I personally think anyone who does PR is a hippo

Nature is full of wonderful little phenomena. Take the red-billed oxpecker for example. It flies around until it finds a big mammal covered in ticks and then proceeds to clean up things with the efficiency of a maid at the Ritz.

The hippo gets clean and free of ticks, while the red-billed oxpecker gets lunch and protection from the big hulking hippo.

 

Image Courtesy of Oregon Budget Traveler

They call this symbiosis, and I see it every day working in a newsroom between journalists working towards a deadline and PR people who have to spread the word. 

Which one is the hippo and which one is the little bird really depends on whose side you're on. The fact remains however that media releases sent out en masse by public relations professionals are increasingly becoming an integral part of the everyday news bulletin.

 

Richard Aedy stated in a 2012 media report that the heavy reliance on media releases was journalism's dirty little secret, and that "once you take out crime, disasters, sport and firemen rescuing kittens from stormwater drains, most of what’s left begins life as a media release."

There are more than a few reasons why this is the case.

Firstly, it's easy. As a journalist trying to meet daily or even hourly deadlines, taking news that land in your lap can only be too easy. 

Let's keep in mind that PR practitioners and journalists are being trained in the same Universities, often doing the same courses and learning the same techniques.

When a journalist sees a press release written in a concise manner selling a point, the temptation to simply add a byline and publish to meet a deadline is immense. And this is speaking from personal experience.

Secondly, if you ever want to speak to someone in a position of power, be it a politician or a prop for the Newcastle Knights, there will be a caveat. As Aedy states, to get to the source, a journalist will "have to deal with someone whose job it is to craft how their boss appears in the media." 

But perhaps the most telling reason as to why media releases have engrained themselves into news bulletins is the simple fact that there are just more PR professionals out there for journalists to fact check.

What does this mean for investigative journalism?

Clearly, newsrooms are shrinking and platoons of PR people are growing. The 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill provided a clear picture of the times, with more PR people present at the press conference to give answers than there were journalists to ask questions.

Less personnel in the newsroom means less time to investigate stories thoroughly in the non-stop race to get a bulletin or a story up in time.

This does not make investigative journalism obselete or any less important.

Indeed, it makes it all the more critical for journalists to be on their guard and navigate the minefield of press releases unloaded on them each day with poise.

Media releases are the seed capital for a story, something to build on and explore. 

Unfortunately, journalists have just started serving up seeds - repackaged press releases with no insight into the issue.

Investigative journalism isn't dead by any stretch of the imagination, but if journalists want to keep the vital tradition alive in their own newsroom, perhaps its time to pick up the phone and make some calls the next time they open a press release.