Regardless, kudos to Shory for standing his ground while every other ‘journalist’ in the room rolled over. What a pathetic display. Forget the whole issue re competitive advantage, any self-respecting reporter should’ve immediately recognized this as manipulation and walked. I certainly hope these aren’t the same reporters who cover Knoxville city government meetings. God knows what we’re missing out on if they are…

Fortunately, this whole ridiculous adventure falls under the category ‘entertainment’, and not ‘hard news’.

Can anyone provide names of all the key players in this clip?

Thanks for posting this. I enjoyed watching the clip, and reading your analysis and the comments that followed. It was eye-opening for all the reasons already mentioned, but I never would have known about it had you not drawn my attention to it.

(On a totally unrelated note, I found out recently that my little bro just worked with you on a project in OR and really enjoyed it. Small world, as I started reading your blog last year.)

That says so, so much.

The objection of this news director, Shorey, wasn’t about whether something was “unedited and uncontrolled.” It was about whether it was on videotape or not. Because he wanted everything on videotape, he deprived the other reporters there of information, because they cared about what Kiffin said — not about whether he said it on videotape.

It is amazing to me that this guy’s actions are spun as some kind of journalistic bravery. They were not. It was stupid television parochialism, pure and simple.

Yes, but at least we got to see that 30 seconds unedited and uncontrolled. If you keep giving in to the demands of government officials and other VIPs, you end up with slobbering interviews in Vanity Fair and unsourced “ranking administration offical” quotes in the Washington Post.

You might get a lot more words, but I’m not sure I’d call it information.

Shory’s argument is the whole news conference needs to be videotaped. No problem there, I’d expect a TV guy to say that. But because of his insistence, the coach, Lane Kiffin, agreed to speak for only 30 seconds (according to the Tennessee minder guy) instead of longer if the camera was turned off.

If I’m there as a newspaper or radio reporter, I’d be pissed and I’d have every right to be. I’d be pissed at Kiffin for setting these conditions, but I’d also be pissed at Shory. Because of what he’s doing, the press and public will be getting less information out of Kiffin, and that is the whole point of being there. But to Shory, unless it’s on video, it doesn’t exist, even if you have audio without video or notes. That is a TV person’s self-serving world. It does NOT serve the interest of people who want more information than a 30-second statement, which is what Kiffin was going to give unless his conditions were agreed to.

To recap: Yes, Kiffin’s conditions sucked. Yes, he deserves to be pilloried for imposing them. But you have to deal with the situation as you find it. Would a reporter at this news conference choose less information, with all of the information being on videotape, or more — perhaps a lot more — information, with all of it recorded and some of it not being on videotape? Any reporter, except Shory I guess, would take the second option.

Shory isn’t defending some high journalistic principle. In fact, he’s being dishonest by equating “not on video” with “off the record.”

You want to have this guy as your hero, you’re welcome to it. But as a result of what he’s doing, you’re getting less information instead of more. That’s the fact of the matter.

I agree with Katie. Bill Shory gets my respect for standing up to the whole lot of ‘em. And thank God for blogs and bloggers. If we had to depend on J-school grads for our news, we’d be well and truly screwed.

The other reporters were cool with the limits because it didn’t affect them. This time.