When Journalists Blog: The Biggest Little Crime Blog

Actually, if you read Jaclyn O’Malley’s other blog posts it is a style she uses almost all the time. Is it really any different than political bloggers writing asshats and stuff?

If anything, I think it is an outlet for her. I believe she did the recent big RGJ Meth story, as well as the usual crime beat. Trust me, if your 8-10 hour day is constantly filled with writing about criminals, liars, molesters and druggies you are going to become cynical. I’ve yet to meet a crime beat reporter who wasn’t.

It sounds like she was assigned a ride-along for this post and got to see the usual “that’s not mine” from repeat offenders.

She does use “allege” though.

It fails the test of acceptable journalism badly, that is obvious. But what is ethical in blogging? So far, the rules are limited to a) no typing in all caps and b) no broken links.

As a blog, this is not unacceptable. Though it’s not good either. Blogs are essentially the Letters to the Editor on crack. (Pun intended.) We may hope that the sum of our work rises to the level of the respondents to The Economist. Usually, however, we just make the The Nevada Appeal look well proofread.

So the question we should put to the faculty at Reynolds is this: Do ethics require journalists to forfeit their right to public expression of opinion? Follow up question: If they are not so required, do ethics allow a news outlet to provide–perhaps require–a space for such expression by their reporters?

Dang, even in the last of the wild west in Elko, would you ever see a chatty little report like this. Is this the product of a crime beat reporter fixated on their beat and not life outside of work?

BTW, glad to see ya!!

Dang, even in the last of the wild west in Elko, would you ever see a chatty little report like this. Is this the product of a crime beat reporter fixated on their beat and no life outside of work?

BTW, glad to see ya!!

Sarcasm takes a special slant to write well or else it just comes out, well…slanted. There are a lot of problems with this piece aside from the writing. I know … it’s the RGJ. That’s a start. It’s a journalistic sandbox full of cat turds and wanna-be cat turds.

She seems to find something universally hilarious about $40 worth of crack, and, for that matter, black people. Probably because she’s never been around either one in real life, I’m guessing. Where’s Cory Farley when you need him? Now that’s a guy who can write the pants off a $40 crack buy.

Sarcasm takes a special slant to write well or else it just comes out, well…slanted. There are a lot of problems with this piece aside from the writing. I know … it’s the RGJ. That’s a start. It’s a journalistic sandbox full of cat turds and wanna-be cat turds.

She seems to find something universally hilarious about $40 worth of crack, and, for that matter, black people. Probably because she’s never been around either one in real life, I’m guessing. Where’s Cory Farley when you need him? Now that’s a guy who can write the pants off a $40 crack buy.

The Man - she uses the word “allegedly” in a post-modern ironic way. Like doing the quotation marks gesture every time you say it. If she did this on television, she’d have been pilloried.

Myrna - I’ll agree that standards is a better test than ethics. If what was written had been published in the news section of the website, it would have been unacceptable. If what has written had been posted anonymously on a private blog we’d have never bothered to read it.

So, if a Newspaper of Record has a responsibility to its Community, to whom does a given blog have responsibility and what does that responsibility entail? Is there such a thing as a Blog of Record?

It’s almost as if the RGJ blogs can’t win. Ray Hagar is hammered because he is “allegedly” dull with his blog, while O’Malley is raked over the coals for her breezy style.

One of the big gripes you always hear from some bloggers about the MSM is that they don’t take a position or are too passive in reporting. Perhaps O’Malley is just doing her small part in changing that perception.

What O’Malley is reporting on her blog is the real story. lets face it, you cannot really write about the truth all the time as people cannot deal with the truth. O’Malley is forced to write about the politically correct version of what she sees or people will backlash as you have seen by the author of this question. If you cannot handle the truth then stick to the canned stories that make you feel all warm inside. O’Malley is the first reporter to tell it like it reeally is on the street. I find her accounts in her blog the only real stories on the crime page. It cracks me up when I here people “outraged” by something so real. Try driving down 4th Street once in awhile and you will see she is corrrect. This concerned person should stick to the comics as real life seems to be too much for him to handle.

Wait, just cause they use blogger and call it a blog doesn’t make it a blog. I saw the RGJ logo up top it’s billed as a RGJ feature, therefore it IS professional journalism.

Case in point. 10+ comments on the blogabouttheblog and only 2 on the “blog.” Meaning none of you consider it a blog. Why don’t you point the criticism the source?

