Scobleizer: Ryan’s wrapup of tough day at Engadget
paul
· 2 years ago
In the blogosphear there is no such thing as bad publicity
Wilhelm Reuch
· 2 years ago
There is no excuse for Engadget. None. They should have understood that this kind of information would never, ever, be widely released internally only - if valid it must be accompanied by a public press release at the same time.
Unless Engadget (and apparaently Scoble) actually think Apple is unaware of the requirements of being a public company.
Damien Mulley
· 2 years ago
Do you think Apple is entitled to know the identities of those that sent the email to Engadget after so much damage being caused?
David K.
· 2 years ago
I don't trust Engadget any less...they made a goof and owned up to it. Besides, if they received the memo from their usual good sources, what were they supposed to think. The bigger issue is that someone has the ability to publish erroneous information through Apple's own internal systems. Sounds like a serious breach of security to me...and in a publicly traded company no less.
The people up in arms over this are most likely Apple shareholders or individuals who already had a beef with Engadget. Get over it. It's a gadget site.
Ed
· 2 years ago
I agree with Wilhelm. That was just plain and irresponsible of Engadget. Ryan's explanation doesn't make sense. He mentioned that even after he found out, less than two hours later, that the email was bogus he didn't edit his post. Why?
Some people mentioned that not much was lost. I'm long on Apple so it didn't matter much to me. But, did you see the exchange volume? That's a huge exchange of money there.
John Dowdell
· 2 years ago
Robert, have you switched yet from "who I believe" to "what I believe"? Do you see everyone as a mix of credibility and error yet, or still see some as wholy credible, some people as not worth listening to?
jd
John C. Welch
· 2 years ago
In this situation I back Ryan Block 100%. His post on the matter is the way to handle it.
No, his post on the matter is the way to clean up the crap he stirred up by following your example of "First over facts". What he did was irresponsible, and quite frankly, stupid. If you ever wanted a better example of why the "blogosphere" is not a collective of journalists, that's a great example. His insinuation that he knew beyond a doubt where that email came from is not only silly, it's completely ignorant of how easy it is to fake an email. He's just in high-speed CYA mode now.
If anything went wrong here, it’s the pressure on everyone (bloggers and journalists) to be first. Why is that pressure there? Because the first one to post a story will usually get linked to by everyone after that. Links bring traffic. Traffic brings money (at least to sites that have ads). That’s one reason why I don’t put ads on my blog. I already feel enough of that pressure and don’t need to feel more because my paycheck is being affected.
Are you proud of your second child? Because you're one of the leading creators of the "First or die" mentality that led to this, and you have yet, as evidenced by this post, really come to understand how stupid and dangerous that is.
I’ve also mostly jumped off the “be first” bandwagon and I’m sorry for pushing it over the past few years.
Over the last year, you certainly haven't demonstrated this. Deeds, not words Robert. Jumping on the "LYNCH HER NOW" bandwagon over the HP scandal. The complete lack of any kind of reality in your initial posts on the iPhone. Harry McCracken. On and on. You talk about how you're getting off the bandwagon you helped build, and yet, you can't really seem to let go.
Anyway, I’ve taken my shots at Engadget in the past (not my proudest moments in life, truth be told) and Ryan’s post raised his stock way up in my eyes.
Right. Because his non-apology, (WE WERE FOOLED, NOT OUR FAULT!), make up completely undoes everything his lack of fact-checking caused. I doubt you'll ever really understand why this monster you helped create and nurture is such a bad thing.
Shawn King
· 2 years ago
"yesterday in his life was probably pretty rough"
Ignoring the mangled syntax, his "pretty rough" day was of his own making. Not much sympathy here.
"Apple’s PR was slow to react."
I'm sorry...what? Apple PR is supposed to jump when Engadget says jump?
"If anything went wrong here"
Are you implying you don't think *anything* went wrong?
"it’s the pressure on everyone (bloggers and journalists) to be first."
No - bloggers feel (completely made up) pressure to be first. Real journalists feel the pressure to *both* "get it first and get it right". *Huge* difference.
"For two, I want to be known for my video work, not my blogging work"
Then stop blogging. Written blogs will *always* be easier to keep up with and noticed more than video.
"I’ve taken my shots at Engadget in the past (not my proudest moments in life, truth be told)"
*Never* take a shot if you're not going to be proud of it. :)
"and Ryan’s post raised his stock way up in my eyes."
