Full disclosure
: I wonder whether it might have been wise for the NY Times to open up its Self-Flagellation Theater yesterday to outside media. In a typically Timesean convolution, the Times even kept its own media reporter out of the room so that he had to scrape up quotes like all the other reporters.
There was plenty of coverage with plenty of quotes anyway (what do you expect from a room filled with reporters?). Just look at Romenesko; it’s all-Blair-all-the-time; it is the media-column equivalent of war in Iraq.
Allowing outside media in would have simply been good PR. It would have said, “We have nothing to hide. This is just the behavior we expect from government and others we cover: full disclosure.” If they haven’t hired a PR expert specializing in crisis stories, they should. As newsmen, they probably figure they know what to do when they become the news story. But I’ve always found that reporters give lousy interviews. Editors make rotten flacks.
