This article is part of the Star鈥檚 trust initiative, where we take readers behind the scenes of our journalism.
On Tuesday, the 海角社区官网Star announced it was formally a member of the Trust Project, a global collaboration between news organizations aimed at fostering greater reader trust.
Over the noon-hour that same day, members of the Star鈥檚 trust committee, formed more than a year ago to improve transparency of our journalism, held an 鈥淎sk Me Anything鈥 (AMA) on Reddit. (Reddit is a discussion, rating and news aggregation website).
Here we present some edited highlights of the AMA, which saw more than two dozen questions from readers. Responses and questions have been cut for length and clarity. The full text of the AMA can be found on .
Q. You set up a paywall on your site. How can you expect people to trust you? 鈥 UnoriginallyGeneric
A. Irene Gentle, Editor of the 海角社区官网Star: Research has shown that Canadians are generally unaware of the financial challenges of the media industry ... At one point, advertising helped pay the bills of expensive journalism 鈥 and journalism is expensive. But Facebook and Google are taking up about three-quarters of the entire industry鈥檚 ad revenue. In other words, American tech giants are reaping the rewards of work done by Canadian media outlets, rather than the outlets actually doing the work. Also, good, responsible journalism is very expensive. It can take a reporter weeks at times to verify a key fact in a story. It looks, to the reader, like a sentence. But that sentence took multiple tools to verify and confirm.
Q. Journo student from St. Clair College here. How can we, as young journos, learn to get the public鈥檚 trust again? 鈥 cynicalPsionic
A. Diana Zlomislic, Investigative Reporter: As journalists, I think we all need to commit to being fair, impartial, accurate and transparent about our processes. When columnists provide opinion, it鈥檚 critical the reader or viewer knows that鈥檚 exactly what they鈥檙e getting. Diverse voices, even those we disagree with, are critical to free press. But the public needs to know there is a difference between opinion and reporting.
Q. With user commenting being cancelled, how do you know if parts of a story are not leaving out important details that you have overlooked? 鈥 GTA705
A. Robin Honderich, Senior Manager of Newsroom Audience Engagement: It鈥檚 always possible that a detail was missed in the production of any story. If this is the case, we provide many ways for readers to get in touch with us to let us know. Aside from our 鈥榗ontact us鈥 page, which provides a number of ways to get in touch but is not always easy to find, at the bottom of every article page ... is a Twitter link or email address for that staff member for extremely easy access.
Q. What are your thoughts on the era of the accusation of 鈥渇ake news鈥 that has become mainstream? Do you feel any news can be 鈥渇ake鈥 or is it all rooted in some degree of truth? 鈥 RationalSocialist
A. Brian Bradley, Digital Producer: I do believe in the big World Wide Web that some information can be 鈥渇ake,鈥 or at the very least, not corroborated, sourced, etc. The onus is on the news organization to follow practices that demonstrate the news is trusted. Is the story solid for sources, background?Who is the reporter, what have they reported? Is there an error-reporting system?
Q. I think that if you want to elicit trust in the reading public, you first need to hire writers who look like the city. 海角社区官网is a city engulfed with multi cultures, different ethnicities. How many Black, Asian, South American writers do you have on your staff? 鈥 tuxman06
A. Angela Mullins, Managing Editor (StarMetro): You make a very good point and one we are incredibly cognizant of in our newsrooms across the country. I was largely responsible for hiring new staff in our Western Canada newsrooms earlier this year as part of the StarMetro expansion and I can assure you there was a tremendous amount of attention paid to diversity in all stripes from gender to ethnicity to race. The reporting and management staff are a microcosm of the cities in which they tell stories.
Q. What actions is the Star Trust taking to stop promoting and legitimizing those who are spreading false information? 鈥 kofclubs
A. Kenyon Wallace, Investigative Reporter: In becoming a member of the Trust Project, the Star is agreeing to follow specific disclosure standards about how we do our journalism. The Trust Project calls these standards , which provide readers with information, such as mission statement, ownership structure, sources of funding, and journalistic standards.
The Trust project is funded by Craig Newmark Philanthropies, Google, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Democracy Fund and the Markkula Foundation.For more on the Trust Project indicators see Email your questions to trust@thestar.ca.