-M

It is the only reason that I read that casino friendly kiss ass rag.

I think it’s awesome. The RGJ can actually be real because they don’t have to worry about offending their advertisers. Ha Ha!

To Myrna the Minx: Yes you are over reacting. Blogs have no standards. They are nortorious for that. O’Malley, however, is a highly professional journalist. I have known her for years and she is careful to contain her news to just that: news. Blogs, on the other hand, allow for expressions of opinion, much like an editorial page. They are not news. Just opinion. One cannot work around, among and below the curb level with the low lifes that prey upon our communities without growing hardened, sometimes callous and always skeptical. I find O’Malley’s news informative and her blogs insightful. Two different things, if you want to spend some time thinking about it. So there you go! You are, in my opinion, over reacting! Just read and enjoy!

That site is hysterical! That reporter is saying what I was thinking reading about all that filth in Reno. But I guess if you’re sympathetic to criminals you’d be offended by it, like you obviously are. I’m telling everyone to read the crime blog!

Gee Minx, why are you being so hard on the crime beat writer? I’ve enjoyed reading her stuff for some time in the paper and thought the addition of the blog was great. I had no idea that any of the stuff she blogs about happens in Reno. I kind of like the graphic dirty truth that you would not get anywhere else.
Obviously she knows what she’s talking about because she investigates, researches and talks to these people. I’m sure you’d have some opinions, too, on these dirtbags if you wrote about them non-stop instead of your political commentary and bagging on the Reno rag and it being lame.
As far as this supposed ethics problem you’re talking about, i think you’re just not used to the journalist blogger. If you read her other posts, most of these criminals have been convicted and sentenced, so it’s not like they are presumed innocent. I see all the “allegeds” in there, too. If you read her stories in the printed version, they are night and day. Fair and balanced. Blogs are not the “newspaper” but as the online world continues to increase in popularity, newspapers are adjusting and blogs are part of it.
Lighten up, Minx. It’s a damn good blog, funnier than hell and you know it. I think you owe Ms. O’Malley an apology.

There are usually two types of crime beat reporters, those who are usually take a skeptical with law enforcement knowing they too have thier own motivations to get the reporter to represent them in a good light. These people tend to burn out pretty fast and are not given many leads or tips to help with thier stories.

The other type likes to “buddy up” with cops, becoming their friends, loinizing police exploits and representing all “criminals”* in a very nafarious light. It’s kind of a high to be around the power that police have and excitement of police work, so it’s hard not to develop that kind of complex. Police tend to throw these types a lot of bones since they’re representing them in a good light.

It seems to me that Ms. O’Malley has been getting a little too cozy with the people she reports on. I think the whole business of journalist bloggers is something to be suspicious at best. This may a good venue for the reporter in question to “blow off steam” but it is being published under the banner of the RGJ and just look at how people are debating this whole thing, it’s putting her credibility in question for some people.

*remember folks, these people have not been convicted of anything yet. I wonder what kind of chance they have of a fair trial now that they’ve thier mugshots put up next to O’Malley describing them as the scum of the earth.

Newsrooms are pressure cookers these days (not that they ever weren’t, just for different reasons before). You have *no* idea of the insanity. I used to work in one, and I can tell you: it’s a barely controlled panic, with the suits grasping at straws and hoping they’ll find the magic formula that keeps the profits flowing and advertisers from fleeing. Infotainment suddenly doesn’t look like such a bad idea after all. Cut the woman some slack; she’s just trying to make a living. If you want to blame anything, direct your scorn at corporate media consolidation. That’s where the impetus for this stuff comes from.

I love the sarcasm and wonder why you worry about how these criminals, who are the worst of the worst, child molesters and drug addicts, are being portrayed in the media. If you or your children were the victim of one of these people, would you still worry about poor mr. criminal getting a fair trial? She is saying what 90% of the public thinks about these people, but unfortunately, it’s the 10% of the liberals that voice their bizarre opinion on defending these type of people.

I can see I am coming into this discussion a little late, but here’s my two cents.
Here’s one of LA Times’ Crime Blogs http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/homicidereport/ pretty much without any opinion, might as well be just a blotter and not a blog. To me, RGJ’s is more interesting to read.
I did find that one post you pointed out a bit over the top, however normally her stuff is right on and often comedic. It’s the only place we can track the antic and adventures of Leonard Spotswood!