Why? I've been in a similar situation (it didn't cost the stock market billions in valuation but it did cause quite a sh*tstorm at Apple) and the first thing I did when I found out I was wrong was - I APOLOGIZED.
Re-reading Ryan's post, I don't see an apology. So, why has his stock gone up, Robert?
John C. Welch
· 2 years ago
Oh yeah, the whole "Apple PR should have gotten back to us faster". Christ. They didn't take DAYS here, they took hours. But if Engadget had waited, then OMG, NO SC00P FOR THEMOMGWTFKHAAAAAN!!!!
Here's a thought. maybe, just maybe, with the imminent release of the iPhone and the WWDC both less than a month away, they're a little busy.
trex
· 2 years ago
Engadget is in the right here, as long as the email did in fact originate from Apple HQ. It's up to Apple to figure out who sent out the hoax email, and whether or not explain this to their investors/public.
Leaks happen - it's a fact of journalism. If Engadget completely made up the story then they would have had a serious problem on their hands.
John C. Welch
· 2 years ago
No, they do not know where the email truly originated. If you can show anyone an absolutely foolproof method for showing an email's origins, you can make a ton of money, because that's a problem that a lot of people would like to solve.
They *thought* it originated from Apple, but they didn't *know* and rather than waiting a few hours for confirmation, they just had to be first, because being "first" is more important than "correct".
Michael Markman
· 2 years ago
Robert,
I'm not sure I know what you're saying. On the one hand, you are backing away from the policy of shoot first and let the blogosphere self-correct if it turns out you were wrong. On the other hand, you are fully endorsing Ryan Block, who doesn't seem to be backing away from the practices which led Engadget to post false information, but simply explaining how he was fooled and how he made an impatient good-faith effort to verify the.
Are these positions consistent?
Michael Markman
· 2 years ago
(missing word) "verify the info."
Kermit Croaked
· 2 years ago
Why would anyone make stock deals based on engadget's writings, which have a hit & miss history regarding accuracy (and frequently put their on "spin" into stories, which sometimes lowers them to (almost) the level of theRegister and theEnquirer sites)?
This shows how screwed up Wall Street is. Even if iPhone and/or Leopard were delayed, Apple would still make about the same money after they were released. So the company's bottom line would only be affected short term, if at all. But speculators buy and sell based on what they think other speculators will do, not based on a company's actual financials, so people sell based solely on the fear that others will sell and drive the stock price down, which ends up being a self-fullfilling cycle.
Phil
· 2 years ago
It was only $4 billion, what's the big deal? - I feel a blogger challenge coming on - who can knock the most share value off a company in one go. With great power comes great responsibility...
Alfredo Octavio
· 2 years ago
Anything that comes from an email has to be considered a rumor, until you confirm that the email came from whom it says it comes. In this time of phishing scams and spams that has to be the rule. Ryan Block, who is an all around nice guy in my experience, should think why he posted what he posted. Yes being first was there, but also putting down a high flying Apple. I know I smiled when I read the post and didn't for a minute think it was a hoax...
John C. Welch
· 2 years ago
Why would anyone make stock deals based on engadget’s writings, which have a hit & miss history regarding accuracy (and frequently put their on “spin” into stories, which sometimes lowers them to (almost) the level of theRegister and theEnquirer sites)?
it's an old scam, not limited to blogs. You create buzz that drops the price long enough to buy cheap. As soon as the buzz is shown to be crap, the price goes up, and you sell. Lots of money, not a lot of work.
Christopher Coulter
· 2 years ago
So letseee, post anything that moves, don't double check, but bleeding-heart apologize later. Works for bloggers, I guess...
John C. Welch
· 2 years ago
Of course, Winer is tying himself in a knot to fellate Engadget and lick the feet of the "First is all that matters" gods. If they're SO professional, why couldn't they sit on the story until they had better confirmation?
Tom
· 2 years ago
Engadget posted a 12-paragraph excuse that basically said everyone else would have done it, too. Um, no.
Mr. Scoble, if you were ever going to take a shot at them, this time you would have been justified. I guess the blogger school is just going to stick together on this one...
figby
· 2 years ago
I have no problem with Engadget here - actually they've been just as wrong hundreds of times, and they eventually correct themselves. It's not what I'd call proper fact-checked journalism, but it is what it is.
The problem is with any idiot who makes stock trading decisions based on what Engadget says...
DaveD
· 2 years ago
I actually think that most everyone else would have acted the same way. Just look at the New York Times with the Microsoft-Yahoo rumor and how that affected the price of YHOO.
