The Australian caught out by Defamer joke
by Duncan
December 8, 2005
Australia’s only national newspaper, the News Corp owned The Australian has been caught out reporting as fact a joke by the Gawker Media owned Defamer that reported that Mel Gibson was set to direct a mini-series on the Holocaust for the American ABC TV network with “the visionary Gibson’€™s breathtaking pitch for the miniseries’€™ climactic scene, a Braveheart-style battle with thousands of Jewish and Nazi combatants rushing at each other across an open field.” I remember reading the hard copy of the Oz yesterday and thinking that I don’t recall anything like this in my readings of WW2. Heads to roll at the Oz perhaps?
How embarrasing is that! A major national broadsheet getting caught out like that – something that 10 minutes (if at all) of research would have sorted it out.
Me thinks The Aust should hire some bloggers … I’m sure Duncan and I would accept a high-paying consultancy in this regard ;-) to research their stories or at least vet them … heck, better yet get some bloggers to actually write some stories – might bring some spark back into traditional journalism.