Ed Pilkington wrote, " The tentacle-like growth of clandestine advertising in American TV shows in the form of product placement has taken another controversial step with the introduction of McDonald's products into regional news programmes.

"Several TV outlets have begun to sell the fast-food giant the right to place cups of its iced coffee on to the desks of news anchors as they present morning current affairs shows...

Pilkington continued, "The New York Times has reported that similar deals to place McDonald's products in news shows are up and running in TV stations in Chicago, Seattle and New York." » more

People have wondered if Robert Capa 's iconic image is fake or real?

Thousands of negatives from Robert Capa's work during the Spanish Civil War have resurfaced and offer new evidence.

Richard Brooks wrote: "Field Marshal Montgomery arranged for 'action' scenes to be filmed well behind the frontline and before the battle of El Alamein began in October 1942. Footage of the D-Day landings in 1944 was doctored using film recorded during the invasion rehearsal at Slapton Sands in Devon..."

So what about that famous Spanish civil war photo by Robert Capa ?

Brooks stated, "It is one of the most famous war photographs and also one of the most contentious. For decades many have argued that Robert Capa's picture of a soldier being shot in the Spanish civil war was faked."

He continued, "The elements which give it such universal meaning also make it vulnerable to fakery claims. There are few clues to the location and no one is pictured other than the falling man whose face is blurred. There is no blood and no sign of an entry wound. The photograph also raises questions as to how Capa happened to be next to him at the moment he was shot." » more

Even though the negative of the famed image was never found, according to Randy Kennedy, the recent discovery of the "original sequence showing all the images taken before and after the shot, could end the debate."

In August, The New York Times published an unusual correction. Ryan Tate, Gawker reported the newspaper "had erroneously called Republican presidential candidate John McCain a 'fighter pilot' on Sunday and in "numerous other Times articles the past dozen years."

Tate said, " Wow, a correction that spans more than a decade! When McCain was famously shot down over Vietnam, he was flying his usual plane, a small jet aircraft known as the A-4 Skyhawk, which the Times now refers to as an ' attack aircraft'...

"The Times should not be so easily cowed, particularly when 12 years worth of coverage is at stake. The newspaper no doubt did its own investigation, and 'attack aircraft' is a more appropriate term for the A-4 than 'fighter.' ­ It's not the "F-4" after all ­ but there's no need to backtrack from using a perfectly accurate alternative name." » more

Editors note: The obvious question is not answered by the NY Times in the correction : "Why now, after 12 years?" StinkyJournalism thinks that this unusual correction provides a good example of why, ethically, sources for corrections should be cited by The Times and explanations given about exactly how corrections came to be made.

John Trenchard reported the photograph that The Independent used to illustrate America's 2008 "great depression" on its April 1, 2008 front-page,  was, in fact, a Getty Images photo taken in 2005.  Trenchard said, "Turns out that they weren't queueing in 2008 - they were queueing in 2005'" ...whoops!" » more

Mainstream media (MsM) has tried to blame bloggers for the publication of a false rumor that made Apple stocks tumble.

James Callan, Bloomberg.com, wrote, "CNN's plunge into online citizen- journalism backfired yesterday when the cable-news outlet posted what turned out to be a bogus report claiming that Apple Inc. Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs had suffered a heart attack."

Callen continued, "Apple shares fell as much as 5.4 percent after the post on CNN's iReport.com and rebounded after the Cupertino, California- based company said the story was false. CNN quickly disabled the user's account and said it tried unsuccessfully to contact the individual."

However, Greg Sandoval , CNet, reported the real story. It wasn't bloggers fault. "The real reason it [the fraudulent story] gained traction is the reporting of it on mainstream blog sites."

Sandoval continued. "What hasn't been widely circulated yet is that iReport was not the first place the fake story was sent. Arnold Kim, who operates the blog, MacRumors.com, wrote Friday that someone submitted the same rumor to his site using an anonymous IP address. Kim did some research on the rumor and decided it was a fake."

"Kim from MacRumors argues," Sandoval said, " that it was SAI's post that gave the rumor credibility and spooked Wall Street. ' The (iReport) story has been picked up by numerous sites as a failure of citizen journalism,' Kim wrote. ' It's nothing of the sort. The real reason it gained traction is the reporting of it on mainstream blog sites.' "

The time line proves MsM --not bloggers-- gave an unverified rumor oxygen by re-printing it from a mainstream media owned site--CNN iReports. CNN benefits from iReports, but unlike CNN employees' content,  they claim they have no responsibly for accuracy. Bloomberg quoted CNN's response to the debacle : "CNN has no plans to review its procedures for placing content on the iReport Web site."

Leonard Witt, PJNet blogger, reported, "that an interview I conducted in July also challenged CNN iReport’s filtering. The interview entitled CNN iReport Superstar Tells All — Maybe Too Much contains this quote from iReport superstar Grayson Daughters:"

" The user can generate whatever they want to. It’s now up to the consumer to decide if they want to USE that media. Once you get into the user-generated realm, journalism ethics are going to very hard to apply to every user out there."