I also believe the non-apologetic words of Ryan too. Unfortunately, it does't "raise his stock up in my eyes"... it make me less likely to ever believe what he writes again.
I'm long AAPL. Have been for a few years now. Since the next horizon to review my position is January 2008, this was just a blip on my radar.
But there was REAL harm done to others. And Ryan - however criminally innocent - is directly responsible. Yet, here's the sentence that imediately tuck out in my eyes:
"Given the nature of that news, we felt we had an obligation to inform people that Apple had sent out an internal memo in preparation of a delay in the iPhone and Leopard."
An obligation? To whom? You wanted to be first Ryan. Nothing more. To say nothing about your ignorance to your REAL obligation - to the truth.
anon
· 2 years ago
I hate engadget. They're a covert, clandestine Microsoft advertising arm that hits out against Microsoft's competitors. What Ryan did was criminal, plain and simple. Numerous breaches of the law from stock manipulation to corporate espionage were involved. Ryan should stand trial, testify under oath about how he came about the email, and go to prison.
engadget would never release email affecting Microsoft stock price in this manner.
anon2
· 2 years ago
Anon,
You're a frackin' moron. Insane. Deranged. Delusional. An oxygen thief.
John C. Welch
· 2 years ago
Um...if you're going to start jailing people for bein' a dumbass, we're gonna need a LOT more jails.
RandomThoughts
· 2 years ago
I know I am late to the party, but lets be real here.
Baseball is very competitive, do people give Barry Bonds a pass on steriods because he is just trying to compete? You could say that the Enron executives were operating in a pressure environment, but that does not excuse what happened there.
Engadget jumped at the chance to cover what they thought was the story. They blew it. Just becasue they are in a competitive environment doesn't give them the excuse and that argument should not even be used. Pressure? You call the blog environment pressure? Get a grip on reality.
DaveO
· 2 years ago
"he printed an email" But he didn't. That was the fundamental error. No email, no indication that the email referenced a non-existent press release. At least if he had printed the email initially, people could have made a more informed choice. Individual readers (and shareholders) could have asked, "why haven't I seen the press release?" No, he left critical information out.
I agree that you'd have to be a jackass to dump your shares based on this story, but you'd have to be a bigger jackass to believe the email and post a blurb that misrepresented the completely unverified email.
Devon Shaw
· 2 years ago
Just to point out, that journalistic standards (at least pre-Lewinsky, pre-sensationalist Fox News) for the most part followed the Two Source Rule, wherein journalists were required to seek corroboration/confirmation from a second source before publishing a story, particularly when the first source was anonymous. News agencies in the past couple years have started trampling over this rule, and that's when jobs are lost. Case in point: Dan Rather.
Ryan would have been fired from any reputable print journal for leaking that information.
Beerzie
· 2 years ago
Get linked or get it right? A marketer does the former, a journalist does the latter. This kind of foolishness lowers the bar for bloggers. Bad job.
Blain
· 2 years ago
The good news: Engadget et al have cemented and backed up their claims of blogging being journalism.
The bad news: It's yellow journalism.
Brian
· 2 years ago
So, what you're saying then is that it's more important to make money than to publish facts?
Maybe _you're_ what's wrong here. You and Ryan, anyway. Covering ass with an excuse that basically amounts to "we needed to move before anyone else" is just bull.
Gedeon Maheux
· 2 years ago
Sorry Robert, you're way off base here. The onerous is on Engadget to get it right despite their own self-imposed pressure. They are at the top of the heap in gadget blogs, so that pressure is of their own making. I wouldn't feel so strongly about it except the so-called "explanation" did nothing to demonstrate that they learned what went wrong. "We messed up, oh well!" just doesn't cut it.
Tooth Fairy
· 2 years ago
Get a clue. Buy one, borrow one, steal one.
Peoples life savings may have been wiped out. Nice Mistake.
Charles
· 2 years ago
Robert, you're wrong here, unless you think Engadget needs to be held to no more account than the average person staring out of a window while waiting for the microwave to ping. The email contained information that would have let them cross-check: it said "Apple today issued a press release..."
He should have said "What press release?" Any slightly trained journalist would have. If I'd received that story, I'd have bee n poised to write the story - and then I'd have read the email a second time and wondered about it standing up. Apple PR might not have leapt to the phones, but the clues necessary to stand the story up, or kill it, were right there in the email itself. This was bad practice within Engadget; indicative of a subtle problem that will be very hard to eradicate. But the same one that newspapers and other media struggle with: how long do you try to stand up (or kill off) a story? When do you publish? If Engadget can move a market, then it has to consider taking longer about checking facts before someone comes after them in a very aggressive fashion.
