She was very polite in her emails to me, but these were only to set up a subsequent telephone call which never happened. The call didn't happen because of my schedule.

However, her politeness does not alter the fact that she (IMO) acted inappropriately as a journalist representing such an esteemed organ as the WSJ.

Anyway, my point here is not about legal rights and wrongs, or journalistic rights and wrongs, but just about good old common decency in the way we treat each other.

There is a big difference between seeing the Eiffel Tower fall down with your own eyes, and reporting that it happened -- and reading an assertion on the web that the Eiffel Tower just fell down, and reporting that it happened. The first gets you a Pulitzer; the second gets you fired.

Jane emailed me once and we followed up with a telephone call. She was very polite and I was satisfied with the resulting article (which, by-the-way, only made it into the on-line version, I think).

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum...ML/002750.html

I just saw another print article by her this week quoting a FT-er. Hopefully she got the permission of the individual involved. If not out of necessity/integrity, then out of courtesy. (Think what would have happened if she wrote an article quoting someone (like jag) who turned out to be using a false identity!)

So you're in that article about cell phones lost on airplanes? And those quotes used were sentences you wrote here on FT and not spoken directly with Jane Costello?

Did I get that right?

If it makes you feel any better, you were portrayed in a favorable and sympathetic light. In other words, there was no hatchet job done on you. It does seem odd that your permission was not asked.

johnndor;

Can you tell me what the subject of the recent article was? I spoke to her RE: "elite for sale" and I would certainly put myself in the camp of folks who found her to be very forthright, courteous, honest and ethical.

We over at CO board have been waiting to see if an article she was researching on changes to the OnePass program materialized-- that wasn't the article, was it, by any chance?

BTW, FWIW and I certainly don't speak for him, in any way, shape or form but I think Randy considers Jane Costello a friend of FT-- that was my impression.

Yes, you are correct. The "Quotes" were lifted from FT, the factual errors are hers alone.



[This message has been edited by yyz-den (edited 08-09-2001).]

I have had e-mail and phone contacts with more than one WSJ reporters, including Jane, and they have been very professional in their dealings.

But in any case, one does not have any rights to any information that you post here! WSJ or any other person can use whatever you disclose here elsewhere without permission. And even if she did not interview you, there is no problem reporting something factual (using Bearx220's example) e.g XYZ, a Delta ff who posts in Flyertalk re the recent fare sale said "It is a joke."

In my experiences, however, journalists do make contacts both out of necessity (fact-checking) and courtesy.

I was quoted in an article by Jane when the Kellogg's promotion first started. She asked my permission as I recall, and we had a phone conversation. I think if someone's real name is quoted but gotten from the profile and our permission is not asked, it feels like an invasion of privacy and compromises our feelings of safety in expressing ourselves. I think she made a mistake, and perhaps by virtue of the planned conversation that didn't take place, assumed consent which you in fact didn't give her. Perhaps a letter directly to her would rectify the situation.

------------------
DtG

The following is not a legal advice. I am not an attorney. However, I wanted to correct a common perception that keeps coming up in terms of copyright of electronic posts on these boards.

As lairdb pointed out earlier, posting here DOES NOT imply putting your writing in public domain. FT claims ownership to the copyright (as opposed to being in public domain) purely as a result of any terms of agreement that assign the handle to post to this board.

The contract that gives a handle to participate in these boards has the following section which implies that the posts are owned by the board. I am not sure if this has been tested in courts or will withstand legal scrutiny.

The reason I say this is because of my reading of a related but not directly similar case. Recently courts ruled that print media did not get electronic rights assigned to them (huge liabilities for press that sold articles written by authors for print media in an electronic form). It is conceivable that a prolific poster who wishes to publish a book solely based on her/his posts can claim true copyright to that material as opposed to Randy or this board. If I were on the jury and if the law was not clear, I would side with the author.

Also, morally if not legally, if the board owners claim a right to the copyright to all material they could also be held liable for consequences in certain cases. My guess is that the ownership is claimed for practical reasons to "excerpt" in other media owned by Randy and Co. and not to commercialize individual writings. Wholesale use of a prolific posters writings may require a whole different treatment.

I also noticed that most of the times, the remedy for violating guidelines is deleting of the post or handle and NOT editing of the post which is more in the spirit of respecting authorship.

------------ excerpts from the policies displayed during registration -----

Who owns my post?

For the sake of simplicity, we'd say that we own anything posted on FlyerTalk. Our reasoning is that we have the power to edit or delete any such post if we, representing the community, find it provides more harm than value to FlyerTalk. Also, if a member decides they no longer want to participate in the community, we would find it difficult to go into the database and delete each post an individual had made. Excerpts from posts to FlyerTalk may appear in InsideFlyer magazines, books, or other materials.

JonNYC -

As Analise pointed out (although only a minute before you) the article in print this week was about cell phones left on airlines.

I am somewhat confused---you say someone from the WSJ read you your quotes over the phone...that is called fact checking. How could they call you unless you gave them your phone number when they contacted you to talk about your post and your opinion on the matter?

That's a normal part of interviewing---you agreed to talk with them about the issue.

If you indeed did say that the quote was yours, you were saying "yes, that's what I feel about this issue. These are my thoughts and my opinion on the matter." If a quote is attributed to you and you never made the comment, either in written or verbal form, that's a whole different matter.

As for sending a copy of the story--please don't expect ANY reporter to send you a copy of their story for editorial approval prior to publication. That's just not the way it's done, except in very special situations.

[This message has been edited by joanek (edited 08-10-2001).]

As one of the old-timers on this board I'd like to add another positve word for Ms. Costello. She asked for, and was given my permission to use my name and quote my comments when I talked with her about an article she was writing last year. My opinion is that she was professional and accurate.

I TOTALLY agree with Joan. Jane apparently saw your post, contacted you, you exchanged ideas (via email, I'm assuming) and Jane used them. Since you apparently did NOT specifically ask to NOT have your name used, your ideas were attributed.

Bottom line: if you dont want your name in the newspaper either:
a) dont talk to reporters, or;
b) if you simply cannot avoid a., proactively insist that your name not be used..

IMHO, it appears that Jane did nothing wrong.

I thought reporters had to (if not had to, then should as a courtesy) ask "may I quote you on this".

mileagerunner said:

Only on TV and movies. When a reporter talks to you with your permission, EVERYTHING is "on the record."