This column appeared in the October 1997 issue of The American Journalism Review.

As online news matures, we’re beginning to see Web publications evolve into true news channels rather than warmed-over digital versions of their pulp parents.

While that term “channels” may seem strange when applied to an online newspaper, a year from now millions of us will be getting the news from channels we’ve chosen on our personal computers. Already, the New York Times and ABC News are the premium news channels on America Online. In August, Netscape released its new Netcaster browser, which will “push,” or “Webcast,” more than 700 channels of information from such sources as USA Today, CNNfn and CBS SportsLine. Microsoft, which will release its new browser this fall, has signed up the Web editions of the New York Times and Wall Street Journal.

As the online news world begins to cover news as it happens rather than once a day, are there risks that journalists with ink-stained backgrounds face in moving toward a broadcast model of Net news? Ted Koppel, anchor of ABC’s “Nightline,” thinks so. In his first interview on the subject of the Internet, Koppel has some words of warning for online reporters eager to reinvent the wheel of journalism.

“Reporting is not really about, ‘Let’s see who can get the first information to the public as quickly as possible,’ ” Koppel says. “It’s about: ‘Let’s see who can get the information to the public — as soon as we have had a chance to make sure the information is accurate, to weigh it against what we know, to put it in some sort of context.’ Only when you’re satisfied as a professional journalist that you’ve got the story and the facts have been verified, only then can you go with it.

“If we are moving into an era in which reporters are pressured to get it online before we have a chance to check and edit the material — if speed is the main criteria of putting something online — then I think that’s dangerous. Ultimately, a journalist has a responsibility to separate truth from rumor.”

Some have suggested that the news is alive and ever-changing, but Koppel calls that “a collosal copout. It suggests that all we have to do is put any information we collect on the air because we can never hope to have it all anyway. No, there are several threshholds you have to cross before you go with it.”

We’ve seen competitive pressures in local TV news markets, where being first is often more important than being accurate. Does Koppel see a similar future for online news?

“There’s always going to be room for the outlet that says, `We’re not worried about geting it first, we’re about getting it right.’ As a news consumer, I’m more interested in the quality of the information I’m receiving. Whether you’re the New York Times, or Wall Street Journal, or Washington Post, or Los Angeles Times — or whatever your news organization — you have to maintain your quality while you’re being faster and better than the other guy on the block. But if you succumb to competitive pressures and you’re willing to sacrifice quality and context and completeness, I think that’s going to rear up and bite us in the ass.”

Bruce Koon, managing editor of the Mercury Center in San Jose, sounds a similar note of caution.

“There’s something to be learned from TV and the wire services in getting news headlines and summaries up on our Web sites,” he says. “But this rush to get the information out before it’s had a chance to settle and get some perspective — TV and technology have contributed to that rush to judgment, which hurts journalism and harms society in general.

“In TV, you’re dead if all your competitors have the story and you’re holding it back. On the Web, readers can find lots of sites reporting speculation and rumor. But then they say, ‘OK, now I want to know what really happened.’ They want information that has been vetted through all the usual checks and balances, and that only happens with a little bit of time.”

The Merc Center is one of the few online newspapers that covers breaking news with more than just wire service reports. Beat reporters from the Mercury News or rewrite editors from the Merc Center report on a range of timely stories, from high-technology business news and local sports to high-profile disaster news. The Mercury Center is now moving into coverage of Bay Area news, with multiple deadlines throughout the day — Koon calls them “scheduled news programs” — rather than a continual, around-the-clock deadline.

“A newspaper can afford to be a little more circumspect,” he says. “We don’t mind being beaten on a story. I’d much rather get it up there only after we feel comfortable with it.”

Amen to that.

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Immediacy has never been a strong suit of Web news among the mainstream media. But in the coming months, dozens of content providers — from giants like the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal to small-town weeklies and dailies — will team up with Netscape, Microsoft, PointCast and other push-news services to broadcast their own “channels” of breaking news right to a user’s desktop.

New forms of media like PointCast seem to be ushering in an age of instantaneous news on the Internet. What lessons do print journalists need to learn from their broadcast brethren?

Koppel: First of all, it’s not totally analogous to what I do or what my colleagues Peter Jennings or Dan Rather do. We have a deadline in the same way that my newspaper colleagues have a daily deadline. Going on live is not something we do most of the time. Now, let me ask you, is there such a thing as an online deadline?