What’s your proble? we get a reporter who is not afraid to tell it like it is and that offends you. Why is it that freedom of speach and freedom of the press is only supported by you librals when it is politicaly correct. Get over your self. Jon

“O’Malley is the first reporter to tell it like it reeally is on the street.”

Jesus Creeping christ! That would be hilarious if I didn’t think that guy was serious…

Yes..groundbreaking work for sure.

You wouldn’t last ten minutes in the neighborhood I grew up in.

I know. Sarcasm dies like Bermuda grass out here…

Myrna’s right. The strength of newspapers vs TV vs the Web/blogosphere is journalistic standards. Usually print journalists have training that informs their judgement about how to report the news, presumption of innocence (although open to exceptions when they see a crime first-hand), and the ethical boundary between fact and opinion. They are also part of a culture that has standards evolved over 100-plus years from political rags, to the yellow journalism of Hearst, to the introspective, balanced coverage that (most) mainstream papers practice today.

It’s mostly with noble intentions that newspapers try to promote blogging, and their reporters as bloggers. It’s more transparent and gives non-journalists perspective into the newsgathering process. But newspapers have (or should have) high standards, and they should be applied to their Web operations — if they wouldn’t put it in print, they shouldn’t put it in HTML.

… this coming from a former crime reporter. And yes, I’m cynical. Find me a crime reporter who isn’t.

I am confused. The blog in question here reads like the order of events that occurred on this police sting where she seems to have seen with her own eyes what was happening and listened to the crooks after they got busted. The only editorializing I saw was the wondering about teen drug dealers and saying the pimp was a scrawny twerp. So what exactly is this big ethics controversy? Did anyone read the original story about this sting that ran in the paper? They were pretty similar.
For me, a reporter blogger is more credible than some totally anonymous person blogging about something they read about or saw on TV because the reporter actually knows first hand what’s going on and has done the leg work to get information. The person who talked about the crime writer’s credibility is totally off base. If you read the posts, she either attributes the information to court records, interviews, police or reports.
I have to say this is one of the most unique and entertaining blogs I have read. I’ve also learned a ton about crime. Thanks crime writer!

The writer of crime blog is honest and has a sense of humor when needed. Thank god! When you see women being picked up just about every day while her john is watching or read about a pediphile getting arrested for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th time…it’s frustrating. She brings awareness how often children are being victimized too. Way more than most of us think.
I hope the writer of Crime Blog continues to write the way she does and continues to post their ugly mugs too.

It is supposed to be a “blog” which (so I thought), invokes editorializing.

I never knew the blog was there until Minx posted about the city’s sad pathetic drunk Spotswood.

I appreciate the RGJ crime blog as sometimes you can forget what truly sick F***s there are in the world and who might be hanging in Downtown Reno.

Sure the author is over-the-top sometimes with the comments….but it IS portrayed as a “blog”

I give Ray a hard time because he doesn’t quite understand the blogosphere. This interview was quite enlightening to what he thinks of blogs. “recationary media” and that they “don’t ad breaking news.” Perhaps that’s why he hasn’t updated his in over a month?

*reactionary

UpNorth,

What part of the blogosphere do you inhabit? Most blogs are reactionary. If you took away links to an MSM story your average blog would be either a blank page or some woman writing about her cats.

Whether it is because of a lack of time, initiative or skill, most bloggers don’t create, they regurgitate. And what they spew out is alleged witticisms wrapped around the work of the Hagars of the world.

So to paraphrase the great Larry Holmes, and we know how you just love Ray’s sports analogies, “UpNorth, you couldn’t carry Hagar’s jockstrap.”

I can’t agree more with your take on O’malley. She’s a hack, plain and simple, and I’ve made it clear on her blog before.

I see the blogsphere where:

~ABC’s The Note Blog breaks the Mark Foley Scandal

~DailyKos pushes media coverage and support of Ned Lamont

~Up North breaks the story about the ASUN Senator threats

~The Gleaner breaks Titus’s endorsement of Hillary

~FOX News regularly takes headlines and stories from the Drudge Report

~Downtown Makeover Dude holds the Reno City Council’s feet to the fire

Most citizen blogs don’t have the resources to break news but sometimes they do. Professional media blogs like the one Hagar could create have those resources. Inside Nevada Politics could become the place for the latest breaking political news in Northern Nevada - he has the contacts. But, because he views blogs as reactionary, that type of transformation is unlikely to occur.

She’s to journalism what John Mark Carr is to pop music.