Harvard Irving
· 2 years ago
Amazing. You can't even get your facts straight about this, when the source is easily available to all. The email was not published in Ryan's first article. It was not even discussed. It simply referred to "reliable sources."
Even if you support/defend Ryan for being quick to publish and having honest intentions, how can you defend the sloppy journalism that does not even mention the facts about what the "source" said?
I honestly find it unbelievable that so many people are getting basic facts about this story wrong. It really shows sloppy journalism on top of sloppy journalism. Please explain to me, Robert, what led you to write that Ryan had "printed the email" in your first paragraph?
Did you see this email "printed" in Ryan's article? Did you imagine it? Are you just using secondary and tertiary sources, instead of going to the actual first-hand source when you write your blog?
All Comments
Unless Engadget (and apparaently Scoble) actually think Apple is unaware of the requirements of being a public company.
The people up in arms over this are most likely Apple shareholders or individuals who already had a beef with Engadget. Get over it. It's a gadget site.
Some people mentioned that not much was lost. I'm long on Apple so it didn't matter much to me. But, did you see the exchange volume? That's a huge exchange of money there.
jd
No, his post on the matter is the way to clean up the crap he stirred up by following your example of "First over facts". What he did was irresponsible, and quite frankly, stupid. If you ever wanted a better example of why the "blogosphere" is not a collective of journalists, that's a great example. His insinuation that he knew beyond a doubt where that email came from is not only silly, it's completely ignorant of how easy it is to fake an email. He's just in high-speed CYA mode now.
If anything went wrong here, it’s the pressure on everyone (bloggers and journalists) to be first. Why is that pressure there? Because the first one to post a story will usually get linked to by everyone after that. Links bring traffic. Traffic brings money (at least to sites that have ads). That’s one reason why I don’t put ads on my blog. I already feel enough of that pressure and don’t need to feel more because my paycheck is being affected.
Are you proud of your second child? Because you're one of the leading creators of the "First or die" mentality that led to this, and you have yet, as evidenced by this post, really come to understand how stupid and dangerous that is.
I’ve also mostly jumped off the “be first” bandwagon and I’m sorry for pushing it over the past few years.
Over the last year, you certainly haven't demonstrated this. Deeds, not words Robert. Jumping on the "LYNCH HER NOW" bandwagon over the HP scandal. The complete lack of any kind of reality in your initial posts on the iPhone. Harry McCracken. On and on. You talk about how you're getting off the bandwagon you helped build, and yet, you can't really seem to let go.
Anyway, I’ve taken my shots at Engadget in the past (not my proudest moments in life, truth be told) and Ryan’s post raised his stock way up in my eyes.
Right. Because his non-apology, (WE WERE FOOLED, NOT OUR FAULT!), make up completely undoes everything his lack of fact-checking caused. I doubt you'll ever really understand why this monster you helped create and nurture is such a bad thing.
Ignoring the mangled syntax, his "pretty rough" day was of his own making. Not much sympathy here.
"Apple’s PR was slow to react."
I'm sorry...what? Apple PR is supposed to jump when Engadget says jump?
"If anything went wrong here"
Are you implying you don't think *anything* went wrong?
"it’s the pressure on everyone (bloggers and journalists) to be first."
No - bloggers feel (completely made up) pressure to be first. Real journalists feel the pressure to *both* "get it first and get it right". *Huge* difference.
"For two, I want to be known for my video work, not my blogging work"
Then stop blogging. Written blogs will *always* be easier to keep up with and noticed more than video.
"I’ve taken my shots at Engadget in the past (not my proudest moments in life, truth be told)"
*Never* take a shot if you're not going to be proud of it. :)
"and Ryan’s post raised his stock way up in my eyes."
Why? I've been in a similar situation (it didn't cost the stock market billions in valuation but it did cause quite a sh*tstorm at Apple) and the first thing I did when I found out I was wrong was - I APOLOGIZED.
Re-reading Ryan's post, I don't see an apology. So, why has his stock gone up, Robert?
Here's a thought. maybe, just maybe, with the imminent release of the iPhone and the WWDC both less than a month away, they're a little busy.
Leaks happen - it's a fact of journalism. If Engadget completely made up the story then they would have had a serious problem on their hands.
