Dateline: Journalism School (Outtakes Opinion)

We noticed that the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette continues to misuse datelines in its news sections. The D-G’s sports department doesn’t seem to have this problem, but the statewide daily’s news division is apparently under the misconception that it’s appropriate to use a city designation at the beginning of a story even if its reporters didn’t compile the information at that location.

We, along with the Dallas Morning News, The New York Times and Washington Post, to name a few, contend that the practice of datelining stories from places where reporters have not physically compiled information is misleading to readers.

“Our policy regarding datelines is you have to be there,” said Lois Reed, editor of the Dallas Morning News. When asked if her newspaper would ever dateline a story from a city such as “Kabul, Afghanistan,” without having reporters on the ground there, Reed said, “Never.”

In addition, the “Associated Press Stylebook,” the bible for daily newspaper style, says a newspaper can use a dateline and reporter byline together at the beginning of a story “only if the reporter was in the datelined community to gather the information reported.”

David Bailey, the D-G’s managing editor, previously spoke to the Business Journal about the daily newspapers inconsistent policy of datelining stories from places where elements of the stories may have originated. Bailey said the D-G believes its practice is less confusing for readers.

“I just don’t think the reader makes that connection to the physical whereabouts of the reporter,” Bailey said.

We contend that the physical eyes, ears, nose and hands of a reporter are exactly what give readers the best connection to any story. Knowing that a reporter actually chased a story all the way to Kabul or Kansas lends credibility to the reporting.

That is, for newspapers with datelines readers can trust.