School of Journalism director Geneva Overholser (pictured) was featured in PBS' July 6 NewsHour about the Washington Post and publisher Katherine Weymouth, who apologized to readers for a controversy over the newspaper's plan for a series of corporate-sponsored policy dinners at Weymouth's home.
"It's important to remember that, amidst all the changes going on in journalism, one thing that professional journalists can still offer us is access to people in power," said Overholser, former editor of the Des Moines Register and ombudsman of the Washington Post. "And what makes this particularly unsavory, Jeff, in my view, is that the Post appeared to be willing to sell that access, and they were sort of using the journalists as lure, and it was kind of a defanged version of journalists, even, because the copy said that the conversation would be spirited, but not confrontational, which I think is quite undermining for the independence that is so important to journalists."
She also said newspapers will continue to think up new marketing strategies.
"And I think all of us who've ever edited newspapers are reminding ourselves of some of the rules we had," she said. "'I would hate to have an ad on the front page.' Well, you know, bring them on if they're going to pay for investigative reporting. But let them be not deceitful. I mean, an ad on the front page that pays for investigative reporting, terrific. If it's tricked up to look like something else, like editorial content, not terrific. It seems to me there are going to be two ethical underpinnings from here on out that we're going to have to rely on: Is this in the public interest? Does it serve the public good? And transparency. Be completely honest about what we're doing."
