PODCAST: ON THE DL
PODCAST: ON THE DL
Sometimes news dictates our guests, and sometimes blogs and podcasts make their own news. So this is one of those shows...reacting to that ‘news.’
Bethlehem Shoals joins the show first to give his take on this long-going (for the internet at least) debate about MLB and NBA that somehow morphed into people thinking it’s me vs. Simmons and some of the basketball Twitterati and Free Darko readers thinking that I’m an idiot.
For full disclosure, I did not ask Shoals to come on the show to defend me. He asked to come on to give his thoughts on the situation, which makes sense considering all the people involved work with him in one place or another.
Next, Drew Magary joins the show to talk about the post at Deadspin where he outed ASU baseball coach Pat Murphy as a ‘red-headed stepchild’ beating jerk. Or something. It turned out that the story was, in part, fabricated. Drew and AJ Daulerio decided to run the story and deal with the aftermath were it not true, and that’s exactly what happened.
Drew runs us through the story, and explains that after the post was pulled the emailer in question claimed that he lied about lying (and that the exchange with Murphy actually DID happen) but he just needed Drew to take the post down and the only way Deadspin would do it is if the post turned out to be untrue.
This whole thing is very confusing, and Drew does a good job of explaining the situation and his role therein. We talk about the difference between being a humor writer on a site like Deadspin and being a real-live journalist -- even with something as innocuous as a fan telling a story about a coach. Information needs to be vetted (personal note that I mention on the show, I vehemently disagree with Gawker’s policy of ‘post first, verify information later’) and Drew has vowed to never saunter over to the journalism side of things again. We later discuss why Drew didn’t out the original emailer after he lied, and discuss the ethical dilemma of outing a person while protecting the identity of the snitch, especially in a situation where the snitch ends up being as shady as this guy.
It is a slippery slope at Deadspin, and it’s become more and more difficult to determine what’s humor, what’s news and what’s made up news to be humorous. Gawker is reportedly worth 300-million dollars, so the company must be doing something right. I’m just now sure if what they’re doing is ‘right’.
Drew and I also touch briefly on Deadspin’s coverage of Simmons and talk about the Favrelous start (yep, went there) to the Vikings’ season.
Friday, November 13, 2009
On the DL 280 - Bethlehem Shoals. Drew Magary.