As the legions of eagle-eyed media critics and fact-checkers grow, newspapers often promise more "transparency." Footnoting in certain newspaper articles has been used online on occasion in recent years, but rarely in print. The Dallas Morning News in recent days embraced the idea in a big way. "Mary Ellen's will: The battle for 4949 Swiss" is a four-part series based on Mary Ellen Bendtsen, a Texas-version of Miss Havisham, a feeble eccentric who tries to hold on to her decrepit Dallas mansion. It ran Aug. 13 through Aug. 20 and it contained 132 eye-glazing annotations. ... ... In print, the notes are located after each chapter. Online, a reader can actually click on a footnote number, which triggers a pop-up window filled with meticulous sourcing. ... ... From time to time, papers have used footnotes especially when writers veer into a literary voice. Chip Scanlan, a faculty member at The Poynter Institute who has written on this subject, said the first time he noticed detailed source notes was in The Wall Street Journal. The paper ran a story on Oct. 11, 2001 about five people caught in the Twin Towers on 9/11. ...... The rise of footnotes, Scanlan explained, is a way for papers to ward off questions about potential fabrications, especially since beginning in the late 1990s a whole slew of reporters were exposed as phonies. More of this article...Search Google News for more quotes by Chip Scanlan...
