Mediagazer: Fabulous journalism — Blaine Harden's astonishing account … (Felix Salmon)

12:40 PM ET, March 18, 2012

Top News:

Fabulous journalism — Blaine Harden's astonishing account of the life of Shin In Geun — a man born into a North Korean prison camp, who has lived pretty much the worst life imaginable — has received significantly less attention than the fact that This American Life has retracted its story …

Discussion: Quote and Comment, The New Yorker Blog, Poynter, Guardian, Forbes, BuzzFeed, The Wrap, Mashable!, TUAW, Engadget and Daring Fireball

Jack Shafer:

Busting Mr. Daisey — This week, the highly regarded public radio show This American Life learned a lesson that many journalists, including me, have learned the hard way: It's almost impossible for an editor to fact-check a contributor who lies. — The show, hosted by Ira Glass …

Discussion: Poynter, AllThingsD, BuzzMachine, Change of Subject, Grist, Boing Boing, CJR, Gothamist, Show Tracker and The Next Web

This American Life:

Retracting “Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory” — Ira writes: — I have difficult news. We've learned that Mike Daisey's story about Apple in China - which we broadcast in January - contained significant fabrications. We're retracting the story because we can't vouch for its truth.

Discussion: The New Yorker Blog, BetaNews, Fresser, Chicago Business, TechCrunch, Erik Wemple, This American Life, Telegraph, Mike Daisey, Media Decoder, Slate, Business Insider, Change of Subject, Hot Topics, AllThingsD, TPM IdeaLab, Guardian, Hillicon Valley, WebProNews, TVNewser, PC Magazine, @jeffjarvis, @acarvin, Fox News, App Advice, @andrewphelps, The Huffington Post, VentureBeat, TIME.com, @craigsilverman, Forbes, Ars Technica, @jasoncherkis, Betabeat, The New York Observer, Gapers Block, @jcstearns, Gawker, Techland, TechCrunch, @borowitzreport, Fortune, @davidfolkenflik, @davidfolkenflik, Mediaite, GalleyCat, @jonathanshainin, @scottros, The Consumerist, Daring Fireball, GeekWire, The Next Web, SlashGear, The Atlantic Wire, The FJP, FishbowlLA, JIMROMENESKO.COM, Digits, @rob_schmitz, The Atlantic Online, parislemon, kottke.org, TPM IdeaLab, The Daily Caller, Erik Wemple and Poynter

Matthew Panzarino / The Next Web:
New York Times edits article by Mike Daisey it posted just after Steve Jobs' death due to fabrications

Discussion: NYConvergence.com, The Verge and Daring Fireball

Laura June / The Verge:
Excerpts from ‘This American Life’ on Mike Daisey: ‘Why not just tell us what really happened?’

Discussion: This American Life, VentureBeat and Soup

Rob Schmitz / Marketplace:
An acclaimed Apple critic made up the details

Amy O'Donnell / MediaShift Idea Lab:

SMS Builds the Radio Star — Radio's history has spanned over 100 years and it continues to reach billions — even in remote and underserved regions. So when UNESCO announced that the inaugural World Radio Day was to be celebrated on February 13, one question on many people's lips was: Why now?

Carl Prine / Line of Departure:

A Defense of Nir Rosen — Over the past several days, the Guardian newspaper in the UK and the Pan Arab news channel Al Arabiya have been publishing a trove of emails purloined from the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. While Al Arabiya and others have declined to print several …

Discussion: @ggreenwald, Guardian and Blogs of War

Janko Roettgers / GigaOM:

DramaFever nabs $4.5M to bring us the world's TV shows — Online video startup DramaFever has a message for American TV audiences: There is a whole world beyond the U.S.' borders, and it's making some great TV shows too. DramaFever has established itself as the biggest online distributor …

Discussion: TechCrunch, VentureBeat and AllThingsD

Jake Tapper / ABCNEWS:

White House Stands By Obama Push for Yemeni Journalist to Remain Behind Bars — White House officials Friday defended President Obama's request that the government of Yemen keep a local journalist behind bars for alleged terrorist ties. — Abd al-Ilah Haydar Al-Sha'i had investigated …

Associated Press:

News Corp executive James Murdoch leaving board of Sotheby's auction house — LONDON — News Corp. executive James Murdoch, under pressure over his role in Britain's tabloid phone hacking scandal, is stepping down from the board of Sotheby's, the auction house has said.

Discussion: Guardian and The Independent

Adam Weinstein / Mother Jones:

“Shadow CIA” Buys Itself a Big-Name Journalist — Disgraced corporate spy shop Stratfor aims to bounce back from its Wikileaks debacle by hiring Robert D. Kaplan. — Stratfor, the Texas-based corporate intelligence agency that was once billed as a “shadow CIA,” announced this week …

Jim Romenesko:

NY Post scolded by photographer — The New York Post declared this week that “Pinterest is the new Facebook,” and used the photo on the right to illustrate its story. The credit line said, “Courtesy Tory Burch via Pinterest.” — Actually, the photo was taken by Leela Cyd …

Discussion: Leela Cyd and Piercing the Veil

Roy Greenslade / Guardian:

Mystery of The Sun's ‘exclusives’ during Joanna Yeates murder hunt — The chief constable of Avon & Somerset police, Colin Port, is due to give evidence to the Leveson inquiry in two weeks' time. — He has been called in order to answer questions about alleged leaks to the press during the Joanna Yeates murder inquiry.

Edmund Lee / Bloomberg:

Goldman Op-Ed Writer Got $150 for Unsolicited Critique — The New York Times (NYT), drawing criticism for running an op-ed by a former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) executive attacking the bank, said the piece was one of thousands of unsolicited submissions it receives weekly.

Discussion: Gothamist and New York Times

Adam Martin / The Atlantic Wire:
Mayor Bloomberg Proud of Bloomberg's Coverage of the Goldman Sachs Op-Ed

Discussion: TIME.com, Metropolis and Forbes

Craig Silverman / Poynter:

New Hampshire editor's front page column calls out competitor's sports editor for plagiarism — The editor of a New Hampshire newspaper has published a front page column to expose plagiarism at a competing paper. — “If one of my reporters did what Compass Sports Editor Joe Milliken did last week …

Discussion: Kirk LaPointe's … and www.eagletimes.com