according to coverage at Nieman Journalism Lab.

Then, less than an hour later, the Times removed the blog post. A short while after that, the Times published a second post reporting that Blum denied being the NYTPicker blogger.

(Nieman has the text of the original, removed post at the link above.)

The funny thing is that, in attempting to unveil the person who regularly critiques the Times and its various blunders, the newspaper has done something that many have criticized them for in the past — relying on an anonymous source. Oh, and the paper pulled a blog post rather than issuing a correction, which is just poor form altogether.

I eagerly await the NYTPicker's inevitable write-up of the situation.

In the meantime, I suppose we can take a lesson from this. Don't try to remove something from the Web. Even if the material has only been on the Web a few minutes, it's probably enough to ensure that the information is far beyond your ability to call it back and kill it.

Besides, it's not ethical to make journalism disappear. Owe up to your errors, correct them and move on.

Photo by wallyg

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2. Lawmaker moves against the anonymous Internet
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4. “Fail” gets the NYT treatment
5. Reporter at NY Post admits that company policy says not to credit bloggers