Sure, it’s continual, around the clock.

The deadline is when you’re satisfied as a professional journalist that you’ve got the story, the facts have been verified, and then you go with it.

What I thought you were going to ask about was the issue of all the dubious news reports floating around on the Internet. One of the problems that I see — and not much has been made of it — is that the credibility of any news report depends on the reputation of the source. To the degree you don’t know the source of the material, that needs to be taken with a healthy dose of skepticism. There is all manner of dubious information on the Web, and whether it ends up in the hands of Pierre Salinger, who gives it more credibility than it deserves, or whether it leaches into the public consciousness in some other manner, a journalist, as an editor, has a responsibility to ultimately separate truth from rumor.

The Internet’s immediacy seems to be one of its most attractive features. It gives people a greater sense of participation and immediacy —

Or a greater sense of paranoia about their government and the press and coverups and so on.

Some of the proponents of push media say that reporters shouldn’t report stories just once a day, they should break stories all day long by printing what they know when they know it and then updating it as additional information becomes available. Are there perils in reporting information the minute you get it?

Of course there are, and that goes back to making sure that we know who the reporter is. The main function of reporting lies in the sorting and assisting, the editing, the putting into context. Reporting is not really about, `Let’s see who can get the first information to the public as quickly as possible.’ It should be about `Let’s see who can get the first information to the public as quickly as possible — as soon as we have had a chance to make sure the information is accurate, to weigh it against what we know, to put it in some sort of context.’ Only after all that is done, then, when one of us goes on the air live with a breaking news story, we try to do that in an ad lib form with whatever reservoir of information we have on a particular story.

Take an example from a few years ago, a plane hijacking in the Middle East. Peter Jennings happens to have had a long history of reporting on events from the Middle East, and he is able to tap into that well of knowledge to provide viewers with context and perspective. Now, if we are now moving into an era in which reporters are pressured to get it online before we have a chance to check and edit the material — if speed is the main criteria of putting something online — then I think that’s dangerous.

Whether you have one or 78 deadlines a day in your online organization, I’ve got no problem with updating the news continually. But where we need to be cautious is that we don’t get pushed beyond that point into what I call ‘McThought,’ or the journalistic equivalent of fast food. There has been a tendency in network television for certain news executives to be watching a bank of television screens and seeing a news report on a competing news program and saying, `Let’s go with that,’ even though we haven’t had a chance to verify the information. Now, that’s probably not applicable to the online world.

Perhaps it’s too early to tell. I wanted to ask about the suggestion I’ve heard from some broadcast journalists that the news is alive, that no story is ever finally written —

That’s a colossal cop-out.

Why do you say that?

Well, it suggests that all we have to do is put any information we collect on the air because we can never hope to have it all anyway. No, there are several thresholds you have to cross before you put it on the line and go with it.

Such as?

Like getting your facts straight. Let’s take an example. A bulletin breaks on the wire. All you know is that a plane has gone down over Pittsburgh. Do you go on the air with that?

I’ve seen those kinds of news bulletins.

I don’t think you have enough information to go on the air with it yet. I have no right to terrify every person who has a family or a friend flying in the Eastern corridor. You need to at least narrow it down. What is the airline? What is the embarkation point? What is the destination? And even then, I’d like to know, are there any survivors?

ABCnews.com just recently launched on the Net. As more and more news organizations join the fray, isn’t it inevitable that Net news will become ratings-driven, with a kind of tabloid mindset where the premium is on getting the story first rather than getting it right?

That depends on what you’re buying. I don’t think that `Inside Edition,’ or any of the lighter, frothier so-called news and entertainment shows on the air has much to do with `Nightline.’ It’s a different audience. We’re looking for different things. But there’s always going to be room for the outlet that says, `We’re not worried about getting it first, we’re about getting it right.’

As a news consumer, I’m more interested in the quality of the information I’m receiving. Whether you’re the New York Times, or Wall Street Journal, or Washington Post, or Los Angeles Times — or whatever your particular news organization — you have to maintain your quality while you’re being faster and better than the other guy on the block. But if your competition reaches the point where you’re willing to sacrifice quality and context and completeness, I think that’s going to rear up and bite us in the ass.

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