Comments on: Housing Bubble Coverage: Defending the Indefensible

By: McGuire on Media » Bloodless journalism and mindless stats are not the way to report this recession

Mon, 02 Feb 2009 22:36:32 +0000

[...] friend and Cronkite School colleague Dan Gillmor wrote a tough blog entry last week on the press failure to cover the mortgage meltdown in its incipient stages. Dan takes no [...]

By: Aha

Aha — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 06:12:57 +0000

I commend any reporter with no ulterior motive that tells the facts, and that is why we have the internet, we can tell the facts and fact check for ourselves.
Sadly when the herd of irrationally entusiastic buyers are all running off a cliff into foreclosure, led by silly agents and profiteers, the best a truth teller can do is avoid being stampeded by the running herd, pay your own insurance and pray.

By: Aha

Aha — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 06:06:41 +0000

When the graduating class of medill school of journalism heard thier commencement speakers speech, he said go forth graduates and above all else remember ” THE PURPOSE OF JOURNALISM IS TO MAKE A PROFIT”
Wake up you silly tinkerbell pollyannas, thinking journalism is not a BUSINESS.
sadly we are not in a social welfare state yet

By: J. Seigel

J. Seigel — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 18:39:06 +0000

Dan,
Many great points — but where are the facts? A comparison of real estate-warning vs. booster stories in just one publication would begin to give actual evidence for this latest round of media bubblemeisters, a la S &L, Enron/Worldcom, 1990s dotcom, 1929, and tulips from Holland, etc. etc. JS

By: Dan Gillmor

Dan Gillmor — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 21:49:59 +0000

Doug, it sounds as though you were ahead of your peers.

Cory, the Sarasota paper had “several” stories? How did that number compare with the boosterish coverage? (I’m not a bit surprised to hear that the real estate folks were going bonkers.)

By: Ian

Ian — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 18:20:29 +0000

In suburban Boston, local blogs were asking these types of questions in 2005:

http://tinyurl.com/2758er

The Boston Globe, Herald, and the local tabs’ real estate coverage mostly consisted of marketing for realtors (“Home of the week”), etc. There were no investigations, and not even many interviews with ordinary people who were concerned about high prices.

By: Cory

Cory — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 16:03:28 +0000

Did you, by chance, read any of the coverage in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune as the bubble grew? The paper featured several prominent stories about the risks. Several realtors were convinced the newspaper was conspiring against them to sink the market.

By: Doug Haddix

Doug Haddix — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 14:05:38 +0000

I thought you might be interested in “Brokered Dreams,” a series of articles that The Columbus Dispatch published in September 2005 about the foreclosure crisis. We’ve published several dozen follow-up stories since then. Our coverage wasn’t perfect, I’m sure, but our readers had plenty of warning about subprime mortgages, aggressive homebuilders and other ingredients in the mortgage meltdown.

Here’s a link: http://dispatch.com/live/contentbe/dispatch/2005/09/21/broker.html

Thanks,
Doug Haddix
Projects Editor
The Columbus Dispatch

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 03:08:26 +0000

“Dwarfed by comparison” … “extremely infrequent stories” … “occasional quotes” … Strong words. Also entirely subjective. And unquantifiable.

I could say in response, oh I dunno, that the press was “startlingly prescient” … “on the case” … “ahead of the curve.” And you would rightly challenge me to back up those assertions.

So, Dan: Back it up. Right now we have your word, based on your own reading of whatever it is you read, that the press “failed”. If you’re going to damn an industry, damn it in detail.

By: Did newspapers ignore housing bubble? - Lost Remote TV Blog

Did newspapers ignore housing bubble? - Lost Remote TV Blog — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 02:45:40 +0000

[...] Many newspapers across the country had very little coverage of the housing bubble and fallout as Dan Gillmor points out. A recent E&P piece has editors pointing to a smattering of stories on the now-crisis – but [...]