A local reporter explains what happened to her when she got involved with Reuters:
Reuters did use one quote from the story I wrote last week in the final paragraphs of one of their earliest Lynch stories, which was sent out for publication early Tuesday morning.
By Tuesday afternoon, the quote was reduced to one sentence. Still, my byline appeared.
By Tuesday night, the quote was gone and Reuters was siphoning information from television reports. The beginning of the story was toned down. The part about “media fiction” was removed. But even then, my byline remained.
I understand that news wire services often edit, add, remove or write new leads for stories. What amazed me was that a story could have my byline on it when I contributed only a few sentences at the end — and in later versions I didn’t contribute anything at all.
The stories contained apparently fresh material attributed to sources I did not interview.
Maybe that’s the way that wire service works.
I would like to make it abundantly clear that somebody at Reuters wrote the story, not me.
Go read the whole story.
(via Hanks)