It's been a bad week for CBS News. Now, former NASW President Deborah Blum takes issue with a post about cattle poisoned by genetically-modified Bermuda grass: "The problem was that the story was only partly right," Blum writes on the Knight Science Journalism Tracker. "The grass, called Tifton 85, was producing cyanide (more about that later). But it was not genetically-modified grass." CBS later posted a correction attributing the gaffe to a local Texas TV affiliate.
Issues in science writing
Linda Furlini takes aim at a credulous CBS report on a new Alzheimer’s disease test. In a guest post on Gary Schwitzer's HealthNewsReview.org site, Furlini accuses CBS of overselling the test, thereby abetting the drug industry: "Alzheimer’s disease is complex, but it is in the pharmaceutical industry’s interest to oversimplify it. Clearly, the test reported on by CBS demonstrates medical progress. But, it should have seriously questioned the value of the test."
No sooner had the New Yorker science writer's career crashed than the questions began. If you recycle parts of a story you've written, exactly what is your action called? Some call it self-plagiarism. On Ars Technica, Jonathan M. Gitlin says it depends: "Can you really plagiarize yourself? Is it plagiarism to get paid to give talks that rehash work you've written?" More from Andrew Beaujon and Craig Silverman at Poynter.
Remember that story last week on a “magic bullet” breast cancer treatment? HealthNewsReview.org reviewer Harold DeMonaco would like you to forget it. Or at least report it accurately: “The drug worked in less than half the patients treated in prolonging the disease-free interval and was not without significant side effects. That’s better than anything available at the moment. But it is remains to be seen if it is a 'magic bullet, smart bomb or miracle drug.'”
Daniel Engber at Slate examines reports on a "five-second rule" study and decides British writers did a poor but forthright job: "Yes, they described fake studies conducted by disreputable scientists, and they used the data [to] promote a product. But they were honest about it. Almost every story announced its lack of quality without shame or serious effort at deception." He's less charitable toward U.S. media on the story. Deborah Blum comments.
Adam Ruben is a practicing scientist with a bone to pick over science writing in the popular press. He lets it rip on AAAS's Science Careers site: "Mainstream science articles have become formulaic. And it’s never more obvious than, say, when you read an article about a bold new advance that promises to cure something or fix something or spell certain doom — and then you realize you’re reading an article that’s 20 years old and none of those things happened."
It was mostly a good thing when the American Society of Clinical Oncology changed its embargo rules for annual meeting abstracts in 2008. The old "embargoed but freely available" system resulted in widespread leaks. The new one makes everything available at once. But, Brian Reid writes on Embargo Watch, abruptly releasing such a large amount of information has created a new problem: Overload. "The huge number of options creates a disincentive to paw through the data."
Where's the line between fiction and non-fiction? It's been blurred by Mike Daisey’s Apple story on This American Life, John D’Agata’s book "The Lifespan of a Fact," and a Washington Post review of humorist David Sedaris’ essays. On Nieman Storyboard, Paige Williams reviews the rules and the recent move toward greater transparency in the reporting: "Now that trust is fluid, it must be guarded and earned and re-earned, even if you are a god," Williams writes.
From the Association of Health Care Journalists comes news of victory in a fight that should never have begun. "Can you imagine holding public meetings open to everyone – except reporters who want to cover them?" Pia Christensen writes. "That’s exactly what the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services did last year. But, after complaints from the Association of Health Care Journalists, HHS has agreed to make it a policy that public meetings are open to the media."
Post-shibboleths and spambots, catch up on blog posts, Storify pages, and slidecasts of the conference, which was supported in part by an NASW Idea Grant. The Open Notebook has a post linking to early coverage, and the conference site has coverage by University of Wisconsin students. Check the #sciencedenial and #denialconf hashtags, and read about the spam attacks.