tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6321434432312648287.post-7927609195275791712008-02-15T09:55:00.000-08:002008-02-15T09:57:11.453-08:002008-02-15T09:57:11.453-08:00<a href="http://blog.lib.umn.edu/schwitz/healthnews/110550.html">The Schwitzer health news blog</a> has an interesting post today regarding the value of on-line discussions as they related to responses to news articles. A couple weeks back, the New York Times published a somewhat controversial column about lack of answers in the treatment of prostate cancer. In 10 days there were over 100 responses to the column, but neither the author nor any representative of the NY Times responded to answer any questions or respond to any concerns. Gary Schwitzer questions the journalistic integrity of such a situation. If a news source throws something out there that elicits response, what responsibility does the news source have to respond?<br /><br />Being a publisher myself, I have had many conversations with my staff about how and when to respond to “Letters to the Editor”. We do not receive an overwhelming volume of them, as we publish smaller circulation specialty publications, but our policy has always been that if we receive reader feedback that makes a reasonably valid point, we run it.<br /><br />That said, on-line media in many, many ways is a different animal than print media. Volume, access and speed have changed the game. The rules are a bit different and remain still largely undefined. I’d like to think certain journalistic obligations are unchanged, but I’m not sure they are. I have no answer to this, but I thank Gary Schwitzer for raising the issue.Physician Recruiterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01602676691698541457noreply@blogger.com1