In a follow up to the new HP iMac, another wave of fresh curiosity has hit the Internet this afternoon. Namely, people are wondering what the situation is with the journalistic integrity of typically solid and reliable sources of news and information.
It’s obvious, so very obvious, that this new HP desktop has a very definitive heritage. For better or worse, it’s very clear where HP got their ideas from, and as such this is something that would most certainly be commentworthy in a review.
However major sources like engadget and theverge haven’t commented on this. In fact, the reviewer of the engadget review got rather snappy at users on twitter once she was called on it.
@hollandjim Says the nobody with 80 followers.
— Dana Wollman (@DanaWollman) September 10, 2012
That aside, a journalist I hold in quite high regard wrote about the issue on his personal blog.
To be as succinct as possible, recently both Gruber and Marco have accused (yes Marco, you made an accusation about us, no matter how dumb you play it in your Tweets) The Verge of covering products which resemble or outright boost the industrial design of an Apple product then purposefully withholding mention of this fact for some kind of gain. To be crystal clear, they are suggesting that we are covering products which look like an Apple product, but avoid mentioning that they look like an Apple product on purpose. They’re suggesting we have ulterior and possibly nefarious motives.
He goes on to say that him and his colleagues don’t feel the need to point out when someone rips off Apple all the time because, quite simply, it happens all the time. He linked to several articles where he & his colleagues did point out the obvious design rip off artistry that went on. The blog post is good and succinct but misses the point. When Apple released iOS5 and it contained a notification center, I’m sure everyone under the sun mentioned how it ripped off Android. Then they dropped the point. The point is that when a new item comes out it should be called on its rubbish design ethics. For example, a new HP desktop should be called out for very obviously “borrowing” designs. It doesn’t need to be its own point, or even the main point in the article – but journalism calls for this to be at least pointed out once.
Then one commenter made the ultimate comment…
Maybe people with minimalist blogs aren’t aware of the deep and precise and standardized technical differences between a “Hands-on” and a “Review”, but writing six full paragraphs without mentioning the obvious first thought does seem weird, no matter what category your CMS thinks it’s in. And while you’re right that Marco’s suggestion was more insulting than it should have been (and than he apparently realized it was), Gruber’s suggestion, that you’re seeking a false balance to avoid angering some of your fundamentalist readers, does at first thought seem like a reasonable guess.
This hits the nail on the head. Softening your posts isn’t necessarily an accusation of catering directly to companies, or just to avoid fighting with commenters and forum users, but an accusation of sites like theverge and engadget missing what is obvious to everyone else but somehow not the journalist. Review, preview or quick flash news update, the obvious should always be stated by a credible journalist. It’s like someone not pointing out to Mitt Romney that he’s not given details of his tax returns. It’s obvious, everyone’s talking about it and it’s almost the first thing that comes to mind when you see a post about it.
