it’s quite a strange speech. early on he announces how anyone with a camera is now able to submit to reuters as “super-stringers.” when i heard that this was reuters plan a week ago i wondered, how does reuters verify these peoples’ truthfulness and intentions? will they now be using idf handouts or photos from the hezbollah guys who arranged those walking tours? how will they know if they are or are not? perhaps actually knowing the person who is working for you is important afterall.
it’s confounding in that he can say that reuters learnt its lesson with the cloning incident, and he states: “At Reuters we did a lot of soul-searching. How could this have happened and what can we do to prevent it happening again? I talked at length with Reuters senior editors and we agreed a plan.”
apparently that plan is to let anyone regardless of their professionalism , reputation or affiliation submit photos. if reuters was too inundated with a stringer’s work to notice a sloppy photoshop job how will they be able to detect similar manipulations when thousands more photos come in from people they do not know?
i think glocer is in a though spot and it doesn’t seem as if he’s strong or honest enough to face the dilemma he’s in. he asks a series of questions: “How do you know what information to trust? What information is accurate? That the images you see are genuine. The trust of your audience is fragile, something we know well at Reuters.”
his answer is to talk at length about firing hajj, removing all of his images from the system and firing the editor who signed off on hajj’s submissions. like rumsfeld blaming everyone for abu ghraib, all the little guys are blamed and fired, meanwhile glocer continues on a misguided course by turning to flickr for reuters next crop of super stringers.
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