Transparency – the watchdog of online journalism?

In the aftermath of the Jason Blair plagiariasm scandal The New York Times launched a feature Talk to the News  due toto the integrity and confidence of the people in the Newspaper. It gives readers the chance to ask questions of the staff, the answers of which are published on the NY Times webpage, some ranging in topic to the political affiliations of journalists.

The Guardian has also made great strides in this respect in employing a readers editor Siobhain Butterworth. She is responsible for answering readers queries. Butterworth publishes a daily colum on corrections and clarifications. She also publishes a weekly colum on reader questions and views.  The reader editor’s homepage also contains links to the Guardian’s style guide and editorial code.

Very few mainstream newspaper organisations have gone to the same length as The New York Times and The Guardian to ensure transparency. Transparency has been labelled the golden rule of the blogosphere, it is interesting that this value had handed high recognition to News websites that recognise it. The efforts of the repective papers have not gone unnoticed as The Guardian has been voted the best website at the British Press Awards in 2008 and 2009.