They *thought* it originated from Apple, but they didn't *know* and rather than waiting a few hours for confirmation, they just had to be first, because being "first" is more important than "correct".
I'm not sure I know what you're saying. On the one hand, you are backing away from the policy of shoot first and let the blogosphere self-correct if it turns out you were wrong. On the other hand, you are fully endorsing Ryan Block, who doesn't seem to be backing away from the practices which led Engadget to post false information, but simply explaining how he was fooled and how he made an impatient good-faith effort to verify the.
Are these positions consistent?
This shows how screwed up Wall Street is. Even if iPhone and/or Leopard were delayed, Apple would still make about the same money after they were released. So the company's bottom line would only be affected short term, if at all. But speculators buy and sell based on what they think other speculators will do, not based on a company's actual financials, so people sell based solely on the fear that others will sell and drive the stock price down, which ends up being a self-fullfilling cycle.
With great power comes great responsibility...
it's an old scam, not limited to blogs. You create buzz that drops the price long enough to buy cheap. As soon as the buzz is shown to be crap, the price goes up, and you sell. Lots of money, not a lot of work.
Mr. Scoble, if you were ever going to take a shot at them, this time you would have been justified. I guess the blogger school is just going to stick together on this one...
The problem is with any idiot who makes stock trading decisions based on what Engadget says...
I also believe the non-apologetic words of Ryan too. Unfortunately, it does't "raise his stock up in my eyes"... it make me less likely to ever believe what he writes again.
I'm long AAPL. Have been for a few years now. Since the next horizon to review my position is January 2008, this was just a blip on my radar.
But there was REAL harm done to others. And Ryan - however criminally innocent - is directly responsible. Yet, here's the sentence that imediately tuck out in my eyes:
"Given the nature of that news, we felt we had an obligation to inform people that Apple had sent out an internal memo in preparation of a delay in the iPhone and Leopard."
An obligation? To whom? You wanted to be first Ryan. Nothing more. To say nothing about your ignorance to your REAL obligation - to the truth.
engadget would never release email affecting Microsoft stock price in this manner.
You're a frackin' moron. Insane. Deranged. Delusional. An oxygen thief.
Baseball is very competitive, do people give Barry Bonds a pass on steriods because he is just trying to compete? You could say that the Enron executives were operating in a pressure environment, but that does not excuse what happened there.
Engadget jumped at the chance to cover what they thought was the story. They blew it. Just becasue they are in a competitive environment doesn't give them the excuse and that argument should not even be used. Pressure? You call the blog environment pressure? Get a grip on reality.
But he didn't. That was the fundamental error. No email, no indication that the email referenced a non-existent press release. At least if he had printed the email initially, people could have made a more informed choice. Individual readers (and shareholders) could have asked, "why haven't I seen the press release?" No, he left critical information out.
I agree that you'd have to be a jackass to dump your shares based on this story, but you'd have to be a bigger jackass to believe the email and post a blurb that misrepresented the completely unverified email.
Ryan would have been fired from any reputable print journal for leaking that information.
The bad news: It's yellow journalism.
Maybe _you're_ what's wrong here. You and Ryan, anyway. Covering ass with an excuse that basically amounts to "we needed to move before anyone else" is just bull.
Buy one, borrow one, steal one.
Peoples life savings may have been wiped out. Nice Mistake.
He should have said "What press release?" Any slightly trained journalist would have. If I'd received that story, I'd have bee n poised to write the story - and then I'd have read the email a second time and wondered about it standing up. Apple PR might not have leapt to the phones, but the clues necessary to stand the story up, or kill it, were right there in the email itself. This was bad practice within Engadget; indicative of a subtle problem that will be very hard to eradicate. But the same one that newspapers and other media struggle with: how long do you try to stand up (or kill off) a story? When do you publish? If Engadget can move a market, then it has to consider taking longer about checking facts before someone comes after them in a very aggressive fashion.
Even if you support/defend Ryan for being quick to publish and having honest intentions, how can you defend the sloppy journalism that does not even mention the facts about what the "source" said?
I honestly find it unbelievable that so many people are getting basic facts about this story wrong. It really shows sloppy journalism on top of sloppy journalism. Please explain to me, Robert, what led you to write that Ryan had "printed the email" in your first paragraph?
Did you see this email "printed" in Ryan's article? Did you imagine it? Are you just using secondary and tertiary sources, instead of going to the actual first-hand source when you write your blog?