TMZ Admits It Was Duped by a Photo

[spanone]

'we're not happy about it, but this is part of journalism'.....these people wouldn't know journalism if it bit them on the ass


It was, as TMZ said dramatically in a headline on Monday morning, “The J.F.K. Photo That Could Have Changed History.” Could have — if it had been a real photo.

Hours after the popular celebrity news Web site published a photo that it said “appears to show John F. Kennedy on a boat filled with naked women,” one of its corporate siblings, The Smoking Gun, revealed that TMZ had been duped.

The photo that TMZ called exclusive was, it turned out, featured in a Playboy magazine photo spread in 1967, four years after Mr. Kennedy was assassinated. The Smoking Gun called it a “colossal screw-up” by TMZ.

TMZ is owned by Warner Brothers, and The Smoking Gun is owned by Turner. Both are units of Time Warner.

TMZ acknowledged in a subsequent article on Monday afternoon that the photo was “a fake.”

“We’re not happy about it, but this is part of journalism,” Harvey Levin, TMZ’s executive producer, said in an interview.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/29/business/media/29hoax.html?hpw=&pagewanted=print

[proud2BlibKansan]

1. "these people wouldn't know journalism if it bit them on the ass"

For the life of me I don't understand why anyone even posts their crap here for anything other than entertainment value.

[spanone]

2. i don't even find them entertaining...

journalism has something to do with disseminating information

did tmz think this picture had been 'hiding' for forty some odd years????

[gratuitous]

3. If you're desperate to know who went out to eat and have a couple of drinks

Then TMZ will bring you the latest, breathless scoop. If you're looking for anything more substantive, look elsewhere. "Changing history" from anything on TMZ is about as likely as a Republican voting against his party.

[urgk]

6. If journalism bit them in the ass, they'd put it on their own front page. (n/t)

[hlthe2b]

7. I've gone to their site via links a couple of times...

And, for the life of me, I don't know who most of those discussed there are supposed to be... Celebrities in someone's eyes, I guess.

[Stevenmarc]

4. TMZ Duped, what a shocker

[FormerDittoHead]

5. Here's another "part of journalism" - find out who's responsible for it... DIG.

Oh wait - BRITNEY WENT SHOPPING!!!....

[Liberal In Texas]

11. Very good point. n/t

[UTUSN]

8. Why is the language in the article weasley instead of categorical?

It says:

*******QUOTE******

The photo that TMZ called exclusive was, it turned out, featured in a Playboy magazine photo spread in 1967, four years after Mr. Kennedy was assassinated. ....

Circumstantial evidence indicated to TMZ that the photo had been taken in the mid-1950s, leading the site to suggest that it could have torpedoed Kennedy’s presidential run. ....

********UNQUOTE*******


It says the pic was not an "exclusive" because it appeared somewhere else before. It doesn't say that the pic isn't what it appears to be. Then it says it might have been taken in the 1950s. It doesn't say it wasn't.

The bottom line is that stories about JFK, SMATHERS, EFK, and Chris DODD being pantless in reserved dining rooms have been known for ages, which support that the pic and its contents COULD have happened. Why doesn't the article SAY that it didn't (if it didn't)?

It would be more impactful if it DIDN'T happen, than if it did.

[mogster]

9. If it had been a fake against a republican politician

Would it ever had gotten as far as this? I doubt it.

[Javaman]

10. So a room full of twenty something ego maniac glad handing slim reporters

who wouldn't don't know history from the correct spelling of Kennedy, were duped?

I find that hard to believe, HARD TO BELIEVE.

[sharp_stick]

12. "journalism"? LOL

To hear some hack at TMZ yammer about journalism is just fucking priceless, at least it would be if the assholes at CNN weren't giving them more air time than Amanpour.

[phasma ex machina]

13. Stupid is as stupid does. M$M's lack of intelligence confirmed yet again.