Biz: CBS Sports fires blogger who flubbed Joe Paterno death report
- Bad sourcing plus poor timing: Adam Jacobi took to Twitter earlier this afternoon to reveal that CBS Sports — which ran with a erroneous story that Joe Paterno had died hours before he actually did, based on a single tweet from a student Web site, originally linked to and otherwise unsourced (then retracted it, naming the source and initially refusing to take full credit for the error) — fired him over the incident. “In the end, CBS had to let me go for the Paterno story going out the way it did,” Jacobi wrote. “and I understand completely. Thanks, everyone, for reading.” The Washington Post’s Erik Wemple calls the move classy on Jacobi’s part, and an important line in the sand for CBS: “Not only does CBSSports.com put on notice its employees that multiple sourcing matters,” Wemple writes,”it puts on notice the entire industry.” While we don’t necessarily think Jacobi should’ve been fired, CBS made a good move, as it initially looked like they would let the sword fall onto Onward State. It would’ve been better if they took credit right away. (photo via Flickr user audreyjm529) source
