Advancing The Story: The role of the ombudsman in a cash-strapped newsroom

Advancing the story takes a look at the work of Alicia Shepard, ombudsman for National Public Radio (NPR).

While summing up Shepard’s approach to the role, the post raises an interesting point about transparency/the role of the ombudsman at a time of dwindling newsroom resources:

“It’s no doubt hard to justify spending money on an ombudsman when the newsroom budget is being slashed.  And it’s easy to dismiss an ombudsman’s defense of his value as simply self-interest. But there’s a difference between having citizens point out errors and flaws, and having an independent observer inside a news organization with ‘a hall pass and a platform,’ as New York Times executive editor Bill Keller describes an ombudsman,” writes ATS.

What price transparency? Or can readers pointing out corrections and clarifications be better used at a time of limited resources?

Full post at this link…

Similar posts:

• Washington Post: Fewer copy editors, more errors – now a ‘universal desk’
• The NYT’s Cronkite mistakes and the paper’s ‘top 20′ error rate list
• Editor&Publisher: Bill Keller says future of NYTimes’ public editor still ‘much debated’
• NYTimes.com: Five major newspapers to share content
• Ulken.com: Exploring data at the New York Times