Now, That's a Big Story

0 Comments | Insight on the News, Sept 25, 2000 | by John Elvin

Wire editors for ABC stations received this bulletin from their Southwestern bureau citing a report by affiliate KFAA in Dallas: "Al Gore arrested today for killing small child with his teeth." The bulletin promised "various shots of Gore with dead body" and comment from police in Austin, where the alleged incident purportedly occurred.

Quite a story, but within five, minutes the wire came alive again with a message from ABC headquarters in New York marked "Urgent" and demanding (in quadruplicate) a "Mandatory Kill," meaning that the Gore story was to be treated as if it had never existed. As a memo from an ABC executive to the NewsBlues site on the Internet explained, the bulletin was the result of a practice session gone awry. It was concocted by a newly hired free-lancer who was fooling around and hit the wrong computer key, sending the fabricated alert far and wide. "This free-lancer was fired immediately," the exec noted.