OK, local journalism followers — you’re gonna want to read Terry Boyd’s rant against local television station WAVE-TV. Boyd called me last night, complaining that the story that his Insider Louisville blog broke had been stolen and aired on the station without attribution.
Yes, this kind of thing ticks us off. If I break a story, I want to get credit when it’s repeated on the nightly TV news. Boyd claims WAVE aired the story on the potential courtship of Kentucky Kingdom by the owners of Holiday World, using his story for its information without giving any credit. In his piece, Boyd writes that his call to the newsroom was answered by an unnamed person who told him “But we verified it with sources.”
I talked with Kathy Hostetter, the WAVE news director, who defended WAVE’s coverage by saying essentially the same thing — the station made some calls, verified the story, and reported it. She didn’t feel the need to credit the original source of the scoop, since everything WAVE reported had been confirmed by a source. Maybe what irritated Terry, and has bothered me in similar stories, was that WAVE reported the story as if it had done some real enterprise reporting. Language like “WAVE has confirmed…” and using the word “exclusive” should be reserved for stories uncovered by the station, not taken from other media.
Ark Lark: Speaking of amusement parks, I’m glad to see that the backers of the controversial Ark Park in Williamstown are having trouble raising enough money to build it. LEO reports backers are trying to remain optimistic in light of a fundraising campaign that’s at about 20 percent of its goal, and a groundbreaking is at least a year away.
Ali’s 70th: You must know that Muhammad Ali is 70 today. You can’t overestimate the importance of Ali’s contributions to the world, given that his influence goes way beyond sport and his celebrity is international. For a great piece on Ali, check out this story in TIME written by my friend Cary Stemle. The story has plenty of great quotes, even one from John Calipari.
Also today, our favorite sports historian, Billy Reed, was a guest on Joe Elliott’s radio show, and he discussed Ali’s influence in the 1960s on race and attitudes toward the Vietnam War. He also spoke the sad truth, saying that the Ali Center could be more popular here but for the lingering negative associations some locals have regarding Ali.
Gilderbloom Speaks: We’ll be covering it, but if you are interested in issues in local real estate you should come to see U of L professor John Gilderbloom’s talk tomorrow at Big Spring. The talk “Contemporary Housing Dynamics: 10 Things to Improve Real Estate – 10 Things to Make It Worse” should be notable. It’s $25 and includes lunch. One Thing — Gilderbloom advocates converting one-way streets to two-way to reduce crime and encourage business.
And Wouldn’t Gatewood Be Proud: Here’s something surprising — on the Recovering Politician site, ex-State Treasurer Jonathan Miller is advocating the legalization of marijuana. And a recent poll indicates a majority of Americans agree. Wonder what smart comment Gatewood would have about that?
